Jina AI Search vs Firecrawl Search for AI agents
Jina AI Search is a search endpoint (s.jina.ai) that searches the web and returns the top results converted to clean, LLM-friendly text. Firecrawl Search is a web scraping platform whose search endpoint returns web results and can scrape each result to Markdown in the same call.
The short answer
- Jina AI Search: Getting search results already converted to clean full-page text in one call.
- Firecrawl Search: Search plus full-page scraping to clean Markdown in one request.
Side by side
| Jina AI Search | Firecrawl Search | |
|---|---|---|
| Searches | The web (the provider does not name the search engine behind it). | The web, news and images (the provider does not name the underlying engine). |
| Returns | The top five results with URL and page content as LLM-friendly text; Markdown, HTML, JSON or text formats. | Title, URL and description per result; optionally full-page Markdown, HTML, links or screenshots for each result. |
| Before the first call | An API key: search is blocked without one. | No key to get started (low limits); an account and API key for normal use. |
| Free | 10 million free tokens with every new API key; each search costs a fixed amount starting at 10,000 tokens (so roughly 1,000 searches at most). | 1,000 credits a month, no card (about 500 searches at 2 credits per 10 results). |
| Paid | Not stated on its pages | Hobby $19/month (or $16/month billed yearly) for 5,000 credits, about 2,500 searches. |
| Acting on a result | Through the web page each result links to | Through the web page each result links to |
| AI in its terms | Jina says it does not use customer request data, inputs or prompts to train its models; outputs may not be used to build competing services. | Not stated on its pages |
| MCP server | Official MCP server: mcp.jina.ai (code: https://github.com/jina-ai/MCP) | Official MCP server: https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp (OAuth: https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp-oauth) |
Questions people ask
What do I need before I can use Jina AI Search?
An API key: search is blocked without one.
Is Jina AI Search free?
10 million free tokens with every new API key; each search costs a fixed amount starting at 10,000 tokens (so roughly 1,000 searches at most).
What do I need before I can use Firecrawl Search?
No key to get started (low limits); an account and API key for normal use.
Is Firecrawl Search free?
1,000 credits a month, no card (about 500 searches at 2 credits per 10 results).
Sources
Every line about another company comes from its own pages. Prices and terms change, so check the source before you rely on one.
Jina AI Search, read on October 15, 2026:
- jina.ai/reader: “Every new API key comes with 10M free tokens!”
- jina.ai/reader: “Every request costs a fixed number of tokens, starting from 10,000 tokens”
- jina.ai/reader: “return the top five results with their URLs and contents, each in clean, LLM-friendly text”
- jina.ai/reader: “Add mcp.jina.ai as your MCP server to use our APIs in LLMs.”
- jina.ai/legal: “Jina AI does not use Customer request data, inputs, prompts, or uploaded content to train its models,”
- jina.ai/legal: “use any Output from the Services to develop applications or services that compete with the Services offered by Jina AI”
Firecrawl Search, read on October 15, 2026:
- firecrawl.dev/pricing: “1,000 credits / month”
- firecrawl.dev/pricing: “No cost, no card, no hassle.”
- firecrawl.dev/pricing: “500 searches or 1,000 pages scraped”
- firecrawl.dev/pricing: “Hobby: $19/month billed monthly, or $16/month billed annually, for 5,000 credits per month”
- firecrawl.dev/pricing: “Search costs 2 credits per 10 results.”
- docs.firecrawl.dev/features/search: “No API key needed to get started.”
- docs.firecrawl.dev/features/search: “full-page markdown, HTML, links, or screenshots for each result”
- docs.firecrawl.dev/mcp-server: “https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp-oauth”