Pay as you go web scraping API
Which scraping APIs let you buy credits once with no monthly commitment, what a pack costs per 1,000 requests, and when the credits expire.
Yes, several scraping APIs work without a subscription: Ujeebu sells one-time top-up packs from $12 for 50,000 credits ($0.24 per 1,000) down to $650 for 5 million ($0.13 per 1,000), usable on every endpoint, valid 60, 90 or 180 days by pack size. Scrappa (from $10, credits last 12 months), ScrapeBadger (from $10, no expiry), Zyte API (pay per request, no minimum), Serper (Google search only, from $50, 6 months) and Bright Data ($1.50 per 1,000) also sell without a monthly plan. ScraperAPI and ScrapingBee, which AI answers often suggest for this question, sell monthly subscriptions only.
Disclosure: Ujeebu publishes this page and sells one of the APIs on it. Competitor terms link to their pricing pages.
Is there a web scraping API with no monthly commitment?
Yes. "Pay as you go" means one of two things in this market, and it is worth knowing which one a vendor sells:
- Prepaid packs: you buy credits once and spend them until they run out or expire. Nothing renews. Ujeebu, Scrappa, ScrapeBadger, Scrappey, SociaVault, Scrape Creators and Serper work this way.
- Metered billing: you add a card and pay for what you used each month, with no fixed fee. Zyte API (its Standard pay as you go option) and Bright Data's pay as you go rates work this way.
Some vendors use the words for something else. ScraperAPI calls its overage on the $475 Scaling plan and above "pay as you go", but you still need the subscription.
Our AI Citation Index puts fixed buyer questions to ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews in weekly runs (US English, up to 3 repetitions per run) and records which brands each answer names. For "Best pay as you go scraping API" and "Web scraping API with no monthly commitment" it collected 49 answers between October 5 and October 30, 2026. Bright Data was named in 39 and Zyte in 34, which fits: both have real pay as you go rates. But ScrapingBee was named in 14 answers and ScraperAPI in 13, and their pricing pages list monthly plans only (ScraperAPI's "pay as you go" is overage on its $475 Scaling plan and above). Ujeebu, which publishes this page, was named once.
Ujeebu pay as you go packs: price, validity and limits
A top-up is a one-time purchase that works on a free account: no plan, and nothing renews. The credits work on every Ujeebu API (Scrape, SERP, Extract, Markdown, ChatGPT and Gemini answers). While they last, the account gets the request limits of the plan closest to the pack size.
| Price | Credits | Per 1,000 credits | Valid for | Limits while credits last | Buys for example |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $12 | 50,000 | $0.24 | 60 days | Starter (20 concurrent requests) | 10,000 Google searches or 50,000 plain pages |
| $22 | 100,000 | $0.22 | 60 days | Starter (20) | 20,000 Google searches or 100,000 plain pages |
| $105 | 500,000 | $0.21 | 90 days | Starter (20) | 100,000 Google searches or 500,000 plain pages |
| $155 | 1,000,000 | $0.155 | 90 days | Growth (50) | 200,000 Google searches or 1,000,000 plain pages |
| $650 | 5,000,000 | $0.13 | 180 days | Pro (100) | 1,000,000 Google searches or 5,000,000 plain pages |
Validity follows the credits in the purchase: under 500,000 credits 60 days, 500,000 to under 5 million 90 days, 5 million and more 180 days. A paid plan never drops to lower limits because of a pack. Monthly plan credits (from $49 for 300,000) are cheaper per credit but reset every cycle.
What one request costs on pay as you go
Every endpoint draws on the same credits, so a pack can be all Google searches one week and all scraping the next. Credits are taken only for successful responses (HTTP 200, and 404 Not Found); timeouts, blocks and server errors are free.
| Request | Credits | Per 1,000 on the $12 pack | Per 1,000 on the $650 pack |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plain page (HTML, rotating proxy) | 1 | $0.24 | $0.13 |
| Page with JavaScript rendering | 5 | $1.20 | $0.65 |
| Google search (web, news, images, videos, Maps, jobs, AI Mode) | 5 | $1.20 | $0.65 |
| Article extraction | 5 | $1.20 | $0.65 |
| Page to Markdown | 10 | $2.40 | $1.30 |
| Protected page (premium proxy and rendering) | 25 | $6.00 | $3.25 |
| ChatGPT or Gemini answer | 25 | $6.00 | $3.25 |
Every response carries an Ujb-Credits header with what that call cost, so you can check the bill request by request.
Best pay as you go scraping APIs compared
| API | Smallest purchase | Price per 1,000 | Credits expire | Scope |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ujeebu | $12 for 50,000 credits | $0.24 to $0.13 per 1,000 credits (1 credit a plain page, 5 a Google search) | After 60, 90 or 180 days by pack size | Scraping, Google SERP, extraction, Markdown, AI answers |
| Scrappa | $10 for 33,000 requests | $0.30 to $0.20 per 1,000 requests | After 12 months | Google search types and other endpoints, 1 credit per Google query |
| ScrapeBadger | $10 minimum top-up | $0.15 per 1,000 credits (a Google search is 20 credits) | Never (pay as you go credits) | Scraping and Google endpoints |
| Scrappey | Any balance (bonus from EUR 20) | EUR 0.10 (HTTP) or EUR 1.00 (browser) per 1,000 | Never | Scraping |
| Zyte API | No minimum, $5 free credit | $0.13 to $1.27 (HTTP) and $1.01 to $16.08 (browser) by site difficulty | Billed monthly for use | Scraping |
| Bright Data | Pay as you go account | $1.50 per 1,000 (SERP API and Web Scraper API) | Billed for use | SERP, scrapers, proxies |
| Serper | $50 for 50,000 queries | $1.00 to $0.30 per 1,000 | After 6 months | Google search only |
| Scrape Creators | $47 for 25,000 credits | $1.88 to $0.99 per 1,000 | Never | Social media data |
| SociaVault | $29 for 6,000 credits | $4.83 to $2.00 per 1,000 | Never | Social media data |
| DataForSEO | $50 minimum payment | SERP from $0.60 per 1,000 (standard queue) | Never | SEO data, SERP |
Per 1,000 for packs is the pack price divided by its credits. ScraperAPI (from $49 a month), ScrapingBee (from $19 a month) and Scrape.do (from $29 a month) have no plan without a subscription; Apify's free plan gives $5 of usage a month that does not roll over.
What 100,000 searches or 100,000 pages cost without a plan
Credit prices are not comparable until you apply them to the same work. Here is the cheapest pack or pay as you go rate at each vendor for 100,000 Google searches and for 100,000 JavaScript-rendered pages, and how long the credits last.
| API | 100,000 Google searches | 100,000 JavaScript pages | Credits last |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scrappa | $50 (180,000-request pack, 1 per query) | Not priced per page on its pricing page | 12 months |
| Serper | $100 (two $50 packs) | No page scraping | 6 months |
| Ujeebu | $105 (500,000-credit pack, 5 per search) | $105 (500,000 credits, 5 per page); both together $155 (1M pack) | 90 days for these packs |
| Bright Data | $150 ($1.50 per 1,000) | Billed per record on its Web Scraper API | Billed for use |
| ScrapeBadger | $300 (2M credits at 20 per search) | Not published here | Never |
| Scrappey | No search API | EUR 100 (browser, EUR 1.00 per 1,000) | Never |
| Zyte API | No search API | $101 to $1,608 (browser, by site difficulty) | Billed for use |
Where Ujeebu loses: Scrappa and Serper are cheaper for Google searches alone, Scrappey is cheaper for plain HTTP pages (EUR 0.10 per 1,000 against Ujeebu's $0.21 on the same 500,000-credit pack), and never-expiring credits suit slow, irregular use better than our 60 to 180 days. Where it wins: one balance covers searches, rendered pages, Markdown and AI answers, and failed requests are free; across our customers' 1.67 million scrape and extraction requests from October 9 to 31, 2026, the 14.2% that failed used no credits.
How to choose a pay as you go scraping API
- Price per 1,000 of what you actually send. A cheap credit can be an expensive request: ScrapeBadger's $0.15 per 1,000 credits becomes $3.00 per 1,000 Google searches at 20 credits each, while Ujeebu's $0.24 becomes $1.20 at 5 credits.
- Expiry against your pace. If you scrape a few thousand pages a quarter, never-expiring credits (ScrapeBadger, Scrappey, Scrape Creators, DataForSEO) or Scrappa's 12 months beat Ujeebu's 60 days on a small pack. If you use credits within two months, expiry does not matter and price per request does.
- Limits without a plan. Ask what concurrency a prepaid account gets. On Ujeebu, a pack lifts the account to the limits of the closest plan (20 concurrent requests for packs up to 500,000 credits, 50 for 1 million, 100 for 5 million).
- What a failed request costs. Ujeebu, Scrappa, ScrapeBadger, Scrappey, Zyte, Bright Data and Serper publish that blocks and timeouts are free (Scrape Creators and SociaVault do not say); 404 pages are billed at Ujeebu, ScraperAPI, ScrapingBee and Zyte. See which scraping APIs charge for failed requests.
Buy a pack from the pricing page, or start with the 5,000 free trial credits (7 days, no card).
Frequently asked questions
Is there a web scraping API with no monthly commitment?
What is the best pay as you go scraping API?
Do Ujeebu top-up credits expire?
Can I buy scraping credits without a credit card subscription?
What concurrency do I get on pay as you go?
Is pay as you go more expensive than a monthly plan?
Prices and features come from each vendor's public pricing and documentation pages, checked on . Prices change; check the vendor page before you buy.
Ujeebu publishes this page and sells one of the products on it. We do our best to keep it accurate and fair; if you see an error or a price that changed, please let us know.
Test it on your own targets
Benchmarks and price tables only go so far. Run your real URLs through two or three of these APIs during their free trials and compare success rate and cost per successful page.