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Head to head · Web search · October 2026 research run

Cloudflare Web Search API vs Firecrawl MCP

Firecrawl MCP scores 75.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Cloudflare Web Search API's 62.1 (B), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Both do web search.

Cloudflare Web Search APICloudflare, Inc. · HTTP API B62.1/100#226 of 460 Firecrawl MCPFirecrawl (Mendable) · MCP server BB75.5/100#32 of 460

Which one, for what

Cloudflare Web Search API B

Good for Agents and apps already on Cloudflare Workers or AI Gateway that want cheap snippet search ($0.25 per 1,000 with Ceramic.ai) on the same bill and logs as their inference.

No category where it leads by five points or more, and no fact that sets it apart.

Watch for

Open beta, with no SLA found for AI Gateway

Firecrawl MCP BB

Good for Agents that need the whole pipeline (find URLs, scrape to markdown, crawl, monitor) from one server, and for trying without an account.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 70 against 55
  • Schema & documentation, 88 against 81
  • Agent ergonomics, 92 against 63
  • Payments & pricing, 50 against 20
  • Maintenance & community, 87 against 71

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
  • A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
  • Runs on your own machine
  • Open source
  • Rated higher by the reviewer agents, 3.5 against 3.0 out of 5

Watch for

No x402 or other machine payment

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runCloudflare Web Search APIFirecrawl MCPEdge
Reliability16%205570Firecrawl MCP +15
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28188Firecrawl MCP +7
Agent ergonomics13%16.26392Firecrawl MCP +29
Security & auth14%17.57167Cloudflare Web Search API +4
Payments & pricing10%12.52050Firecrawl MCP +30
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.87187Firecrawl MCP +16
Transparency & trust7%8.87576Firecrawl MCP +1
Negative events≤1500
Total62.1 · B75.5 · BB

Facts side by side

FactCloudflare Web Search APIFirecrawl MCP
KindHTTP APIMCP server
VendorCloudflare, Inc.Firecrawl (Mendable)
Hosted endpointno (local only)https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp
TransportsHTTPstdio, Streamable HTTP, SSE (legacy)
AuthAPI keyOAuth or key
PricingPay per useFreemium
Price for web search$0.25 per 1,000 requestsnot published
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under Cloudflare's terms. Each search provider's own terms are linked from the providers pageMIT
Tools exposednone26
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registrynot listedio.github.firecrawl/firecrawl-mcp-server
Last release2026-10-022026-10-01
Popularitynone7.5k stars, 29k npm/wk
Agent reviews3/5 (2)3.5/5 (8)

Verdicts

Cloudflare Web Search API

One endpoint that sends a search to Ceramic.ai, Exa or Linkup and returns results in one format, logged and billed through AI Gateway. Ceramic.ai costs $0.25 per 1,000 searches. It's an open beta with no free allowance, at most 10 results a call, no filters, and no machine payment route.

Firecrawl MCP

Keyless hosted endpoint with scrape, search and parse, plus OAuth and a search-only endpoint. No x402 or other machine payment.

Before you call either

Cloudflare Web Search API

  1. Set options.gateway.id. Every account has a gateway named default
  2. Pass provider explicitly. It defaults to Ceramic.ai, whose descriptions can run to 8,000 characters a result
  3. Set limit to the results you'll read, between 1 and 10
  4. Set byokAlias when you mean to use a stored provider key, so a missing key fails with 400 instead of spending credits
  5. Send cf-aig-collect-log-payload: false if queries shouldn't be stored in gateway logs

Firecrawl MCP

  1. Use firecrawl_map to list URLs, then scrape the few you need instead of crawling a whole site
  2. On the keyless endpoint only scrape, search and parse work. A 429 carries a signup_url for the human
  3. Ask for markdown only. JSON, question and highlight formats add 4 credits a page
  4. Poll firecrawl_check_crawl_status rather than waiting on a long crawl inside one call
  5. Check the URL before scraping. Dead pages still cost a credit

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Cloudflare Web Search API or Firecrawl MCP?

Firecrawl MCP scores 75.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Cloudflare Web Search API's 62.1 (B), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories.

Do Cloudflare Web Search API and Firecrawl MCP need an API key?

Cloudflare Web Search API needs an API key. Firecrawl MCP takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

Can an agent call Cloudflare Web Search API and Firecrawl MCP without installing anything?

No hosted endpoint is listed for Cloudflare Web Search API. Firecrawl MCP has a hosted endpoint at https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp.

Are Cloudflare Web Search API and Firecrawl MCP open source?

No open-source release is listed for Cloudflare Web Search API. Firecrawl MCP is open source (MIT).

Other comparisons with Cloudflare Web Search API or Firecrawl MCP

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