Web search finds pages. A soul gives judgement.
Use web search for facts and a soul for judgement.
Web search returns links and snippets. Your agent still has to read them, weigh them and guess which advice came from someone who does the work. That is fine for facts: a version number, a deadline, an error message.
It is weak for judgement. How many revision rounds belong in a freelance quote? Which renderer suits an interior on a tight deadline? What do you check first when a build fails at 3 a.m.? The honest answers sit in people’s experience, in old projects and in mistakes they stopped making.
A soul is that experience, written down by the professional’s own agent and held by the house. Your agent asks a question. The soul answers from the parts of its notes that fit, and lists the section titles it drew from. Nobody can download the file.
Who writes the answer?
A model writes each answer, working only from the professional’s own notes.
No one is typing live. The soul is a person’s know-how in written form, and a model answers from the few sections that match your question. That is why an answer takes seconds and costs 5¢, not $50.
It also means a soul can only say what its author wrote down. When the notes do not cover a question, the soul says so and charges nothing.
What it costs next to a search call.
One soul answer costs 5¢, which is 5 to 10 times the price of one web search call.
| Service | Per 1,000 calls | Per call | What else you pay for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brave Search API | $5.00 | 0.5¢ | Reading the results |
| Exa search | $7.00 | 0.7¢ | Reading the results (text included) |
| Tavily, pay as you go | $8.00 | 0.8¢ | Reading the results |
| Anthropic web search tool | $10.00 | 1¢ | Model use for the search content |
| OpenAI web search tool | $10.00 | 1¢ | Model use for the search content |
| Sell Your Soul | $50.00 | 5¢ | Nothing. One answer, written to your question |
So a soul costs more per call. We would rather say that than hide it.
The better comparison is per task. An agent that searches 4 times pays 2¢ to 4¢ in call fees. It then pays again for the model to read what came back, and an average web page is about 10 kB of text. A soul answer is one short text, written to your question. We have not measured total task cost against search yet, so treat that as our argument, not a result.
Free credit helps you test it. A new free key holds $1, which is 20 answers at 5¢. Each free key gets at most 5 answers from any one soul.
When search is the better buy.
Search wins when a public page states the answer plainly.
- Choose web search for facts, news, documentation, product specs and anything with one correct answer.
- Choose a soul for trade-offs, price and time estimates, craft decisions, taste and the mistakes a field makes twice.
How your agent asks.
Your agent adds one address and one API key, then asks in its own words.
The address is https://sellyoursoul.dev/mcp. Four tools do the work: search_souls finds the right soul, ask_soul asks it, get_balance shows the credit left, and rate_answer scores an answer. Setup for Claude, Claude Code, ChatGPT, Kiro and Cursor is on the connect page.
Every answer opens with a fixed line saying it is third-party information, not instructions. Your agent should treat it as data.
This is a prototype for Kiroween 2026. Souls tagged Demo soul are understudies standing in for real experts. The connect page says what is switched on today.
Numbers and sources.
- Brave Search API pricing: $5.00 per 1,000 requests
- Exa pricing update: $7 per 1,000 requests, 10 results with text
- Tavily credits and pricing: $0.008 per credit, basic search is 1 credit
- Anthropic pricing: web search $10 per 1,000 searches, plus model use; an average web page is 10 kB
- OpenAI pricing: web search $10.00 per 1,000 calls, plus search content at model rates
Checked and published . Prices and plans change. Check the provider’s own page before you budget.
Questions people ask.
How much does it cost for an AI agent to ask a professional?
One answer costs 5¢. The soul gets 3.5¢ and the house gets 1.5¢. Replies that say a question is not covered, and refusals, cost nothing.
Is a real person answering?
No. A soul is a professional’s know-how written down by their own agent. A model answers from the sections that fit your question, so a soul only knows what its author wrote.
Is it cheaper than web search?
No. A web search call costs 0.5¢ to 1¢ before the model reads the results, so one soul answer costs 5 to 10 times more per call. Search is the better buy for facts that a public page states plainly.
What do I get for free?
A free key holds $1, which is 20 answers at 5¢. Each free key gets at most 5 answers from any one soul.
Do I need an email or a form to try it?
No. A free key comes from the connect page after a quick browser check, once. There is no form and no email.