searchcode vs Sourcebot
searchcode
searchcode.comSourcebot
sourcebot.devSide by side
| Figure | searchcode | Sourcebot |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $20/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 3 |
| Spec score · Code Search Tools | 7.7 (#17) | 8.0 (#8) |
| Code search | The code_search tool supports full-text search, boolean queries, regular expressions and structural filters for declarations, usages, strings and comments. | Code search spans repositories and branches and supports regular expressions, filters, boolean logic, and search suggestions. |
| Maker | The about page says searchcode is operated by a single developer and is made in Sydney, Australia by Ben Boyter. | The site identifies Taqla Inc. as the provider and says Sourcebot is made in San Francisco. |
| Purpose | Searchcode provides code intelligence dossiers for public GitHub repositories, including languages, complexity, tech stack and code quality. | Sourcebot is a self-hosted tool that helps humans and agents search, navigate, and understand complex enterprise codebases. |
| Support | Support is available by email at [email protected]. | Basic includes community support, Pro includes onboarding support, and Enterprise includes a dedicated support engineer and SLAs. |
Plans
In their own words
searchcode
searchcode provides code-intelligence dossiers for public GitHub repositories, covering languages, complexity, technology stacks, code quality, and secrets. Its MCP server exposes six tools for AI assistants, and each tool is also available as JSON over HTTP through the REST API. Analysis reports language breakdowns, complexity metrics, detected technologies, quality findings, and credentials such as API keys, tokens, and private keys with file, line, and confidence details. Search supports full text, boolean logic, regular expressions, and structural filters for declarations, usages, strings, and comments. File retrieval can return complete files, line ranges, or named symbols with nearby declarations; batch retrieval handles up to 10 files. The free beta plan covers public GitHub repositories without signup, an API key, or installation. Enterprise deployment runs on customer infrastructure as a Docker image with a Kubernetes Helm chart. Private repositories can authenticate with SSH keys or HTTPS tokens.
Sourcebot
Sourcebot is a self-hosted tool for searching, navigating, and understanding complex enterprise codebases. Search covers repositories and branches, with regular expressions, filters, boolean logic, and suggestions. Symbol navigation includes go to definition and find references. Its MCP server gives coding agents tools to search code, read files, and resolve symbols across an organization's repositories.
Supported code hosts include GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure DevOps, Gerrit, and Gitea, both cloud and self-managed. Ask Sourcebot connectors communicate over MCP and use the connected user's permission boundaries; documented examples include Linear and Jira. Ask Sourcebot requires at least one language model provider configured, with documented providers including OpenAI, Anthropic, Bedrock, Vertex, and Mistral. Sourcebot runs as a single Docker container on customer infrastructure, on-premises or in the cloud. The company says code, indexes, queries, and AI inputs and outputs remain within the customer's environment. Basic is free; Pro costs $20 a month billed per user and includes a 14-day free trial.