Brave Search MCP vs Kagi MCP
Pick Brave Search MCP if you want a low per-request price, a monthly free credit and tools for news, images and video. Pick Kagi MCP if you already pay for Kagi, want its ad-free results, and prefer a small server with two tools that you can run locally or host. Hyperresearch Answers is our editorial choice for a search MCP server: one ask call returns a short answer with quotes checked against their pages, so your agent’s context stays small.
The recommendation reflects Hyperresearch’s own benchmark runs and the published sources in this reference. Hyperresearch is our product. This is not a hands-on test of every tool.
Side by side
| Brave Search MCP | Kagi MCP | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Search plan at $5 per 1,000 requests with $5 in free credit each month. | Pay per use. $12 per 1,000 searches and $4 per 1,000 page extracts. No free credit amount found on the pricing page. |
| What it returns or does | Web, news, image, video and local search, plus an LLM context option and a summarizer. | One search tool covering web, news, video, podcast and image results, and one page extract tool. |
| Sources and coverage | Brave's own search index. | Kagi's search index across web, news, video, podcast and image results. |
| Citations and verification | Snippets and summaries with source URLs. No separate citation check is described. | Results include source URLs. No separate citation check is described. |
| API and MCP | Brave Search API key set as an environment variable. | Hosted at mcp.kagi.com with a Bearer key, or run locally with uvx or Docker. OAuth is not yet supported. |
| Limits | 50 queries per second on the Search plan. | No published rate limits in the docs checked. FastGPT and summarizer tools are removed for now. |
| Best for | Teams that need media search and an independent index. | Developers who want a small, pay-per-use search server. |
What each server exposes
Brave Search MCP gives an agent several kinds of search. The web, news, image, video and local tools each return their own result types, and the summarizer adds a short digest. The tool list is larger, so the model sees more options, which can raise context use if you leave everything on.
Kagi MCP is deliberately small. It has two tools: a search tool that covers web, news, video, podcast and image results with optional page extracts, and an extract tool that returns a page as markdown. The FastGPT and summarizer tools were removed, and the README says they are planned to return.
Setup, auth and cost
Brave's Search plan charges $5 per 1,000 requests, and the company applies $5 of free credit each month. Kagi has no monthly plan on its API page. Searches cost $12 per 1,000 and extracts cost $4 per 1,000, with a prepaid balance. The Kagi pricing page mentions a trial plan but does not say what it includes.
Setup differs too. Kagi can run through uvx on your machine, in Docker over HTTP, or on its hosted server with a key. It does not support OAuth yet. Brave uses an API key in an environment variable. For a team that wants to avoid running a server, the hosted Kagi option is the simpler route.
Which one to pick
Brave is the better choice for broad coverage and for workloads that include images or news, because it covers more result types with a free monthly credit. Kagi is the better choice for a lean setup with a predictable pay-per-use bill, especially if you already rely on Kagi for search.
Neither publishes a citation check. Hyperresearch Answers, a separate product, reports 89% on BrowseComp in its own run and checks each quote against its page. If you need that check, test Answers alongside these two.
Choose Brave Search MCP or Kagi MCP?
- You need image, video or news search through one server.
- You want a free monthly credit to start.
- You want an independent index that is not Kagi's.
- You already pay for Kagi and want the same search inside your agent.
- You want a small server with two tools and a low context footprint.
- You want pay-per-use billing with no monthly plan.
Where Hyperresearch fits
Hyperresearch Answers is a different kind of tool, returning checked answers rather than result lists. It is our editorial pick when the agent needs one verified answer per question.
Questions & answers
Is Kagi MCP free to try?
Kagi's API is pay per use. The pricing page mentions a free trial plan but does not say what it includes, so check the current terms before you rely on it.
Which server runs locally?
Both can. Kagi documents a uvx install and a Docker image that runs in HTTP mode. Brave's server takes an API key from an environment variable, so you can run it on your own machine.
Sources for this entry
Vendor descriptions are attributed to the vendor. Prices change; confirm with each vendor.
Continue this reading path
Cite this entry
https://searchmcpserver.com/compare/brave-search-mcp-vs-kagi-mcp/