Brave Search vs Exa: web search API comparison
Brave Search and Exa measured on the same three jobs: factual lookup, hard retrieval for coding agents, and multi-hop company search. Winner per task is in the table below.
Brave Search or Exa — winner per task
Best measured endpoint per vendor on each task. Modes stay separate rows in the tables below.
| Task | Brave Search | Exa | Measured winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Factual lookup (accuracy) | 94.0% | 99.3% | Exa |
| Hard retrieval (task completion, search-only) | 38.0% | 66.3% | Exa |
| Multi-hop (F1, search-only) | 28.0% | 45.4% | Exa |
Brave Search and Exa on company-news lookup
One query, one verifiable fact. 300 questions, max 10 results. Full factual lookup board →
| Axis | Brave Search | Exa | Measured winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Accuracy (extracted-answer) | 94.0% | 99.3% | Exa |
| Answer recall (AR@5) | 94.7% | 99.3% | Exa |
| Speed (mean latency) | 601ms | 398ms | Exa |
| Cost per 1,000 queries (list price) | $5.00 | $7.00 | Brave Search |
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | $ / 1k correct | Accuracy | AR@1 | AR@5 | Latency | Snippet tokens | Total $ | Official docs | Cost per 1,000 queries |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brave Searchweb search | POST /res/v1/llm/contextcount=10 | $5.32 | 94.0% | 81.0% | 94.7% | 601ms | 2,064 | $1.50 | Official docs | $5 / 1kSearch plan · LLM Context |
| 2 | Brave Searchweb search | GET /res/v1/web/searchcount=10 · result_filter=web | $5.36 | 93.3% | 79.3% | 91.7% | 630ms | 817 | $1.50 | Official docs | $5 / 1k |
| 3 | Exaweb search | POST /searchtype=fast | $7.05 | 99.3% | 95.0% | 99.3% | 652ms | 1,987 | $2.10 | Official docs | $7 / 1ktype=fast · up to 10 results |
| 4 | Exaweb search | POST /searchtype=instant | $7.17 | 97.7% | 80.0% | 97.3% | 398ms | 2,128 | $2.10 | Official docs | $7 / 1ktype=instant · up to 10 results |
$ / 1k correct is $ / 1k queries divided by extracted-answer accuracy. Ranked by $ / 1k correct. Cost per 1,000 queries is the published PAYG list price, linked to the vendor pricing page. Not promotional packs or volume discounts. TinyFish Search is free with a 30 requests/min cap — $0 is not unlimited throughput.
Brave Search and Exa on coding-agent docs
Grounded task completion on 100 documentation tickets. A pass needs a # source: URL from that run. Full coding-agent board →
Exa leads at 66.3%. Median task time: Brave Search 20s vs Exa 20s.
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | Task completion | Median task time | Median task cost | Avg search time | Median task tokens | API list price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Exa deep | POST /search type=deepPOST /contents | 83.0 ± 1.0 | 37s | $0.127$0.057 search+fetch$0.070 token cost | 3.97s | 23,660 | $0.012 / search$0.001 / fetch |
| 2 | Exa auto | POST /search type=autoPOST /contents | 81.7 ± 1.1 | 23s | $0.107$0.032 search+fetch$0.074 token cost | 1.19s | 27,433 | $0.007 / search$0.001 / fetch |
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | Task completion | Median task time | Median task cost | Avg search time | Median task tokens | API list price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brave | POST /res/v1/llm/context | 38.0 ± 2.6 | 20s | $0.082$0.025 search$0.057 token cost | 523ms | 14,103 | $0.005 / search |
| 2 | Exa fast | POST /search type=fast | 66.3 ± 1.5 | 20s | $0.103$0.035 search$0.068 token cost | 626ms | 22,344 | $0.007 / search |
| 3 | Exa instant | POST /search type=instant | 61.3 ± 2.9 | 21s | $0.105$0.035 search$0.070 token cost | 447ms | 22,423 | $0.007 / search |
Brave Search and Exa on multi-turn company search
45 questions, each with three or four constraints. Scored on precision, recall, F1, and exact-set. Full multi-turn board →
Exa leads F1 at 45.4%. Median agent time: Brave Search 43.52s vs Exa 49.83s. Median task cost: Brave Search $0.268 vs Exa $0.652.
| Provider | Endpoint & configuration | F1 | Precision | Recall | Exact set | Median time | Mean turns | Median task cost | API list price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brave Search | GET /res/v1/web/searchbrave | 28.0 ± 1.7 | 66.9 ± 8.5 | 19.3 ± 0.5 | 0.7 ± 1.3 | 43.5 s | 8.0 | $0.268$0.070 search$0.200 token cost | $0.005 / search |
| Exa deep | POST /search type=deepexa-deep | 45.4 ± 2.0 | 83.2 ± 3.0 | 33.7 ± 1.4 | 1.5 ± 1.3 | 89.5 s | 7.4 | $0.717$0.156 search$0.556 token cost | $0.012 / search |
| Exa instant | POST /search type=instantexa-instant | 43.3 ± 1.0 | 82.6 ± 3.8 | 32.2 ± 0.5 | 3.0 ± 1.3 | 49.8 s | 7.3 | $0.652$0.091 search$0.559 token cost | $0.007 / search |
F1, precision, recall, and exact-set accuracy are percentages reported as mean ± sample SD across three independent runs; each run aggregates all 45 questions. SD is measured in percentage points. Median time is the median end-to-end time across all runs for each vendor. Median task cost is the median of LLM $ plus search API $ per agent run. API list price is the PAYG unit rate of the search endpoint the harness calls.
| Provider | Endpoint & configuration | F1 | Precision | Recall | Exact set | Median time | Mean turns | Median task cost | API list price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brave Search | GET /res/v1/web/searchbrave | 29.4 ± 1.6 | 73.5 ± 5.8 | 20.4 ± 0.9 | 1.5 ± 1.3 | 45.1 s | 8.0 | $0.285$0.060 search+fetch$0.222 token cost | $0.005 / search |
| Exa deep | POST /search type=deepexa-deep | 48.2 ± 2.1 | 89.4 ± 1.2 | 36.0 ± 2.2 | 2.2 ± 2.2 | 95.8 s | 7.5 | $0.683$0.156 search+fetch$0.526 token cost | $0.012 / search$0.001 / fetch |
| Exa instant | POST /search type=instantexa-instant | 44.9 ± 0.9 | 85.9 ± 2.5 | 33.5 ± 0.9 | 5.2 ± 1.3 | 52.5 s | 7.5 | $0.653$0.091 search+fetch$0.557 token cost | $0.007 / search$0.001 / fetch |
F1, precision, recall, and exact-set accuracy are percentages reported as mean ± sample SD across three independent runs; each run aggregates all 45 questions. SD is measured in percentage points. Median time is the median end-to-end time across all runs for each vendor. Median task cost is the median of LLM $ plus search/fetch API $ per agent run. API list price is the PAYG unit rate of the search (and fetch) endpoint the harness calls.
Brave Search vs Exa — common questions
Brave Search vs Exa: which web search API is better?
Factual lookup: Exa leads accuracy (Brave Search 94.0% vs Exa 99.3%). Hard retrieval: Exa leads task completion (Brave Search 38.0% vs Exa 66.3%). Multi-hop: Exa leads F1 (Brave Search 28.0% vs Exa 45.4%).
Is Brave Search or Exa cheaper?
On factual lookup list price: Brave Search $5.00 per 1,000 queries vs Exa $7.00 — Brave Search is cheaper. Coding token efficiency is median task tokens; multi-hop cheapest is cost per agent run. Free tiers and volume discounts excluded.
Exa vs Tavily vs Brave Search API comparison
Exa, Tavily and Brave Search are measured on the same three tasks. Brave Search vs Exa is this page; the other pairs and the full boards live on the web search hub. There is no single winner across tasks or across accuracy, latency and cost.