Consensus vs Keenious

Consensus

• Checking what peer-reviewed studies say about a specific question
• Students and researchers starting a literature review
• Teams that want cited paper search inside ChatGPT, Claude or their own tools

Keenious

• Students looking for sources that match a draft essay or assignment
• Writers who want paper recommendations inside Word or Google Docs
• Researchers searching for literature across languages and disciplines
• Universities that want campus-wide access linked to library holdings

Consensus

• Paid prices could not be confirmed: the pricing page did not show them when read, and Consensus's own pricing summary leaves out dollar amounts.
• The free tier allows 10 Pro messages and 3 Deep Searches per month. Pro includes 15 Deep Searches, Deep 200 and Team 50 per seat.
• API calls beyond a plan's included credits cost $0.05 each; 500 are included on Pro, Team and Enterprise and 2,000 on Deep.
• An Android app is listed on Google Play. No iOS app was found on the US App Store when checked.

Keenious

• The free plan allows 3 conversations a day with 5 AI responses each, and PDF uploads stop at 3 MB.
• Keenious Plus has no free trial, and the pricing FAQ says early cancellations are not refunded.
• Uploaded files and conversations are deleted automatically after 1 day.
• The site lists a web app and add-ins for Microsoft Word and Google Docs, but no mobile or desktop apps.

Consensus

Cited answers from 220M+ papers

Ask a research question in plain language and get a summary tied to its source papers, with filters for study type, journal rank, citation count, sample size and year.

Deep Search

Builds and runs a search strategy, screens up to 1,000 papers and writes a report on the 50 most relevant. The monthly allowance depends on the plan.

Research agent

Chains citation crawling, DOI lookup, author search and similar-paper search, and can build a comparison table from the full text of the results.

Citation Graph

Starts from one or more seed papers and maps what they cite and what has cited them since. It is included with every account.

Library with Zotero import

Imports papers from Zotero, BibTeX, RIS or PDF, then searches the collection, looks for gaps in it and generates bibliographies.

API and MCP connector

The API returns ranked papers with metadata for use in other tools, and the MCP connector links Consensus search to ChatGPT, Claude and Copilot.

Keenious

Search from your own text

Type a question, paste text or upload a PDF, and Keenious returns related papers. Results are retrieved from its index by meaning and keyword ranking; they are not written by a language model.

Chat about papers

Chat explains methods, statistics and terminology, including text you highlight in a paper. It runs on Google's Gemini 3.5 Flash, and there is no choice of model.

Search map

Shows each result as a dot placed by meaning, colored by research area and sized by citation count. Selecting an area filters the map and the list together.

Word and Google Docs add-ins

Keenious runs as a sidebar in Microsoft Word and Google Docs, so related research appears beside the document being written.

Search across languages

The site says Keenious can be used in nearly 100 languages, and a question in one language can find research written in another.

Bookmarks and citation export

Papers can be bookmarked, and results or bookmarks exported as citations for a reference manager; the help center points EndNote users to the RIS format.

Consensus

Pricing could not be confirmed. See consensus.app.

Keenious

• Free$0

  All search results, 5 AI responses per conversation, 3 conversations a day and a 3 MB file upload limit.

• Plus for Individuals$10

  per month, billed annually ($120); $45 quarterly or $20 monthly

  Unlimited conversations and responses, export of all results in formats such as RIS and BibTeX, and 20 MB file uploads.

• Plus for Teams$20

  per user / month, billed annually ($240); $90 quarterly or $40 monthly

  All Plus features with an admin console, centralized billing, two-factor authentication and dedicated support.

• InstitutionsCustom

  Access for all students and faculty with SSO, SAML or IP-based access, library collection links and a data processing agreement.

Consensus

• Education

  Up to 40% off for students, faculty and US clinicians

  Students and faculty with a valid school email, and US clinicians with a valid NPI number, can claim up to 40% off. Consensus's pricing summary gives students 1 year free, then 40% off until graduation.

Keenious

• Annual discount

  Annual billing is half the monthly rate

  The pricing page's price data lists Plus for Individuals at $120 a year, $45 a quarter or $20 a month, and Plus for Teams at $240, $90 or $40 per user.

• Education

  30% off annual billing for students

  The pricing FAQ offers students a 30% annual discount. They email the verification address from their institution's email account and receive a discount code.