Search-as-a-Service platform Algolia is on a mission to revolutionize the way that web users find information. The tool not only handles some 1.75 trillion user queries a year, served by over 70 data centers worldwide, but it’s also used by one in six web users, making it a solution worth considering if you’re looking for a way to improve your site’s search capabilities.
Here’s the thing though – with SaaS prices continuing to soar and an ever-growing number of AI tools vying for both your attention and budget, you’ll no doubt be wanting to keep your spend to a minimum. Which means being more stringent than ever with the tools you purchase.
So, the question is, how much does the platform cost? And can you get a discount?
Here’s everything you need to about Algolia pricing.
How much does Algolia cost?
Algolia offers several different pricing plans, including a free version of its platform, a pay-as-you-go iteration, and fully customized annual subscriptions for businesses at scale. Pay-as-you-go prices start at just $0.50 per set of search requests.
The company isn’t as transparent with its enterprise-level pricing though, as is the case with most software providers — it’s a symptom of the wider challenge of pricing transparency faced by SaaS buyers across all verticals.
The problem is, this can make it incredibly difficult for you to know whether you’re being quoted a fair deal, let alone the best possible deal. Which is just one of the reasons why as many as 90% of companies end up overpaying for their SaaS tools by an average of 26%, reflecting a massive loss in potential savings.
So, what’s the solution? How can you gain insight into the actual cost of an Algolia Premium or Elevate subscription and ultimately ensure you’re paying a fair price?
The first step is in knowing which plan type you’re wanting to purchase.
Algolia pricing tiers
Build
Algolia’s free edition permits 10,000 search requests per month, 1 million records, and supports a range of basic search and discovery features. These include analytics, Natural Language Processing, and A/B testing. Build is recommended for users looking to trial Algolia’s features, but does have some limits on full functionality.
Grow
Teams looking to develop their search solution may upgrade to Algolia Grow, a pay-as-you-go plan which is billed monthly and permits higher feature usage over Build. Grow is recommended for projects in production with data being used by end users. It has a free tier permitting 10,000 search requests and records of 100,000, with any consumption beyond this threshold billed at $0.50 per 1,000 monthly search requests.
Premium
Algolia Premium is an annually billed paid plan which includes additional AI features, global hosting options, and access to extra services and add-ons for users’ search solutions. Prospective customers will need to contact the Algolia sales team directly for a quote.
Elevate
Elevate is the most advanced tier of Algolia’s platform, and like Premium, requires potential buyers to contact the sales team for pricing details. Subscribers can access everything from Premium as well as Algolia NeuralSearch, which supports further AI functionality and vector and keyword results processing in parallel. Users will need to commit to an annual contract with Elevate.
So, if you’re searching for a more advanced plan, the obvious next step is to obtain a quote from the Algolia sales team. However, entering into a sales conversation without any frame of reference on the price you’ll pay could make it challenging to get a good deal for your organization.
So, how else can you find out what you can expect to pay for Algolia’s enterprise-level plans?
How to find out what other companies are paying
If you’re not yet wanting to engage with a sales representative, your second option is to scour the internet to find examples of what other companies are paying.
One user on this Reddit thread, for example, shared an invoice showing a monthly charge of $6,309.30. While this is based on pay-as-you-go pricing and could therefore fluctuate month-on-month, if we were to assume similar usage levels each month, the annual spend could easily rack up to $76,000.
A second user on the same thread, however, claims to be paying $60,000 for the year.
While this approach to finding out the cost of an Algolia subscription can provide a good benchmark, in this instance the results are conflicting, and possibly even outdated – even though they’re only six months old.
So, what’s the other, more reliable option?
In short, Vertice.
Can you get a discount on Algolia pricing?
While the information above can be useful for providing a frame of reference on what others are paying for a subscription, it doesn’t necessarily confirm whether or not they received a discount. Especially when the original list pricing is obscured, as is the case for Algolia’s Premium and Elevate plans.
This is where additional pricing and discounting insights become invaluable.
According to our own data, the company has a pricing parity score of 59, meaning that some organizations with similar requirements are paying markedly different amounts for their plans.
This, combined with the fact that DevOps companies in general offer average discounts in the region of 23%, indicates that it is indeed possible to secure a discount on an Algolia subscription.
But just how much of a discount will ultimately depend on your negotiation strategy.
Here are our top tips.
Allow ample lead time
Regardless of whether you’re purchasing Algolia for the first time, or simply renewing your subscription, you should allow yourself ample time to conduct your research and gather the leverage you need to secure the best possible deal.
Of course, the pressure will be amplified for renewals, as there may well be a deadline and notification period to take into account, but even with new purchases you may need to be set up and onboarded by a certain date.
The problem is, when vendors know you need a fast turnaround, they gain more power and can become far less flexible.
Starting negotiations well ahead of time is therefore crucial to avoiding this and securing not only the best price, but also more favorable contract terms.
Commit to a longer subscription period
Algolia offers two annually billed pricing editions — Premium and Elevate. When negotiating your contract for one of these plans, proposing a longer commitment period may encourage the vendor to offer a discounted rate.
In fact, our data tells us that vendors tend to offer an extra 5% discount to your quoted fee per extra year that you sign on for. If you’re confident that Algolia will remain a steadfast asset to your business over the years to come, inquiring about a multi-year subscription could yield significant savings.
Leverage vendor pricing benchmarks
As we’ve discussed, some of the companies that subscribe to Algolia pay different amounts for their contract, even if they have similar usage needs. So, by accessing price benchmarking data that shows what organizations similar to your own are actually paying, you’ll be well-equipped to negotiate a competitive rate for your business.
But the question remains, how can you find this information?
That’s where Vertice comes in.
Leave your software negotiations to Vertice
With access to the pricing and discounting data for more than 16,000 software providers worldwide – Algolia included – we’re not only able to provide you with the leverage you need to secure the best possible deal, but we can also handle these negotiations on your behalf, saving your team a substantial amount of time and energy.
That’s not all we do though.
In addition to working with you as a procurement partner and mediating the negotiation process, our SaaS purchasing platform enables you to monitor and track your applications, spend and even SaaS utilization rates from one convenient dashboard, helping you streamline the procurement process and identify cost-saving opportunities.
See for yourself how much you could be saving on SaaS, or alternatively browse our vendor database for exclusive pricing insights on thousands of other providers.
