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WebSearch billing

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After you upgrade to a paid account, WebSearch bills you for API calls.

Usage notes

  1. Pay-as-you-go (post-paid) settles charges based on your actual usage. A bill is generated daily, and the fees are deducted from your Alibaba Cloud account.

  2. If the discrepancy in billing statistics between the two parties is 1% or greater, the project and technical contacts from both parties will conduct a data review. If the discrepancy is less than 1%, the statistics from Alibaba Cloud are considered final.

Metering

Important

Billable item: The product and service name that appears on your Alibaba Cloud bill. Use this name for bill reconciliation.

1. Web search (text search)

Metering: A request is considered valid if the target URL returns an HTTP status code below 400.

When using the UnifiedSearch API for web search (text search), metering depends on the EngineType parameter:

Search latency (average RT)

Number of returned web pages

Billable item

Generic

950 ms

Approximately 10

web search (standard edition) * 1

GenericAdvanced

950 ms

40 to 80

web search (standard edition) * 1 + value-added package * 1

LiteAdvanced

500 ms

1 to 50

web search (speed edition) * 1

Deep

6s

1 to 50

vertical search * 50

2. Multimodal search (image search)

Metering: A request is considered valid if the target URL returns an HTTP status code below 400.

When using the MultimodalSearch API for multimodal search (image search), metering depends on the EngineType parameter:

Search latency (average RT)

Number of returned web pages

Billable item

MultimodalSpeed

1,000 ms

—

multimodal search (speed edition) * 1

MultimodalSpeedAdvanced

1,600 ms

—

multimodal search (speed edition) * 1 + value-added package * 1

3. Value-added package

Metering for value-added services: Each type of value-added service consumes a specific number of value-added packages per call. You are billed based on the total packages consumed. The CostCredits structure in the API response details the packages used in each request.

Billable item

Enhanced summary (first 10 URLs)

value-added package * 1

Enhanced Edition

value-added package * 1

Multimodal enhancement

value-added package * 1

Pricing

Standard edition: Generic

Important

When you call the UnifiedSearch API, billing is triggered based on your request parameters:

  • If the request parameter engineType is set to Generic, web search (standard edition) fees apply.

Performance specifications (QPS)

Tiered unit price (CNY/1,000 calls)

Tier 1: 42.00

Tier 2: 38.00

Tier 3: 34.00

Tier 4: 30.00

30 (inclusive)

0 ≤ daily calls < 200,000

200,000 ≤ daily calls < 350,000

350,000 ≤ daily calls < 600,000

≥ 600,000

60 (inclusive)

1,000,000 ≤ daily calls < 1,200,000

1,200,000 ≤ daily calls < 1,600,000

1,600,000 ≤ daily calls < 2,000,000

≥ 2,000,000

100 (inclusive)

1,700,000 ≤ daily calls < 2,000,000

2,000,000 ≤ daily calls < 2,600,000

2,600,000 ≤ daily calls < 3,000,000

≥ 3,000,000

200 (inclusive)

3,500,000 ≤ daily calls < 4,500,000

4,500,000 ≤ daily calls < 6,000,000

6,000,000 ≤ daily calls < 8,000,000

≥ 8,000,000

Billing example

image

Billing rules

  • Unit price for tiered pricing

    Note

    Billing is based on a daily "tier reached" method. For a given performance specification, you are automatically billed each day at the rate of the tier that corresponds to your total number of daily calls, as shown in the table above.

    Example scenario: Billing for two days that fall into different tiers

    • Example: A user has performance specifications of 30 QPS. On May 10, 2025, the user makes 360,000 calls to web search (standard edition). On May 11, 2025, the user makes 150,000 calls to web search (standard edition).

      • Fee for May 10: All calls for the day are billed at the unit price for Tier 3 of the 30 QPS plan. 360,000 / 1,000 × 34.00 = CNY 12,240.

      • Fee for May 11: All calls for the day are billed at the unit price for Tier 1 of the 30 QPS plan. 150,000 / 1,000 × 42.00 = CNY 6,300.

    Example scenario: Billing when call volume exceeds the highest tier for your QPS performance specifications

    • Example: A user with 30 QPS performance specifications makes 1,100,000 calls to web search (standard edition) on May 10, 2025. This usage might exceed the upper limit for the selected performance specifications. If you frequently exceed your QPS limit, service reliability cannot be guaranteed. To ensure reliability, upgrade your performance specifications to 60 QPS. Contact your business manager one week in advance or click Contact Us for assistance with the upgrade.

      • If you remain at 30 QPS: All 1,100,000 calls are billed at the unit price for Tier 4 of the 30 QPS plan. 1,100,000 / 1,000 × 30.00 = CNY 33,000.

      • If you upgrade to 60 QPS: All 1,100,000 calls are billed at the unit price for Tier 1 of the 60 QPS plan. 1,100,000 / 1,000 × 42.00 = CNY 46,200.

  • Performance specifications

    Note

    • The default performance specification for new purchases is 30 QPS.

    • To upgrade your performance specification, your daily call volume must reach the minimum guaranteed volume of the next tier. Submit your request one week in advance. Without a request, your service is limited to the QPS performance of the default specification.

    • Your performance specification is downgraded if your usage does not meet the minimum guaranteed call volume of the lowest tier in your current specification for 5 consecutive calendar days.

    Example scenario: Performance specification downgrade

    • Example: User A has a 60 QPS performance specification. From May 1 to May 5, 2025, their daily call volume for five consecutive days is less than the 1,000,000 calls required for 60 QPS Tier 1.

      • Starting at 00:00 on May 6, the 6th calendar day, the specification is downgraded to 30 QPS. Billing is then calculated based on the pricing tier for the new 30 QPS specification. For the period from May 1 to May 5, 2025, when the daily call volume was below the threshold, billing is still based on the price for 60 QPS Tier 1.

Speed edition: LiteAdvanced

Important

When you call the UnifiedSearch API, billing is triggered based on your request parameters:

  • If the engineType parameter is set to LiteAdvanced, fees for web search (speed edition) apply.

Service type

Unit price (CNY/1,000 calls)

Web search (speed edition) [LiteAdvanced]

12

Billing rules

Note

  • Default performance specifications for new purchases: 10 QPS

  • To request a higher quota, contact your business manager one week in advance or click Contact Us for assistance. A higher quota generally requires a daily call volume of 400,000. If you do not apply, you will only receive the default QPS performance.

Example scenario: How web search (speed edition) is billed

  • Example: User A makes 100,000 calls to LiteAdvanced on May 10, 2025.

    • Web search (speed edition) fee: 100,000 / 1,000 × 12 = 1,200 CNY

Deep edition: Deep

Service type

Unit price (CNY/1,000 calls)

Web search (deep edition) [Deep]

50

Billing rules

Note

  • The default performance specification upon purchase is 5 QPS.

  • To request a higher specification (typically when daily call volume approaches 200,000), contact your business manager or click Contact Us at least one week in advance to apply for a QPS quota increase. If you do not request an upgrade, your service is limited to your current QPS performance.

Example scenario: How web search (deep edition) is billed

  • Example: User A makes 100,000 calls using Deep on May 10, 2025.

    • Cost for web search (deep edition): (100,000 / 1,000) * 50 = CNY 5,000

Multimodal search (image search)

Important

When you call the MultimodalSearch API, billing is triggered based on your request parameters:

  • If you set the engineType parameter to MultimodalSpeed, you are charged for multimodal search (speed edition).

Service type

Unit price (CNY/1,000 calls)

Multimodal search (speed edition) [MultimodalSpeed]

25

Billing rules

Note

  • The default performance specification upon purchase is 5 QPS.

  • To request a higher specification, contact your business manager or click Contact Us at least one week in advance. If you do not request an upgrade, your service is limited to your current QPS performance.

Example scenario: How multimodal search is billed

  • Example: User A makes 100,000 MultimodalSearch calls on May 10, 2025.

    • Cost for multimodal search (speed edition): (100,000 / 1,000) * 25 = CNY 2,500

Value-added packages: Advanced

Important

When you call the UnifiedSearch API, billing for value-added services is triggered based on your request parameters:

  • If you set the engineType parameter to GenericAdvanced, you are charged for the Enhanced Edition value-added service.

  • If you set the summary parameter in the contents object to true, you are charged for the enhanced summary value-added service.

When you call the MultimodalSearch API, billing is triggered based on your request parameters:

  • If you set the engineType parameter to MultimodalSpeedAdvanced, you are charged for the multimodal enhancement service.

Service type

Unit price (CNY/1,000 calls)

Enhanced Edition

2.8 (1 value-added package)

Enhanced summary (first 10 URLs)

2.8 (1 value-added package)

Multimodal enhancement

2.8 (1 value-added package)

Billing rules

  1. Value-added service types

    • Enhanced: Retrieves 40 to 80 URLs.

    • Enhanced summary: Provides enhanced summaries for the first 10 URLs by default. These summaries are excerpts of relevant paragraphs generated by a Large Language Model (LLM).

  2. Unit price: All value-added services are billed per call, with no performance specification limits.

    Example scenario: How value-added packages are billed

    • Example: User A has a performance specification of 30 QPS. On May 10, 2025, they make 400,000 total web search (standard edition) calls. Billing for value-added services that day includes 360,000 calls with enhanced summary and 120,000 Enhanced Edition calls.

      The total daily call volume of 400,000 falls into the 30 QPS, Tier 3 pricing.

      1. Cost for value-added packages: ((360,000 + 120,000) / 1,000) * 2.8 = CNY 1,344

        • Cost for enhanced summary: (360,000 / 1,000) * 2.8 = CNY 1,008

        • Cost for Enhanced Edition: (120,000 / 1,000) * 2.8 = CNY 336

      2. Cost for web search (standard edition): (400,000 / 1,000) * 34 = CNY 13,600

      3. Total cost for May 10: 1,344 + 13,600 = CNY 14,944

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