Independent search index and search API
Brave Search, part of Brave Software, runs its own web index and sells a Search API that is used as a source by several AI answer engines and metasearch products. Brave Software is privately held and its search unit is not separately funded.
Brave Search was founded in 2021 and is based in San Francisco.
No funding has been publicly disclosed for Brave Search, or none that could be verified against a primary source. Absence here means "not disclosed", not "not funded".
Direct and adjacent competitors tracked in the Atlas.
Search engine and API built for AI agents
Exa builds a web search index and API designed for LLMs and agents rather than human browsing, plus Websets for high-compute research queries. It raised an $85M Series B led by Benchmark in September 2025 and a $250M Series C led by Andreessen Horowitz in May 2026 at a $2.2B valuation.
Search API for LLM agents
Tavily provides an API-first search engine that returns pre-scraped, pre-ranked text chunks with citations for AI agents. It raised a $5M seed in July 2024 and a $20M Series A led by Insight Partners and Alpha Wave Global in August 2025, and was acquired by Nebius Group for a reported $275M in February 2026.