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Consensus

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Spec score 9.4 #1 of 28 in AI Research Assistants

What it is

Consensus is an AI workspace and academic search engine for scientific research, available on web, Android, iOS, and as an extension. It searches more than 220 million peer-reviewed papers, with the database updated weekly, and offers filters for publication date, access, citations, journal rank, study design, population, sample size, and other paper details. Its Research Agent plans multi-step searches, uses tools such as citation crawling and DOI lookup, and returns citation-backed answers. Consensus says citations in its AI summaries correspond to exact paper quotes, with the relevant section identified and PDF text highlighted when available. Medical Mode searches a selected collection of about 8 million papers and 50,000 clinical guidelines from the top 1,000 medical journals. Users can import Zotero libraries and export CSV or RIS files for reference managers. Consensus also works in ChatGPT, Claude, and Microsoft 365 Copilot; API and MCP calls share a monthly allowance. The Free Tier costs nothing. Pro is $20 a month, or $144/year billed annually; Deep is $65 a month, or $540/year billed annually.

Spec sheet

What it does
Consensus is an AI academic search engine that retrieves scientific papers and produces cited syntheses.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Product
Consensus is an AI workspace and academic search engine for scientific research.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Integrations
Consensus supports Zotero library import and exports CSV or RIS files compatible with reference managers including EndNote, Mendeley, and Zotero.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
Privacy
Consensus says user content sent for AI processing is not used to train its models or third-party models, and it does not attach account identifiers to that content.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Support
The company offers support through in-product Support Chat and at [email protected].Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
License
The public consensus-mcp repository is marked MIT licensed, while the hosted Consensus product is a commercial service.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
Headquarters
San Francisco, California, United StatesRead 23 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Founded
2021Read 23 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Advanced filters
Filters include publication date, open-access status, citations, journal rank, study design, human or animal population, sample size, duration, publisher, field, and country.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
AI integrations
Consensus is available in ChatGPT, Claude, and Microsoft 365 Copilot, and its API and MCP requests share a monthly usage pool.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
API limit
The API and MCP share monthly call allowances by plan, and paid plans can enable additional calls for $0.05 each up to their plan limit.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
API limits
API requests are rate-limited to one request per second, and API and MCP calls share the plan's monthly allowance.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
API overage
Paid plans can enable additional API or MCP usage at $0.05 per call after included credits, subject to plan maximums.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Chat integrations
Consensus can be connected to ChatGPT, Claude, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.Read 15 Oct 2026 · consensus.app
Citation grounding
Consensus says every citation in its AI summaries is mapped to an exact quote from the paper, with the source section shown and PDF text highlighted when available.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Company founders
Crunchbase lists Eric Olson and Christian Salem as co-founders.Read 15 Oct 2026 · crunchbase.com
Company founding and size
LinkedIn lists the company as founded in 2022 with 2–10 employees.Read 15 Oct 2026 · linkedin.com
Company headquarters
LinkedIn lists headquarters in San Francisco, California.Read 15 Oct 2026 · linkedin.com
Company legal name
Crunchbase lists the legal name as Consensus NLP inc.Read 15 Oct 2026 · crunchbase.com
Consensus Meter
For yes-or-no questions, the Consensus Meter classifies retrieved studies as supporting, opposing, or possibly supporting the claim.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Deep review
Deep reviews break a question into subquestions, run up to 20 targeted searches, screen more than 1,000 papers, and usually analyze up to 50 papers, sometimes up to 100.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Document upload
Users can upload PDFs and other research documents, then ask questions about their contents.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Funding status
Crunchbase shows four funding rounds, including Seed, Series A, and Series B, but hides the total amounts.Read 15 Oct 2026 · crunchbase.com
Independent criticism
CASRAI warns that the Consensus Meter counts retrieved papers without explicitly weighting study design, sample size, statistical power, or risk of bias.Read 15 Oct 2026 · casrai.org
Independent limitation
CASRAI describes Consensus as a broad, continuously changing aggregator rather than a fixed, reproducible systematic-review database.Read 15 Oct 2026 · casrai.org
Library access integration
The product advertises LibKey integration to connect users with institutional journal subscriptions.Read 15 Oct 2026 · consensus.app
Limit: mobile performance
Google Play complaints repeatedly cite slow response times and difficulty opening thread or paper panels in the mobile app.Read 15 Oct 2026 · play.google.com
Limit: organization features
Product Hunt review summaries mention user demand for better storage and retrieval of personal research.Read 15 Oct 2026 · producthunt.com
Limit: usage quotas
A Trustpilot reviewer complained that the monthly search quota was consumed by one large literature search and considered the service poor value.Read 15 Oct 2026 · trustpilot.com
MCP integrations
The hosted MCP server supports Claude, ChatGPT, Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf, Gemini Spark, Microsoft 365 Copilot, and other remote MCP clients.Read 15 Oct 2026 · docs.consensus.app
Medical Mode
Medical Mode searches a curated subset of about 8 million papers and 50,000 clinical guidelines from the top 1,000 medical journals.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Mobile access
The privacy policy references Consensus mobile applications for iOS and Android.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app
Praise: evidence-backed answers
Product Hunt reviewers repeatedly praised fast, evidence-backed answers with clickable links to the underlying studies.Read 15 Oct 2026 · producthunt.com
Praise: search quality
Google Play reviewers said the search quality was good, including one paid desktop user who still valued the results.Read 15 Oct 2026 · play.google.com
Privacy statement
Consensus says it does not use user data to train AI models and does not share user data with third parties.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Pro analysis
Pro messages synthesize findings from as many as 20 papers and include inline citations.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Product Hunt rating
5.0 out of 5 from 11 reviewsRead 15 Oct 2026 · producthunt.com
Product update
On August 26, 2026, Consensus announced that its API became self-serve for everyone.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Rating on Google Play
3.7 out of 5 from 73 reviewsRead 15 Oct 2026 · play.google.com
Rating on Trustpilot
2.5 out of 5 from 6 reviewsRead 15 Oct 2026 · trustpilot.com
Reference-manager integrations
Consensus supports citation export and integrations with Zotero, EndNote, Paperpile, and Mendeley.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Research Agent
Research Agent plans multi-step searches, chains tools such as citation crawling and DOI lookup, and returns citation-backed answers grounded in peer-reviewed research.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
Research corpus
The service says its database contains more than 220 million peer-reviewed research papers.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Research database
The Help Center says Consensus searches a database of over 220 million peer-reviewed research papers, updated weekly.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
REST API
The REST API uses https://api.consensus.app/v1/search with an x-api-key header and supports paper metadata and research filters.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
SDK and extensibility
Consensus publishes an official MCP server and public setup repository; the hosted server is used remotely and is not self-hosted from source.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
Search filters
Users can filter papers by publication date, open access, citations, journal rank, study design, population, sample size, duration, publisher, field, and country.Read 29 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
Search ranking
Consensus searches with semantic and keyword methods, narrows to about 1,500 candidates, then reranks the top 20 using recency, citations, and journal quality.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Security statement
Consensus says MCP queries travel over HTTPS/TLS and that no personal data is stored from MCP requests.Read 15 Oct 2026 · docs.consensus.app
Study Snapshot
Study Snapshots extract details such as methodology, sample size, study duration, location, outcomes, and results.Read 15 Oct 2026 · play.google.com
Support and documentation
The Help Center provides product guides, troubleshooting, data and security articles, research-method guides, and a changelog.Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
System requirements
The Android app is available for phones and tablets; the service also provides iOS and Android mobile applications and an installed web app.Read 15 Oct 2026 · consensus.app
Who it serves
Consensus describes its users as researchers, students, and clinicians, and offers team plans for research groups, labs, and academic departments.Read 29 Sep 2026 · consensus.app

Plans and prices

Pro Priced on request 15 Deep reviews per month · 500 API and MCP calls per month Read 22 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
Deep Priced on request 200 Deep reviews per month · 2,000 API and MCP calls per month Read 22 Sep 2026 · help.consensus.app
Free Tier Free Unlimited Papers searches · 10 Pro messages/month · 3 Deep reviews/month · 10 Study Snapshots/month · 30 API & MCP calls/month Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Pro $20 a month $20/month or $144/year billed annually ($12/month equivalent) Unlimited Papers searches · Unlimited Pro messages · 15 Deep reviews/month · Unlimited Study Snapshots · 500 API & MCP calls/month Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Deep $65 a month $65/month or $540/year billed annually ($45/month equivalent) Unlimited Papers searches · Unlimited Pro messages · 200 Deep reviews/month · Unlimited Study Snapshots · 2,000 API & MCP calls/month Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Enterprise Priced on request Email for a custom quote All Team features · Thousands of users · Volume discounts · Library integrations · Training · Development partner program · 500 API & MCP calls/user/month Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app
Teams Priced on request Custom pricing All Pro features · 50 Deep reviews/user/month · Up to 200 seats · Centralized billing · 500 API & MCP calls/user/month Read 15 Oct 2026 · help.consensus.app

Every Consensus plan and price →

Strong points and limits

Strong points

  • Searches a database of over 220 million peer-reviewed papers.
  • Filters include study design, population, sample size, and country.
  • Research Agent can chain citation crawling and DOI lookup.
  • Medical Mode includes papers and clinical guidelines.
  • Zotero import and CSV or RIS export are supported.

Limits

  • Free Tier limits Pro messages and monthly deep reviews.
  • API and MCP calls share a monthly plan allowance.
  • Paid plans can charge $0.05 per added call, up to plan limits.

Who it suits

Consensus is aimed at researchers, students, and clinicians who need to search scientific literature and review citation-backed answers. Team plans are available for research groups, labs, and academic departments.

Consensus in depth

Read the full write-up

Consensus is an academic search engine and AI workspace for finding, narrowing and interpreting scientific literature. It suits students, researchers and clinicians who need answers tied to papers rather than general web pages. The strongest case for it is a traceable literature workflow; readers seeking broad, open-ended web search should consider a general AI search service instead.

Overview

Founded in 2021 and headquartered in San Francisco, Consensus searches a database of more than 220 million peer-reviewed papers, refreshed weekly. Its focus is disciplined research: discover relevant studies, apply scholarly filters, and use AI assistance without losing the connection to the underlying publication.

Consensus is also positioned for research groups, laboratories and academic departments through team offerings. Individual users can work on the web and mobile apps, while developers can connect through an API or MCP.

Key features

Search and filtering

Filters cover publication date, open-access status, citation count, journal rank, study design, population, sample size, study duration, publisher, field and country. This is a practical advantage when a literature search has explicit inclusion criteria; it is more specialized than a typical consumer search box.

Medical Mode narrows the scope to about 8 million papers and 50,000 clinical guidelines from the top 1,000 medical journals. That curated collection is useful for clinically oriented discovery, while questions spanning medicine and other disciplines may call for the broader database.

Research Agent and citation grounding

Research Agent plans multi-step searches and can chain citation crawling with DOI lookup. Its answers are grounded in peer-reviewed research, and each citation in an AI summary is mapped to an exact quotation, with the relevant source section shown and PDF text highlighted when available. That makes claims easier to audit than summaries that provide only a paper title or a loose reference.

Libraries, exports and integrations

Users can import a Zotero library and export CSV or RIS files for EndNote, Mendeley and Zotero workflows. Consensus is available inside ChatGPT, Claude and Microsoft 365 Copilot. API and MCP requests draw from the same monthly allowance, so automated use reduces the capacity available to other integrations.

Privacy and support

Consensus says content sent for AI processing is not used to train its own or third-party models, and account identifiers are not attached to that content. Support is provided through in-product Support Chat and [email protected].

Pricing

The free tier costs nothing. It provides unlimited paper searches, limited Pro messages, three Deep reviews per month, 10 Study Snapshots per month and 30 combined API and MCP calls per month. It is suitable for occasional literature lookups, but the review and automation caps will constrain regular research use.

Pro costs $20 a month, or $144 per year billed annually (equivalent to $12/month). It adds unlimited paper searches and Pro messages, 15 Deep reviews per month, unlimited Study Snapshots and 250 monthly API and MCP calls. This is the sensible individual plan for recurring research that does not require hundreds of deep reviews.

Deep costs $65 a month, or $540 per year billed annually (equivalent to $45/month). It raises the allowance to 200 Deep reviews and 1,000 API and MCP calls per month while retaining unlimited searches, Pro messages and Study Snapshots. Choose it when intensive review generation or automation justifies the higher recurring cost.

Teams use custom pricing based on team size. The plan includes Pro features, 50 Deep reviews per user per month, discounts for up to 200 seats, centralized billing and 250 API and MCP calls per team member per month. Enterprise pricing is also custom, for organizations with more than 200 users, and adds team features, library integrations, product training and 250 API and MCP calls per user per month.

Paid plans can enable additional API or MCP calls at $0.05 each, up to the applicable plan limit.

Platforms

Consensus runs on web, Android and iOS, and offers browser-extension, API and MCP access. Its integrations also place it in ChatGPT, Claude and Microsoft 365 Copilot workflows.

Who it's for

Researchers and students benefit from the large scholarly index, detailed study filters and citation-to-passage traceability. Clinicians get a dedicated medical corpus and guidelines search. Teams gain centralized billing and group-oriented allowances. It is a weaker fit for readers who primarily need current general-web information, conversational browsing or unrestricted free AI usage.

Pros and cons

Pros

Strong scholarly coverage: more than 220 million peer-reviewed papers, updated weekly, support broad literature discovery.

Auditable AI answers: citations map to exact paper passages and can show highlighted PDF text.

Research-specific control: filters include study design, population and sample size, not just keywords and dates.

Useful workflow connections: Zotero import, RIS/CSV export and API, MCP and assistant integrations reduce manual handoffs.

Clear privacy position: Consensus says AI-processing content is excluded from model training and account identifiers.

Cons

Free usage is bounded: only three Deep reviews, 10 Study Snapshots and 30 API/MCP calls per month.

Automation consumes one pool: API and MCP activity shares its allowance, which can limit mixed workflows.

Heavy review work gets expensive: Deep is $65 a month unless annual billing lowers the effective rate.

Medical Mode is deliberately scoped: its curated coverage may not suit cross-disciplinary questions.

Alternatives

For a general-purpose AI search service with Android, iOS, macOS, Windows, web and API access, consider Perplexity; its free plan has limited daily use and Pro costs $20 per month.

Genspark Design is the better choice for design-oriented AI work, with 100 free credits per day and broader desktop platform coverage.

Arc Search is a free browser-focused option, while Yahoo Scout is free to try without a paid subscription at launch.

You.com fits users wanting web and news results, 100 free queries per day and API options. Andi AI offers unlimited free searches and basic summarization. Felo Search is another free search option with five professional searches per day. Jina AI is oriented toward API and self-hosted use, including a free non-commercial token tier.

Verdict

Choose Consensus if your work depends on finding scientific papers, applying defensible filters and checking AI-generated claims against quoted passages. Pro is the practical starting point for regular individual research; Deep is for high-volume reviews or automation, and Teams or Enterprise suit organized groups. Look elsewhere if your priority is unrestricted general-web search or a lower-cost, broad-purpose assistant rather than a citation-centered academic workflow.

Verdict

Consensus combines literature search, configurable filters, and AI-assisted research with citations tied to paper passages. Its free plan has usage limits, while paid plans expand reviews and API or MCP allowances.

Where Specifiction places it

Alternatives to ConsensusAll alternatives →