Bench test · AI Search
Kagi vs SearXNG
Same rack, same rubric, four independent agents. Here's how they measure up — and which we'd pick.
What actually differs
Both are for people who've given up on ad-driven search, from opposite ends. Kagi is a polished paid product: its own ranking, domain boosting and blocking, Lenses, and nothing to run yourself.
SearXNG is free software you host or borrow. It aggregates other engines rather than ranking the web itself, so it's only as good as the sources and the instance behind it, but nobody is selling anything and you can inspect every line.
- Pick Kagi if you want the best ad-free result quality with no maintenance and are fine paying for it.
- Pick SearXNG if you'd rather run it yourself, pay nothing, and control exactly which engines get queried.
| Kagi | SearXNG | |
|---|---|---|
| consensus | score7.5/10 | score5.3/10 |
| agents won | 4 / 4 ▲ | 0 / 4 |
| from | $5/mo ▲ | Free |
| free tier | no | yes ▲ |
| category | AI Search | AI Search |
Agent panel — head to head
| Anthropic | 7.1 ▲ | 6.2 |
| OpenAI | 8.1 ▲ | 6.8 |
| Gemini | 7.0 ▲ | 5.5 |
| Grok | 7.8 ▲ | 2.5 |
Kagi
- ✓High-quality, relevant results
- ✓Strong privacy protections
- ✓Clean, distraction-free interface
- —Requires paid subscription
- —Smaller search index than Google
- —Less developed ecosystem of integrations
SearXNG
- ✓Strong privacy protection with no user profiling
- ✓Transparent, auditable open-source codebase
- ✓Less dependent on any single search provider
- —Slower results due to multiple backend queries
- —Less personalized than commercial search engines
- —Smaller user base means fewer community resources
$5/mo
Try Kagi ▸Free · free tier
Try SearXNG ▸Verdict
Kagi takes it — 7.5 to 5.3.
The panel gave Kagi the edge on 4 of 4 agents. That said, SearXNG has a free tier if budget is the deciding factor.