Crawl4AI pricing
Open-source (Apache-2.0) LLM-friendly crawler, with an optional hosted Cloud API.
full verification from $10/mo MCP: Yes Last checked
Free to self-host. The hosted Cloud adds /scrape, /extract, /search, /serp and /answer endpoints on credits ($0.001 per credit at list price; plans include credits at lower rates). Prices are labelled 'soft launch' and may change.
Official links: Website (opens official site in a new tab) · Pricing page (opens official site in a new tab) (plain links; no affiliate tracking)
Quick facts
| Free tier | Self-hosting is free forever (you pay your own infra). Cloud: 1,000 free credits/month, no card. |
|---|---|
| How units are counted | Cloud credits: scrape 0.5 base (x0.5 archive hit, x1 light/standard, x2 real browser, x4 hard sites); search 1; serp 1 per Google page; answer 1-3. Source of numbers: public GET https://api.crawl4ai.com/v1/prices (linked from official docs). |
| MCP / agent support | Yes. README documents a hosted MCP endpoint (api.crawl4ai.com/mcp). Evidence. |
| Open source | Apache License 2.0 |
| Verification | Open-source license from the repository; cloud prices read from the vendor's public price endpoint referenced by its docs. |
Plans
| Plan | Per month (monthly billing) | Per month (annual billing) | Included | Overage / extra usage | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open source (self-host) | $0 | n/a | Unlimited (your hardware) | n/a | Apache-2.0; infra and proxy costs are yours |
| Cloud Free | $0 | n/a | 1,000 credits/mo | n/a | 10 requests/min, 2 concurrent |
| Cloud Starter | $10 | n/a | 10,000 credits/mo | Extra $1.00 per 1k credits | 10 at once; 120/min |
| Cloud Builder | $99 | n/a | 125,000 credits/mo | Extra $0.79 per 1k credits | 20 at once; 600/min |
| Cloud Scale | $499 | n/a | 750,000 credits/mo | Extra $0.67 per 1k credits | 50 at once; 1,500/min |
Normalized prices
Effective price per unit, computed only from published numbers and assuming you use the whole included allowance. See methodology.
| Metric | Plan / rate | Billing | Monthly spend | Effective price | How computed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic page fetch | Cloud Starter | monthly | $10 | $0.50 per 1,000 | formula$10 / 10,000 units x 0.5 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.50Light-level scrape = 0.5 credit (live /v1/prices base); soft-launch pricing. |
| JavaScript-rendered page | Cloud Starter | monthly | $10 | $1.00 per 1,000 | formula$10 / 10,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $1.00Heavy level (real browser) = 2x multiplier on the 0.5 credit base. The engine picks the level, not you. |
| SERP query (structured search results) | Cloud Starter | monthly | $10 | $1.00 per 1,000 | formula$10 / 10,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $1.001 credit per live Google page; cached page costs half. |
| Basic page fetch | Cloud Builder | monthly | $99 | $0.396 per 1,000 | formula$99 / 125,000 units x 0.5 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.396Light-level scrape = 0.5 credit (live /v1/prices base); soft-launch pricing. |
| JavaScript-rendered page | Cloud Builder | monthly | $99 | $0.792 per 1,000 | formula$99 / 125,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.792Heavy level (real browser) = 2x multiplier on the 0.5 credit base. The engine picks the level, not you. |
| SERP query (structured search results) | Cloud Builder | monthly | $99 | $0.792 per 1,000 | formula$99 / 125,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.7921 credit per live Google page; cached page costs half. |
| Basic page fetch | Cloud Scale | monthly | $499 | $0.3327 per 1,000 | formula$499 / 750,000 units x 0.5 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.3327Light-level scrape = 0.5 credit (live /v1/prices base); soft-launch pricing. |
| JavaScript-rendered page | Cloud Scale | monthly | $499 | $0.6653 per 1,000 | formula$499 / 750,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.6653Heavy level (real browser) = 2x multiplier on the 0.5 credit base. The engine picks the level, not you. |
| SERP query (structured search results) | Cloud Scale | monthly | $499 | $0.6653 per 1,000 | formula$499 / 750,000 units x 1 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.66531 credit per live Google page; cached page costs half. |
| Basic page fetch | Cloud Builder (overage) | payg | n/a | $0.395 per 1,000 | formula$0.79 / 1,000 units x 0.5 unit(s) per request x 1,000 = $0.395Extra credits $0.79/1k credits x 0.5 credit per light scrape. |
Best for
- Free, self-hosted crawling for RAG
- Teams with infra skills who want no per-page fees
Watch-outs
- Self-hosting means you handle browsers, proxies and blocks.
- Cloud pricing is explicitly soft-launch.
What we could not verify
- self-hosted cost: Depends on your servers/proxies; not computed.
- price stability: Vendor states cloud prices can change during soft launch.
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Sources checked
- https://api.crawl4ai.com/v1/prices (opens official site in a new tab) (json)
- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/unclecode/crawl4ai/main/README.md (opens official site in a new tab) (http)
Prices are read from these official pages (and the official docs where named). Confirm on the vendor's site before buying. Corrections welcome: [email protected].