Exa vs Tavily: web search API comparison
Exa and Tavily measured on the same three jobs: factual lookup, hard retrieval for coding agents, and multi-hop company search. Rankings do not transfer. Winner per task is in the table below.
Exa or Tavily — winner per task
Best measured endpoint per vendor on each task. Modes stay separate rows in the tables below.
| Task | Exa | Tavily | Measured winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Factual lookup (accuracy) | 99.2% | 93.8% | Exa |
| Hard retrieval (task completion, search+fetch) | 83.0% | 60.0% | Exa |
| Multi-hop (F1, search-only) | 45.4% | 41.1% | Exa |
Exa and Tavily on company-news lookup
One query, one verifiable fact. 129 questions, max 10 results. Full factual lookup board →
| Axis | Exa | Tavily | Measured winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Accuracy (extracted-answer) | 99.2% | 93.8% | Exa |
| Answer recall (AR@5) | 100.0% | 94.6% | Exa |
| Speed (mean latency) | 447ms | 4.40s | Exa |
| Cost per 1,000 queries (list price) | $8.13 | $17.45 | Exa |
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | Accuracy | AR@1 | AR@5 | Latency | Snippet tokens | Total $ | Official docs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Exaweb search | POST /searchtype=deep | 99.2% | 98.5% | 100.0% | 3.00s | 1,330 | $1.65 | Official docs |
| 2 | Exaweb search | POST /searchtype=instant | 97.7% | 83.7% | 97.7% | 447ms | 2,051 | $1.05 | Official docs |
| 3 | Tavilyweb search | POST /searchsearch_depth=advanced · chunks_per_source=3 | 93.8% | 79.8% | 94.6% | 4.40s | 3,041 | $2.25 | Official docs |
Exa and Tavily 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 83.0%. Median task time: Exa 23s vs Tavily 32s.
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | Task completion | Median task time | Avg search time | Median task tokens |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Exa deep | POST /search type=deepPOST /contents | 83.0 ± 1.0 | 37s | 3.97s | 23,660 |
| 2 | Exa auto | POST /search type=autoPOST /contents | 81.7 ± 1.1 | 23s | 1.19s | 27,433 |
| 3 | Tavily advanced | POST /search search_depth=advancedPOST /extract extract_depth=advanced | 60.0 ± 2.0 | 46s | 3.41s | 26,269 |
| 4 | Tavily basic | POST /search search_depth=basicPOST /extract extract_depth=basic | 59.0 ± 1.7 | 32s | 1.50s | 27,405 |
| Rank | Vendor | Endpoint & configuration | Task completion | Median task time | Avg search time | Median task tokens |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Exa fast | POST /search type=fast | 66.3 ± 1.5 | 20s | 626ms | 22,344 |
| 2 | Exa instant | POST /search type=instant | 61.3 ± 2.9 | 21s | 447ms | 22,423 |
| 3 | Tavily fast | POST /search search_depth=fast | 47.3 ± 2.5 | 22s | 282ms | 23,922 |
Exa and Tavily 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: Exa 49.83s vs Tavily 92.17s. Cost / agent run: Exa $0.601 vs Tavily $0.910.
| Provider | Endpoint & configuration | F1 | Precision | Recall | Exact set | Median time | Mean turns | Cost / agent run | Measured on |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exa | 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 | $0.656 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
| Exa | 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 | $0.601 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
| Tavily | POST /search search_depth=advancedtavily-advanced | 41.1 ± 2.3 | 83.7 ± 4.2 | 29.8 ± 1.7 | 2.2 ± 0.0 | 92.2 s | 7.4 | $0.910 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
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.
| Provider | Endpoint & configuration | F1 | Precision | Recall | Exact set | Median time | Mean turns | Cost / agent run | Measured on |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exa | 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 | $0.639 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
| Exa | 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 | $0.606 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
| Tavily | POST /search search_depth=advancedtavily-advanced | 41.0 ± 1.3 | 89.4 ± 6.0 | 29.1 ± 0.7 | 2.2 ± 0.0 | 92.6 s | 7.3 | $0.813 | 45 questions135 agent runs |
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.
Exa vs Tavily — common questions
Exa vs Tavily: which web search API is better?
Factual lookup: Exa leads accuracy (Exa 99.2% vs Tavily 93.8%). Hard retrieval: Exa leads task completion (Exa 83.0% vs Tavily 60.0%). Multi-hop: Exa leads F1 (Exa 45.4% vs Tavily 41.1%). Rankings do not transfer across tasks.
Is Exa or Tavily cheaper?
On factual lookup list price: Exa $8.13 per 1,000 queries vs Tavily $17.45 — Exa 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. Exa vs Tavily 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.