The deciding difference is operational: SearXNG can run on infrastructure you control, Brave Search API cannot. If that constraint is real for you, it settles the choice before anything else is considered.
Independent web index with straightforward per-query pricing.
Self-hosted metasearch. No third-party search vendor in the path.
| Brave Search API | SearXNG | |
|---|---|---|
| Licence | Proprietary | Open source |
| Pricing | freemium | open source |
| Self-hostable | No | Yes |
| Languages | Any language | Any language |
| Install | — | — |
| Keys required | BRAVE_API_KEY | None |
The deciding difference is operational: SearXNG can run on infrastructure you control, Brave Search API cannot. If that constraint is real for you, it settles the choice before anything else is considered. Brave Search API: Independent web index with straightforward per-query pricing. SearXNG: Self-hosted metasearch. No third-party search vendor in the path.
Brave Search API is a hosted service only. SearXNG can run on your own infrastructure.
Brave Search API is proprietary (freemium). SearXNG is open source (open source).
Every page here answers to Accept: text/markdown and returns the same content at roughly a tenth the tokens. No separate site, no toggle — same URL.
curl -s -H "Accept: text/markdown" https://newagent.build/compare/brave-search-vs-searxng