Consensus vs Liner
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Consensus
AI search engine that answers questions from peer-reviewed papers
Liner
AI search with cited answers, research agents and a writer
Where they differ
- Only Liner lists macOS, Windows and iOS apps.
- Only Liner lists a browser extension.
- Liner also covers long-form writing and highlights.
At a glance
| Consensus | Liner | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Free plan |
| Starts at | Not published | $14.99 per month, billed annually ($17.99 billed monthly) |
| Free plan | Basic paper search across 220M+ papers, plus 10 Pro messages and 3 Deep Searches per month. Paid tiers are Pro, Deep, Team and Enterprise; their prices could not be read. | Unlimited Advanced Search with ads in the answers, 1 file upload a day of up to 25 MB and 10 Research Assistant uses a day. |
| Free trial | None listed | None listed |
| Web | ||
| macOS | ||
| Windows | ||
| iOS | ||
| Android | ||
| Browser extension | ||
| Made by | Consensus NLP, Inc. | Liner |
| Price read from | Not confirmed | liner.com |
| Checked | Oct 5, 2026 | Oct 5, 2026 |
Who each one suits
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
Liner
- People who want every line of an AI answer tied to a source
- Students drafting a literature review or looking for citations
- Users who want search, research and writing on one subscription
- Small teams: the Team plan covers 2 to 20 members
Worth knowing
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.
Liner
- The free plan shows ads in answers and allows 1 file upload a day; the plan table lists 0 agent credits for it, though the FAQ mentions limited credits.
- Agents and external models spend credits: Pro includes 1,000 and Max 2,500, and one Literature Review request uses 40.
- The site's FAQ says Liner Scholar and Liner Write are supported only on desktop.
- Liner does not offer refunds; a subscription can be canceled before it renews.
Key features
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.
Liner
- Cited answers
- Answers carry a citation on each line that opens the source. Follow-up questions continue the thread, and an answer can be turned into a mind map.
- Deep Research
- Gathers information on a topic and returns it as an organized report while showing its line of reasoning. Each request uses 40 agent credits.
- Liner Scholar agents
- Agents for academic work include Literature Review, Citation Recommender, Research Tracer, Hypothesis Generator and Peer Review. Each request costs between 30 and 80 credits.
- File uploads
- Upload papers and PDFs to get summaries and ask questions about them: 1 file a day on Free, 20 a day on Pro and unlimited on Max.
- Liner Write
- A writing workspace that drafts from a topic, shapes ideas into emails, newsletters and reports, and lets you search and edit in the same window.
- Search API and MCP
- Developers can call Liner's search and answer agents through an API, and MCP servers expose its web search and scholar search to other AI agents.
Plans
Consensus
Pricing could not be confirmed. See consensus.app.
Liner
Free$0
Unlimited Advanced Search with ads in the answers, 1 file upload a day of up to 25 MB and 10 Research Assistant uses a day.
Pro$14.99
per month, billed annually; $17.99 billed monthly
1,000 agent credits, 20 file uploads a day of up to 100 MB, ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude models, and no ads. Covers Liner, Liner Scholar and Liner Write.
Max$29.99
per month, billed annually; $35.99 billed monthly
Everything in Pro with 2,500 agent credits and unlimited file uploads of up to 200 MB each.
Team$26.99
per seat / month
For 2 to 20 members: everything in Max plus central billing, a workspace with admin controls and team data excluded from AI training.
EnterpriseCustom
Everything in Team plus a dedicated manager, onboarding sessions, audit logs and higher discount rates.
Ways to pay less
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.
Liner
- Annual discount
Lower monthly rate with annual billing
The pricing page labels annual billing as saving 20%. Pro is $14.99 a month billed annually against $17.99 monthly, and Max is $29.99 against $35.99, about 17% less.
