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Endpoints / Retrieval
POST/v1/search

Search

BillingSearch charges depend on the selected backend and billable units. Pricing & lanes ↗

Run provider-neutral web or news search through Lazu. Hosted api.lazu.ai currently enables Tavily, Serper and Jina; self-hosted operators can add Exa or Brave through the same search-backend system.

What it returns

Normalized results

Every backend maps into title, url, snippet, optional content, published_at, score and source.

Auditable routing

The response includes the selected backend and route receipt. Request logs store the same routing metadata for support and billing reconciliation.

Hosted configuration

The /v1/search implementation supports Tavily, Serper, Exa, Jina and Brave, but the hosted Lazu deployment is configured with this active set:

BackendHosted statusCapabilitiesNotes
TavilyEnabledweb_search, web_fetch, answerSupports include_answer and search_depth; advanced is 2 units.
SerperEnabledweb_searchMaps country / region, language and time_range when provided.
JinaEnabledweb_search, web_fetchUses https://s.jina.ai; best for retrieval-style snippets.
Exa / BraveSupportedweb_search after operator setupAvailable for self-hosted or admin-configured deployments.

Hosted backends currently use the default backend policy: up to 10 results per request and an 8s upstream timeout. If you send a larger max_results, Lazu clips it to the selected backend policy.

Request body

ParameterTypeDescription
query
string
required

Search query. The MVP supports one query per request.

type
string
nullable
webnews

Search vertical. Defaults to web.

backend
string
nullable

auto, a provider name such as tavily or serper, or a configured backend ID/name. Defaults to auto.

region
string
nullable

Region hint. Serper maps this to gl; other providers may ignore unsupported regions.

language
string
nullable

Language hint such as en or zh-CN.

time_range
string
nullable
dayweekmonthyear

Freshness hint. Providers that cannot map the value may ignore it.

max_results
integer
nullable

Number of results to return. Defaults to 10 and is capped by the selected backend policy.

search_depth
string
nullable
basicadvanced

Provider depth hint. Tavily advanced uses two billable credits.

include_answer
boolean
nullable

Include a provider answer when the selected backend returns one. Lazu does not generate its own final answer in this endpoint.

include_raw_content
boolean
nullable

Include raw or cleaned content when the provider returns it. Defaults to false.

include_domains
string[]
nullable

Restrict results to domains. Token-level domain allowlists still apply.

exclude_domains
string[]
nullable

Exclude domains when supported by the selected backend.

include_provider_payload
boolean
nullable

Return the provider-native payload for debugging. Defaults to false.

provider_options
object
nullable

Advanced provider passthrough. Only the selected provider's object is used, for example {"serper":{"tbs":"qdr:d"}}.

Response

Search response
json
{
"query": "latest OpenAI web search API changes",
"results": [
  {
    "title": "Web search - OpenAI API",
    "url": "https://platform.openai.com/docs/guides/tools-web-search",
    "snippet": "Use web search in the Responses API...",
    "content": null,
    "published_at": null,
    "score": 0.91,
    "source": "web"
  }
],
"usage": {
  "web_search_requests": 1,
  "web_search_billable_units": 1
},
"provider_trace": {
  "backend": "tavily"
},
"route_receipt": {
  "selection": "auto",
  "selected_backend": "tavily",
  "chose_provider": "tavily",
  "candidates": ["tavily:Tavily"],
  "rejected": [],
  "downgraded": false,
  "fallback_count": 0,
  "decision_reason": "selected"
}
}
ParameterTypeDescription
results[]
object[]

Normalized search result list. content is only populated when raw content was requested and returned by the backend.

usage.web_search_requests
integer

Lazu search request count, normally 1.

usage.web_search_billable_units
integer

Provider billing units used for the charge. Tavily basic is 1 unit, Tavily advanced is 2 units, and Serper or Jina is normally 1 successful query.

provider_trace.backend
string

Actual provider selected after routing.

route_receipt
object
nullable

Candidate, fallback and rejection metadata. The same data is stored in the request log.

Billing

Search backends are priced from their configured search_price. The value is the USD price per provider billing unit, not always per HTTP request.

Check the currently displayed search price and reconcile the web_search line item in request details. Do not infer a free service from an old example or deployment configuration.

BackendUnit mapping
Tavilybasic = 1 credit; advanced = 2 credits
Serper1 successful query = 1 unit
Jina1 successful query = 1 unit

Failed upstream calls, timeouts and invalid requests are refunded according to the normal Lazu billing rules.

See also

CodePOST /v1/search
curl https://api.lazu.ai/v1/search \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $LAZU_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "query": "latest OpenAI web search API changes",
    "type": "web",
    "max_results": 5,
    "backend": "auto"
  }'
Request receiptIllustrative receipt

Independent example, not a current quote or the result of the request above. Actual charges come from the completed request receipt.

Request ID
req_demo_01
Backend
example-search-backend
Lane
stable
Search billable units
1
Elapsed
842 ms
Key
demo-key
Example cost · USD$0.0050
Read a real request receipt ↗
Try it · real request›
Your API key

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RESPONSE · 200
{
  "query": "latest OpenAI web search API changes",
  "results": [
    {
      "title": "OpenAI ships web search API",
      "url": "https://example.com/news",
      "snippet": "…",
      "score": 0.92,
      "source": "tavily"
    }
  ],
  "usage": {
    "web_search_requests": 1,
    "web_search_billable_units": 1
  },
  "provider_trace": { "backend": "tavily" },
  "route_receipt": {
    "selection": "auto",
    "selected_backend": "search_tavily",
    "chose_provider": "tavily",
    "candidates": ["search_tavily"],
    "decision_reason": "matched web_search capability"
  }
}
ERROR · 429
{
  "error": {
    "type": "rate_limit_exceeded",
    "message": "Per-key limit reached. Retry after 12s.",
    "request_id": "req_01ABCDEF"
  }
}

Console

Admins configure providers in Search backends.

Calls api.lazu.ai directly. The key stays in this browser.