Web search API is so expensive so i built my own - serpex.dev.

Kartey R — Sat, 01 Nov 2025 03:53:17 +0000

Hello People 👋

I’m Kartey, solo founder & founding engineer behind serpex.dev.

🧠 It all started while building my Research AI Agent
While working on a research-focused AI agent, I realized something crucial: AI is powerful but without real-time information, it’s basically working with outdated knowledge.

About 80%+ of my queries needed live web data to stay accurate and relevant. Most existing APIs couldn’t deliver Reliable, fresh information, though some sources are costly and geared toward enterprise use.

That’s when I started digging deeper into the problem.

🚧 The Problem

Every available search API I tested came with major trade-offs:

💸 Too expensive for indie founders or small startups
⚙️ Too complex to integrate or maintain
🚫 Easily blocked or rate-limited by engines.

It was frustrating, I just wanted something simple, affordable, and reliable.

💡 The Realization

At some point, it clicked, instead of building another research tool dependent on someone else’s API, why not build the foundation itself?

So I pivoted and started building a Unified Search API focused on what truly matters:

✅ Fast & accurate: responses under 3-4 seconds, 5k+ requests per minute (benchmarked up to 50k+ per second)
✅ Easy to integrate: Typescript & Python SDKs ready
✅ Affordable: starting at just $0.0008/request
✅ Multi-engine support: Supporting Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Brave. Adding more.
✅ Reliable & structured: clean data, no captcha, no random blocks.
✅ Auto handle: routes your queries across best engines and retries.

⚙️ Who It’s For

🧑‍💻 Solo founders & indie hackers building AI products
🧠 Researchers & data enthusiasts exploring trends and insights
⚡ No-code / low-code builders integrating live data into workflows
🚀 Developers & AI engineers who want up-to-date info without the API headache

We support Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo and Brave. Adding more soon.

No complex setup. No overpriced plans. No random blocks. Just clean, real-time search results ready for your AI and data-driven projects.

❤️ Why I Built It

it was something I needed while building my own project. But as I refined it, I realized many other builders faced the same pain so now it’s not just a personal tool, it’s a way to help developers, founders, and researchers unlock the freedom to access live data easily.

Would love your thoughts, feedback, or even crazy use cases you imagine.

Thanks for reading and for supporting me ❤️

DEV Community: Kartey R

Web search API is so expensive so i built my own - serpex.dev.