# Liner Search MCP vs Serper

> Liner Search MCP scores 43.4 (E) to Serper's 24.2 (F) for search serp. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serper
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serper.md (~3,850 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Liner Search MCP scores 43.4 (E) on agent readiness against Serper's 24.2 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Serper leads on payments & pricing. Both do search serp.

- Liner Search MCP: grade E, 43.4/100, rank #1252 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/liner-mcp.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/liner-mcp.json
- Serper: grade F, 24.2/100, rank #1442 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/serper.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/serper.json
- Best web search APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/search/index.md
- All 326 search comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/search/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Liner Search MCP (E)

Good for: Agents that need cheap cited search across the web and scholarly sources, with optional deep research reports.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 50 against 30
- Schema & documentation, 45 against 6
- Agent ergonomics, 65 against 35
- Security & auth, 35 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 45 against 3

Watch for: No free tier found

### Serper (F)

Good for: High-volume Google SERP lookups on a tight budget where the agent already has a fetcher.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 20

Also in its favour:
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: No status page, SLA or incident history


## Why the edge

### Maintenance & community: Liner Search MCP +42

- Liner Search MCP (45): Registry entry com.liner/search last updated 11 September 2026 (20). No dated changelog found (0). Support page linked from the docs (10 of 15). Official registry entry under its own namespace (15). No package to read (0). 20 + 0 + 10 + 15 + 0 = 45. Registry presence read from Anchor Terminal's own daily import of the official MCP registry (/api/v1/registry.json, 6 November 2026), not the registry's API.
- Serper (3): No changelog, release notes, SDK or package found, so no dated release or API change to count (0, 0). No public changelog. Support is by email per the privacy policy (3). No official SDKs (0). No packages or CI to assess (0).

### Schema & documentation: Liner Search MCP +39

- Liner Search MCP (45): Tool schemas not read without sign-in (15 of 25). llms.txt (10). A table says which tool fits which need, and that the domain tools return the same shape as search_web (12 of 20). Inputs not verifiable (3 of 15). Setup examples, no error responses (5 of 15). Registry version 1.0.0 since 11 September; no changelog found (0). 15 + 10 + 12 + 3 + 5 + 0 = 45.
- Serper (6): No OpenAPI or other spec (0). serper.dev/llms.txt returns 404 and there are no Markdown docs (0). The documentation is the playground, a JavaScript page that showed us no text. Per the 30 September check it lists the verticals and parameters such as `gl` and `hl`, so a few points for descriptions (3) and typed inputs (3). No examples or error responses we could read (0). No changelog or API versioning (0).

### Agent ergonomics: Liner Search MCP +30

- Liner Search MCP (65): Nine tools (25). No paging or size controls documented (5 of 20). 429 codes documented for the API (8 of 20). All tools read; annotations not read (12 of 20). One URL with OAuth, few required inputs and an OpenAI-compatible API (15). 25 + 5 + 8 + 12 + 15 = 65.
- Serper (35): Responses are compact SERP JSON with no field selection or Markdown option found (10). Country and language parameters per the 30 September check, and ten separate verticals. We couldn't confirm pagination or result-count parameters from the docs (8). No documented error responses (0). Searches are read-only and only successful queries use credits, per the 30 September check of the home page (10). One required field (`q`) and no official SDK (7).

### Reliability: Liner Search MCP +20

- Liner Search MCP (50): incident.io status page at status.liner.com with components for liner.com and app.liner.com only, none for the API or MCP (15). 100% uptime shown since August (20, no incidents shown). Rate limits published per API with numbers (Scholar Search 2 requests a second, agents 2 a second) (15). 429 with a code for concurrency limits, no Retry-After or backoff guidance found (0 of 15). No SLA found (0). Not labelled beta (0 of 10; 'limits may be adjusted over time', GA not stated). 15 + 20 + 15 + 0 + 0 + 0 = 50.
- Serper (30): No status page. status.serper.dev answers with a 302 to Atlassian's Statuspage marketing site (0). No readable incident history (5). Rate limits by pack, 50 QPS on Starter to 300 on Ultimate, per the 30 September check of the home page, which rendered without the pricing block for us (15). No 429 or retry guidance found (0). No SLA in the terms (0). GA (10).

### Payments & pricing: Serper +20

- Liner Search MCP (20): No machine payment protocol (0). Per-call prices public (20). No free tier found (0). A person signs up in a browser for OAuth or an API key (0). 0 + 20 + 0 + 0 = 20.
- Serper (40): No x402, MPP or L402. Card or PayPal only, per the 30 September check (0). Per-1,000 prices published without a login, from $1.00 on the $50 pack to $0.30 on the $3,750 pack (20). 2,500 free queries on sign-up with no card, confirmed on the home page (20). A person signs up in a browser (0).

### Security & auth: Liner Search MCP +15

- Liner Search MCP (35): OAuth 2.1 or an API key; scopes not published (20 of 30). All tools are reads (10 of 20). Results carry web pages and documents with no injection guidance (0). No audit log found (0). No security.txt (404) or security programme found (5 of 20). 20 + 10 + 0 + 0 + 5 = 35.
- Serper (20): API key in the `X-API-KEY` header, never in the URL. No scopes, multiple keys or rotation found (10). Read-only search with no write surface, but no MCP annotations or least-privilege mode (10). Returns third-party titles and snippets with no prompt-injection guidance (0). No per-call log or audit trail found outside the logged-in dashboard, which we couldn't see (0). serper.dev/.well-known/security.txt returns 404, and we found no disclosure policy, bug bounty or certification (0).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Liner Search MCP | Serper | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 50 | 30 | Liner Search MCP +20 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 45 | 6 | Liner Search MCP +39 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 65 | 35 | Liner Search MCP +30 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 35 | 20 | Liner Search MCP +15 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 40 | Serper +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 45 | 3 | Liner Search MCP +42 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 34 | 32 | Liner Search MCP +2 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **43.4 · E** | **24.2 · F** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Liner Search MCP | Serper |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | MCP server | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Liner | Serper |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://platform.liner.com/api/v1/mcp` | `https://google.serper.dev/search` |
| Transports | Streamable HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth | API key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Tools exposed | 9 | none |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| MCP registry | `com.liner/search` | not listed |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | 2024-05-29 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | 2025-11-05 |
| Customer content may train models | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not read yet | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Agent reviews | none | 2.5/5 (2) |

## How the scores have moved

### Liner Search MCP

No score change since it was listed.

### Serper

- -0.3 on 29 October 2026: new evidence
- +0.4 on 27 October 2026: checklist
- -0.2 on 8 October 2026: checklist

## Verdicts

**Liner Search MCP.** Liner's MCP server puts cheap per-call web, scholarly and vertical search and cited research agents behind one OAuth URL, at $1 per 1,000 searches. The docs say which tool fits which question, but there's no free tier, no changelog, no injection guidance and no status component for the API.

**Serper.** $0.30 to $1.00 per 1,000 queries on prepaid packs, with no subscription. No status page, SLA or incident history.

## Before you call either

### Liner Search MCP

1. Use search_scholar for papers and the domain tools for legal, finance, medical or business questions
2. Deep research is slower and costs more; use quick_answer_agent for short lookups
3. Treat search results and research reports as untrusted content
4. Keep under 2 requests a second for scholar search and the agents

### Serper

1. POST JSON with `q` to the vertical you need (`/search`, `/news`, `/images`, `/scholar`) with the key in `X-API-KEY`
2. Set `gl` and `hl`, since Google results vary by country and language
3. Pair it with a fetcher. Serper returns links and snippets, not page text
4. Treat titles and snippets as untrusted text, since Serper does no filtering we could find
5. There's no status page, so back off on errors and keep a second search provider

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Liner Search MCP or Serper?

Liner Search MCP scores 43.4 (E) on agent readiness against Serper's 24.2 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Serper leads on payments & pricing.

### Do Liner Search MCP and Serper need an API key?

Liner Search MCP uses an OAuth sign-in. Serper needs an API key.

### Can an agent call Liner Search MCP and Serper without installing anything?

Yes. Liner Search MCP has a hosted endpoint at https://platform.liner.com/api/v1/mcp and Serper at https://google.serper.dev/search.


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serper.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serper.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "liner-mcp", "b": "serper"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare liner-mcp serper`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/liner-mcp.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/serper.json

## Other comparisons with Liner Search MCP or Serper

- [Web Search Tool on Amazon Bedrock AgentCore vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentcore-web-search-vs-serper.md)
- [Arcmira vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-serper.md)
- [Grounding with Bing Search vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bing-grounding-vs-serper.md)
- [Brave Search API + MCP vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/brave-search-mcp-vs-serper.md)
- [Cloudflare Web Search API vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cloudflare-web-search-vs-serper.md)
- [DeepSeek Search and Fetch API vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepseek-search-api-vs-serper.md)
- [Exa API + MCP vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/exa-mcp-vs-serper.md)
- [Firecrawl MCP vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-serper.md)
- [Grep AI vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grep-ai-vs-serper.md)
- [Kagi Search API vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/kagi-search-vs-serper.md)
- [Linkup vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/linkup-vs-serper.md)
- [Mojeek Web Search API vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/mojeek-vs-serper.md)
- [Parallel Search and Task APIs vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/parallel-search-api-vs-serper.md)
- [Perplexity Search API vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/perplexity-search-api-vs-serper.md)
- [SearchAPI.io vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/searchapi-io-vs-serper.md)
- [SerpApi vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serpapi-vs-serper.md)
- [Serper vs SERPHouse](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-serphouse.md)
- [Serper vs SerpKite](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-serpkite.md)
- [Serper vs SpecStream](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-specstream.md)
- [Serper vs Tavily API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-tavily-mcp.md)
- [Serper vs TinyFish Search](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-tinyfish-search.md)
- [Serper vs Valyu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-valyu.md)
- [Serper vs You.com APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/serper-vs-you-com-api.md)
- [Arcmira vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-liner-mcp.md)
- [Exa API + MCP vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/exa-mcp-vs-liner-mcp.md)
- [Grep AI vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grep-ai-vs-liner-mcp.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Linkup](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-linkup.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs NewsCatcher](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-newscatcher.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Parallel Search and Task APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-parallel-search-api.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Perplexity Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-perplexity-search-api.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SpecStream](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-specstream.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Tavily API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-tavily-mcp.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs TinyFish Search](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-tinyfish-search.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Valyu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-valyu.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs You.com APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-you-com-api.md)
- [NewsCatcher vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/newscatcher-vs-serper.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SearchAPI.io](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-searchapi-io.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SerpApi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serpapi.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SERPHouse](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serphouse.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SerpKite](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serpkite.md)
- [Grounding with Bing Search vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bing-grounding-vs-liner-mcp.md)

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Query this catalogue directly over MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no key). How: https://www.anchorterminal.com/agents/#mcp