Keenious vs Semantic Scholar
We give Keenious a 3.0 GPA and Semantic Scholar a 3.4, out of 4.0. Semantic Scholar grades higher on value for money and the free plan. They get the same grade on features, ease of use and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Keenious
Academic search that recommends papers from your own text
Semantic Scholar
Free AI-powered search engine for scientific literature
How we grade them
| 3.0GPAKeeniousVery good | 3.4GPASemantic ScholarVery good | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | BPlus is $10 a month billed annually, so $120 a year, which is about typical here. It buys unlimited conversations, export in formats like RIS and BibTeX, and 20 MB uploads. Month by month it's $20, twice the price. Students get 30% off the annual plan. | AEntirely free, with no paid plans, and built by a nonprofit. In a category where paid plans usually start around $12 a month, that's as good as value gets. |
| Free plan and trial | BEvery search result is free, which is the main thing. Chat is capped at 3 conversations a day with 5 AI responses each, and PDF uploads stop at 3 MB. Plus has no free trial, so the free plan is your only way to try it. | AYou can search and read papers without an account. A free account adds a library, email alerts, Research Feeds and author page claiming. Nothing is held back for paying users, because there aren't any. |
| Features | BGood at its one trick: type, paste or upload text and get related papers from more than 250 million works, as a list and as a map grouped by research area. Chat explains methods and terms. But there's no choice of model, and uploads and conversations are deleted after 1 day. | BMore than 200 million papers with filters for venue, author, type and date, a flag on the citations that really mattered, and feeds that recommend papers from what you've saved. But TLDR summaries only cover computer science, biology and medicine, and Semantic Reader is in beta and mostly for arXiv papers. |
| Ease of use | BNo App Store rating on record, so B is as high as we go. There's no query to craft, because you paste what you've already written. It works in nearly 100 languages too, so a question in one can find research in another. | BNo App Store rating on record, so B is as high as we go. It works like any search engine: type, filter, read. No account is needed to get going, and a TLDR saves you opening papers that aren't for you. |
| Platforms and integrations | BA web app plus sidebars for Microsoft Word and Google Docs, and results export as citations for a reference manager. Universities can link it to their library collections. The site lists no mobile or desktop apps. | BWeb and a browser extension, with links to Zotero and Mendeley and an Academic Graph API where most endpoints work without a key. There's no smartphone app. The FAQ says the site is designed to be used in mobile browsers. |
| Best for | finding sources that match your draft | free search across the scientific literature |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: Keenious and Semantic Scholar. How we grade
Where they differ
- Keenious starts at $10 per month, billed annually ($20 billed monthly). Semantic Scholar is free.
- Only Semantic Scholar lists a browser extension.
- Keenious also covers chat assistant.
At a glance
| Keenious | Semantic Scholar | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Free |
| Starts at | $10 per month, billed annually ($20 billed monthly) | Free |
| Free plan | All search results, 3 conversations a day with 5 AI responses each, and PDF uploads of up to 3 MB. | Entirely free, with no paid plans. Papers can be read without an account; a free account adds a library, email alerts, Research Feeds and author page claiming. |
| Free trial | None listed | None listed |
| Web | ||
| Browser extension | ||
| Made by | Keenious AS | Allen Institute for AI (Ai2) |
| Price read from | keenious.com | semanticscholar.org |
| Checked | Oct 5, 2026 | Oct 5, 2026 |
Who each one suits
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
Semantic Scholar
- Free literature search across all fields of science
- Keeping up with new papers through alerts and recommendation feeds
- Developers who need open scholarly data through an API
Worth knowing
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.
Semantic Scholar
- There is no smartphone app; the FAQ says the site is designed to be used in mobile browsers.
- TLDR summaries are limited to papers in computer science and the biomedical fields.
- Semantic Reader is in beta and covers mostly arXiv papers, and Ask This Paper works on a limited set of papers.
- Unauthenticated API calls share one pool of 1,000 requests per second; an API key starts at 1 request per second.
Key features
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.
Semantic Scholar
- Paper search with TLDR summaries
- Searches papers with filters for venue, author, publication type and date. TLDRs are very short AI summaries, available for nearly 60 million papers in computer science, biology and medicine.
- Highly Influential Citations
- A machine-learning model flags the citations where the cited paper had a significant effect on the citing one, so a long citation list has a starting point.
- Library and Research Feeds
- Save papers into folders, share public folders and bulk export citations. Turning on a Research Feed for a folder brings paper recommendations based on its contents.
- Paper and author alerts
- Email alerts report new citations of a chosen paper, or new papers and citations for an author you follow.
- Semantic Reader
- A beta reading view for most arXiv papers, with in-line citation cards, a table of contents, AI skimming highlights and on-demand definitions of terms.
- Academic Graph API and datasets
- A REST API for papers, authors, citations, venues and recommendations, plus downloadable datasets. Most endpoints work without a key.
Plans
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.
Semantic Scholar
Free$0
Search, TLDR summaries, Semantic Reader, a paper library, alerts and Research Feeds, plus rate-limited API access.
Ways to pay less
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.
Semantic Scholar
No public discounts listed.
