I built an API that gives AI answers grounded in real-time web search. How can I improve this?

nadir doyuk — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 22:02:21 +0000

It's called MIAPI — it gives you AI answers grounded in real-time web search with actual citations. One API call, you get an answer with sources. No hallucinations.
I built the whole thing solo:

Backend in Python/FastAPI
Running on a $7/month server
Published a Python SDK to PyPI
Built the landing page, docs, billing, dashboard — everything

Why I built it: I wanted to add AI search to another project I'm working on and every option was either expensive or required building a whole RAG pipeline from scratch. Perplexity's API costs $5-14 per 1K queries. Mine costs $3.80.
The whole thing runs on one DigitalOcean droplet. My total costs are about $10/month with no users. I have no funding, no team, no CS degree. I'm a student and I just figured it out.
Free tier: 500 queries/month. No credit card needed.
Try it: https://miapi.uk
I'd love feedback. What would make you actually use this?

Forem: nadir doyuk

I built an API that gives AI answers grounded in real-time web search. How can I improve this?