Developer Tools vs Exa
Developer Tools and Exa are both developer tools tools. Developer Tools is aimed at freelancers and small businesses, while Exa is aimed at developers and enterprise. Both have a free plan.
Developer Tools
173 free web, DNS, SSL, SEO & developer tools — fast, live, no sign-up
Exa
Web search and content API built for AI agents and LLM apps
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| Starting price | Not published | Not published |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Built for | Freelancers, Small businesses, Developers | Developers, Enterprise, Small businesses |
| Platforms | web, ios, android, macos, windows, linux | web |
| Country | TR · 2015 | US · 2021 |
| Rating | — | — |
Choose Developer Tools if
Choose Exa if
Developers and AI teams who need a fast, controllable web search and content layer for agents, RAG or research products.
- Free $10 monthly credit grant with no card required
- Lite search at $4 per 1,000 requests suits high-volume agents
- Highlights cut token usage and LLM costs compared with full pages
Look elsewhere if: Non-technical users who want a finished answer engine or chat app rather than an API (Perplexity, You.com).
Developer Tools vs Exa pricing
Developer Tools
Exa
- Free$0$10 in credits every month plus a one-time $10 onboarding bonus
- Search Lite$4/1,000 requestsUp to 10 results per request; $1 per 1k extra results
- Search Auto$7/1,000 requestsUp to 10 results per request; AI summaries $1 per 1k pages
- Deep Search$12/1,000 requestsdeep-lite (about 4 seconds) and deep (4 to 15 seconds) types
- Contents$1/1,000 pagesPer content type; prepaid credits, no subscription or minimum
Developer Tools · Key features
Exa · Key features
- Search API with lite, auto, deep-lite and deep types on one independent index
- Dynamic Highlights that pass only the most relevant tokens to the model
- Contents API for full page text, highlights and AI summaries
- Agent API for cited research, list building and enrichment with structured output
- Coverage of people, companies, code, papers, ecommerce listings and local businesses
- Monitors for recurring searches and Websets for verified datasets
Cons
- No flat monthly plan, so spend rises directly with traffic
- Websets API needs a separate paid Websets plan and credits
- Benchmark leadership is reported by Exa itself
Developer Tools vs Exa: FAQ
Do Developer Tools and Exa have a free plan?
Yes, both Developer Tools and Exa have a free plan; paid plans add more usage and features.