What a search costs, and what is free

Searching spends credits because every search is a live lookup that we pay for. What follows is exactly what costs what, and the three things you can do for nothing.

The price is always on the button. The Search button says "Search - 1 credit" or "Search - 50 credits" before you press it, and that figure is the figure charged: it is worked out by the same rule that does the charging, not estimated separately. If the page is already in your recent results the button reads "free - already fetched" and no confirmation appears, because there is nothing to confirm.

Prev and Next show a ceiling rather than an exact figure - "up to 50 cr". They say the most a page can cost, because whether the particular page you are moving to is one you already fetched is only known once you press it. If it was, you are charged nothing and told so. You are never charged more than the figure shown.

Free thing 1: re-opening a page you already bought. Any page you fetched in the last 7 days is served again for nothing, and never re-queries the source. Paging back and forth through results you have already paid for is free.

Free thing 2: the match count, once bought. On deep search the source tells us how many people match your filters, and that answer arrives alongside a page you have already paid for. We remember it against those filters for 24 hours, so running the same search again, or coming back to it tomorrow, shows the count without buying it a second time. It is always shown with its age ("4,183,665 people matched 6 hours ago (remembered, not live)") because a count is a snapshot of an index that keeps moving, and we will not pass an old number off as a current one. After 24 hours the next paid search refreshes it.

Free thing 3: checking your filters. On deep search there is a "Check filters - free" button. It confirms the filter set is well-formed and shows which of your filters were understood, so you can spot one that is not narrowing anything before you spend 50 credits finding out. Be clear about what it is not: it does NOT count the matches and does NOT show you any of them. There is no free preview of results anywhere, from anyone, and we would rather say so than dress a filter check up as one. If the check cannot run, that tells you nothing about your filters and your search works exactly as normal.

Why there is no free "how many match" on a brand-new filter set. The source we buy from runs a genuine live search for every request and charges for the resources it uses. It has no count-only and no sample endpoint, and is not building one. So the first search of a filter set you have never run costs a page; from then on the count is free for a day and the pages you fetched are free for a week.

What each case costs, end to end. First search of a new filter set: one page, at the price shown on the button. The exact same search again within 7 days: nothing, and the count comes back free with its age. A refined filter set (you added a seniority, or changed a title): a new filter set, so one page again. Coming back to a filter set you ran earlier the same week: free for the pages you already fetched, and free for the count if it is under 24 hours old, otherwise one page refreshes it. Changing only the ORDER of your job titles, or their capitalisation, is not a new search and does not cost anything extra.