Apr 20, 2026·8 min read
Shipping the Research API: lessons from a year of multi-step retrieval
How we went from prototype to production with a multi-step research pipeline that handles 10M queries/day.
— Sarah Chen, Staff Engineer
Now live: Research API streaming
The developer hub
for You.com
Search, Contents, and Research APIs designed to ground your AI in the open web. Docs, SDKs, a monthly challenge, and the showcase — all in one place.
Trusted by builders atLinearNotionCursorReplitGranola
The platform
Three APIs. One mental model.
Pick the right primitive for the job — or compose all three.
Real-time web grounding
Search API
Sub-second web results with snippets, links, and metadata. Built for RAG.
await you.search({
query: "latest react 19 features",
freshness: "week",
});Full-page extraction
Contents API
Clean, parsed page contents from any URL. Markdown, structured, ready to embed.
await you.contents({
urls: ["https://example.com/post"],
format: "markdown",
});Multi-step deep research
Research API
Autonomous research pipeline with streaming intermediate steps and citations.
for await (const step of you.research({
prompt: "Compare RAG vs fine-tuning",
})) console.log(step);SDKs
Official, typed, edge-ready.
$ npm i @youdotcom/sdk
$ pip install youdotcom
WebFinds · Live demo
Only the results that match your criteria.
Describe what you're looking for in plain English. WebFinds extracts a checklist of criteria from your query, searches the live web, verifies each result against that checklist, and pulls out the fields that matter — into a spreadsheet you can save, share, and export.
Mode
Pulls 25 results, judges each against your criteria with an LLM, and extracts the columns you ask for. Saves as a Set. ~5–10s.
Examples
Criteria:YC-backeddev tools categoryfounded after 2022has free tier
›What are criteria?
Criteria are the binary checks each result must pass to be marked Verified. We auto-extract them from your query — edit, remove, or add your own.
Columns are extracted by the LLM from each result's title and snippet. Empty cells (n/a) mean the value couldn't be confidently determined.
Columns:FoundedPricing
Sample preview · run a query to build a real set
Live playground
Try the Search API
in your browser.
Your API key never touches a third-party log — requests proxy through this origin and are forwarded to You.com directly.
response.json
// Run a query to see the response.
// Results stream in real-time.April 2026 · Searchbuilders Challenge
Build a research agent for a niche you love
Use the Research API to build an autonomous agent that does deep research on a topic you care about — vintage synths, pro cycling, mycology, your call. Bonus points for surprising the judges.
Prize
$5,000 cash + featured Showcase spot
Deadline
0d0hremaining
Past winners
Mar 2026scholar-grepby Aditi R.
$5kFeb 2026trendscoutby Lukas M.
$5kJan 2026papercrawlby Yuki T.
$5kShowcase
What teams are shipping.
L
Linear
AI-powered ticket triage with Search API
Linear uses You.com Search to ground its AI assistant in real-time engineering documentation across the web.
Read story
N
Notion
Live web context for Notion AI
Notion AI pulls fresh web context via the Contents API to answer questions beyond the workspace.
Read story
C
Cursor
Documentation-aware code completion
Cursor enriches code completions with up-to-date framework docs fetched via You.com.
Read story
P
Perplexity Workspaces
Enterprise research at scale
Perplexity uses the Research API to power deep multi-step queries inside enterprise workspaces.
Read story
R
Replit Agent
Real-time package and API lookups
Replit Agent calls Search API during code generation to verify library APIs.
Read story
G
Granola
Meeting context grounded in the open web
Granola enriches meeting summaries with public context using Contents API.
Read story
Events
Build with us, in person.
Integration clinics, meetups, and the occasional hack night.
Clinic
Apr 30, 6:21 AM
Integration Clinic: Search API Deep Dive
Live walkthrough of building production-grade Search API integrations. Bring your code, leave with answers.
Virtual (Zoom)
Meetup
May 7, 6:21 AM
Searchbuilders SF Meetup
In-person meetup with the You.com team and Bay Area developers building search-powered products.
San Francisco, CA
Office Hours
May 14, 6:21 AM
Research API Office Hours
Drop-in session to ask the engineering team anything about the Research API.
Virtual (Discord)
Hackathon
May 23, 6:21 AM
Hack Night: Build with You.com
4-hour virtual hack night. Prizes for the most creative API integration.
Virtual
Blog
From the engineers
who built it.
Apr 11, 2026·11 min read
Grounding LLMs with the Search API: a practical guide
A field guide to retrieval-augmented generation that actually works in production. Code samples in TS and Python.
— Marcus Webb, DevRel
Apr 2, 2026·6 min read
Designing the Contents API: tradeoffs we made (and would make again)
Behind the scenes on the architectural choices that make Contents API fast, cheap, and predictable.
— Priya Anand, Eng Manager
Status
All systems normal
Real-time uptime and incident reports.
- Search APIOperational
- Contents APIOperational
- Research APIOperational
- DashboardOperational
Changelog
Recent updates
Everything new across the platform.
v2.4.0
Apr 21
Streaming responses for Research API
You can now stream intermediate steps from the Research API for lower perceived latency.
v2.3.1
Apr 17
Increased Contents API rate limits
Default tier rate limits raised from 60 to 120 RPM. No action required.
v2.3.0
Apr 9
New 'freshness' parameter on Search API
Filter results by recency: hour, day, week, month, year.
v2.2.0
Mar 31
Python SDK 1.0 released
First stable release of the official Python SDK with async support and full type hints.
v2.1.0
Mar 19
TypeScript SDK now supports edge runtimes
Cloudflare Workers, Vercel Edge, and Deno are now first-class targets.