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Amazon Kendra

aws.amazon.com

From $0.32/mo Free trial WebAPI
Visit aws.amazon.com
Spec score 8.3 #4 of 26 in AI Enterprise Search Software

What it is

Amazon Kendra is a cloud enterprise search service for websites and applications, available through APIs and the web. It uses machine learning to answer natural-language questions, match curated FAQs, and extract answers from HTML tables. The Kendra Retriever API supplies semantically relevant passages for retrieval-augmented generation, with access-control and metadata filtering and relevance tuning. Native connectors cover Amazon S3, Microsoft SharePoint, Salesforce, ServiceNow, Google Drive, and Confluence, while custom and partner connectors are supported. Experience Builder creates search applications without coding or machine-learning experience and integrates with AWS IAM Identity Center, Azure AD, and Okta. Search Analytics reports quality, usability, interaction, and content gaps. Document enrichment can add metadata, convert scans to text, classify files, extract entities, and transform content. Encryption, permission synchronization, answer citations, admin controls, and listed compliance programs are included. Pricing is paid, from $1.12 with a 30-day trial; no free plan.

Spec sheet

What it does
Amazon Kendra is an intelligent enterprise search service powered by machine learning for websites and applications.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Security
Kendra encrypts data in transit and at rest and supports AWS-owned, AWS-managed, or customer-managed KMS keys for at-rest encryption.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Compliance
Amazon Kendra is compliant with HIPAA, SOC 2, IRAP, FedRAMP Moderate in US East and US West, and FedRAMP High in AWS GovCloud (US-West).Read 1 Oct 2026 · docs.aws.amazon.com
Access methods
Kendra can be accessed through the Amazon Kendra console, AWS CLI, and AWS SDKs, and components of a campaign must be created in the same AWS Region.Read 1 Oct 2026 · docs.aws.amazon.com
Connectors
Native connectors include Amazon S3, Microsoft SharePoint, Salesforce, ServiceNow, Google Drive, and Confluence, with custom and partner connectors also supported.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Document enrichment
Custom Document Enrichment can add metadata, convert scanned documents to text, classify documents, extract entities, and transform content using rules or AWS Lambda.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Document-size limit
The maximum size of a single document or raw file ingested through a data-source connector is 50 MB.Read 1 Oct 2026 · docs.aws.amazon.com
Domain optimization
Kendra is optimized for domains including IT, financial services, insurance, pharmaceuticals, legal, healthcare, telecommunications, automotive, and others.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Generative AI retrieval
The Kendra Retriever API returns semantically relevant passages with ACL filtering, metadata filtering, and relevance tuning for retrieval-augmented generation workflows.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Identity integration
Experience Builder integrates with AWS IAM Identity Center and supports identity providers such as Azure AD and Okta for single sign-on.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Natural-language search
Kendra answers natural-language questions, matches curated FAQs, and can extract answers from tables in HTML pages.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
No-code builder
Experience Builder lets users create, customize, and launch a search application without coding or machine-learning experience.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Regional limit
GenAI Enterprise Edition indexes are available only in US East (N. Virginia), US West (Oregon), Europe (Ireland), and Asia Pacific (Sydney).Read 1 Oct 2026 · docs.aws.amazon.com
Search analytics
The Search Analytics Dashboard reports search quality, usability, user interaction, and content-gap metrics and exposes the data through an API.Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com

Plans and prices

GenAI Enterprise Edition $0.32 a month $0.32 per hour up to 20,000 documents or 200MB extracted text · 0.1 QPS (approximately 8,000 queries/day) Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Basic Developer Edition $1.13 a month $1.125 per hour up to 10,000 documents or 3GB extracted text · 0.05 QPS (approximately 4,000 queries/day) · not recommended for production workloads Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Basic Enterprise Edition $1.40 a month $1.4 per hour up to 100,000 documents or 30GB extracted text · 0.1 QPS (approximately 8,000 queries/day) Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com
Connectors for GenAI Enterprise Edition $30 a month $30 per index per month includes up to 500 hours of sync usage per month Read 1 Oct 2026 · aws.amazon.com

Every Amazon Kendra plan and price →

Strong points and limits

Strong points

  • Natural-language answers and HTML-table extraction
  • Connectors for major business content systems
  • No-code search application builder
  • Permission sync and answer citations
  • Encryption and compliance support

Limits

  • No free plan
  • Single ingested document limited to 50 MB
  • GenAI indexes limited to four regions
  • Basic Developer Edition not recommended for production

Who it suits

It suits organizations building managed enterprise search across connected business content. Teams needing no-code search creation, analytics, permissions, or AWS-based deployment may find its listed capabilities relevant.

Verdict

Amazon Kendra combines enterprise search, connectors, retrieval controls, analytics, and enrichment in a cloud service. Its regional and document-size limits, paid model, and AWS-specific access requirements should be checked against deployment needs.

Where Specifiction places it

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