Algolia vs Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch)
Default scenario: At 1M records, 5M searches / month, estimated bills are $2,520/yr for Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) and $34,260/yr for Algolia. That’s a $31,740 difference before accounting for different features or operating costs.
The services may differ in features, performance, support and the work you need to do yourself. Read the notes and test what matters to your setup.
Your selected usage
1M records, 5M searches / month
- Algolia: $34,260/yr estimated
- Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch): $2,520/yr estimated
Estimated costs at different usage levels
| Usage | Algolia | Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) |
|---|---|---|
| Docs site10K records, 100K searches / month | $540/yrGrow · $0 records + $45 searches | $324/yrServerless, small (about 2 GB data) · $0 records + $0 searches |
| E-commerce1M records, 5M searches / month | $34,260/yrGrow · $360 records + $2,495 searches | $2,520/yrServerless, production (about 20 GB data) · $0 records + $0 searches |
| Marketplace20M records, 50M searches / month | $395,460/yrGrow · $7,960 records + $24,995 searches | $2,520/yrServerless, production (about 20 GB data) · $0 records + $0 searches |
Resource-priced vendors (billed by RAM/cluster) are mapped to the smallest plan that fits; see notes. Try your own numbers against all search providers.
Side by side
| Algolia | Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Hosted search-as-a-service billed per search request and per stored record. Pay-as-you-go Grow plan; enterprise features need an Elevate contract. | Managed Elasticsearch from Elastic. Serverless projects bill per VCU-hour of search and ingest compute plus GB stored; hosted clusters bill by size. |
| Headquarters | 🇺🇸 United States | 🇳🇱 Netherlands |
| Parent jurisdiction | 🇺🇸 United States | 🇳🇱 Netherlands |
| EU self-serve plan | Available; check eligible plans and regions | Available; check eligible plans and regions |
| GDPR DPA | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | payg | payg |
| Free tier | Build/Free plan with 10,000 search requests per month and 50,000 records. | 14-day free trial. |
| Open source | No | Yes · self-hostable |
| Source last checked | 2026-10-06 | 2026-10-06 |
| Pricing evidence | Published rates | Modeled rates |
Which should you choose?
Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) has the lower estimated bill wherever both list a self-serve price, from 100K records, 500K searches / month to 20M records, 100M searches / month. From about 50M records, 250M searches / month, Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) is over its self-serve plan limits.
Choose Algolia if…
Our data shows no advantage on price, residency, jurisdiction or licensing. Compare features in the notes below.
Choose Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) if…
- it has the lower estimated bill at Docs site, E-commerce and Marketplace usage
- you want a provider whose parent company is outside the US (Netherlands)
- you want open-source software you can run yourself
Based on estimated list-price bills and the facts above. Features, performance and support aren’t scored.
Algolia pricing
Calculated from the listed vendor rates; exclusions still apply.
| Plan | 1k additional records / month | 1k additional searches |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 |
| Grow | $0.4 | $0.5 |
Grow: 10,000 search requests and 100,000 records included each month, then $0.50 per 1,000 search requests and $0.40 per 1,000 records. With search-as-you-type, every keystroke can be a billable request. Grow Plus (AI ranking, synonyms and personalization features) has the same record price but $1.75 per 1,000 searches. NeuralSearch, SSO and the 99.999% SLA require Elevate (annual contract; volume discounts with annual commitment). Grow and Grow Plus can be hosted in the US, UK or EU West. Algolia was founded in Paris and is headquartered in San Francisco.
Algolia plan limits, full rates and cheaper alternatives · official pricing page
Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) pricing
Published rates converted using workload assumptions. Read the notes. Uses published example deployments and assumes 1 KB records. Real query load and resource sizing can differ.
| Plan | Base fee / month |
|---|---|
| Serverless, small (about 2 GB data) | $27 |
| Serverless, production (about 20 GB data) | $210 |
Elasticsearch Serverless list prices are "as low as" $0.09 per search VCU-hour, $0.14 per ingest VCU-hour, $0.047 per GB retained per month and $0.05 per GB egress. Support is extra (up to 15% of usage on Enterprise). The calculator uses Elastic's own published examples, assuming ~1 KB per record. A dev project with 2 GB of data and light search (2 h/day) is $27/month on the default Performant search power ($24 On-demand). A production project with 20 GB and search busy 8 h/day is $210 ($190 On-demand). Spiky or very high query volume scales VCUs, so busy marketplaces can exceed this. Elastic Cloud Hosted (dedicated clusters) is billed by deployment size instead. Self-managed Elasticsearch is free under AGPL/SSPL/ELv2. Elastic N.V. is a Dutch company with dual headquarters in Amsterdam and San Francisco and most operations in the US. EU regions are available on AWS, GCP and Azure.
Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) plan limits, full rates and cheaper alternatives · official pricing page
Frequently asked questions
Is Algolia cheaper than Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch)?
Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) has the lower estimated bill wherever both list a self-serve price, from 100K records, 500K searches / month to 20M records, 100M searches / month. From about 50M records, 250M searches / month, Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) is over its self-serve plan limits. At 1M records, 5M searches / month, the estimates are $34,260/yr for Algolia and $2,520/yr for Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch). Estimates use list prices and leave out features, support and operating costs.
Do Algolia and Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) offer EU data residency?
Both offer EU data residency on a self-serve plan. Check which plans and regions qualify.
Do Algolia and Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) have a free tier or trial?
Algolia: Build/Free plan with 10,000 search requests per month and 50,000 records. Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch): 14-day free trial.
Where are Algolia and Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) based?
Algolia is headquartered in the United States. Elastic Cloud (Elasticsearch) is headquartered in the Netherlands.