AgentBeacon vs JSearch for AI agents
JSearch is a commercial job search API that returns live job postings and salary estimates gathered from Google for Jobs. AgentBeacon is built on beacons, each a few plain words about what someone has or needs right now, live while they renew it. Each result is one, with the employer’s Apply link for a hiring beacon or an address to message a business’s through AgentBeacon. It needs no key.
The short answer
- JSearch: Broad, Google-for-Jobs-style job search across many boards from one API.
- AgentBeacon: Giving an agent a job to apply for or a home-service business to message, with no key.
AgentBeacon covers far less today: jobs in Austin, Texas, and remote, and businesses in and around Austin. Where it has what the agent is looking for, it is free and needs no sign-up.
JSearch and AgentBeacon, side by side
| JSearch | AgentBeacon | |
|---|---|---|
| Searches | Aggregated postings via Google for Jobs, covering LinkedIn, Indeed, Glassdoor, ZipRecruiter and other public job sites. | Hiring beacons from employers’ own job boards (Austin, Texas, and remote) and home-service businesses around Austin |
| Returns | JSON jobs with job_id, job title, employer_name, job_publisher, job_city, job_country, job_min_salary, job_apply_link and apply_options; endpoints search-v2, job-details, company-job-salary, estimated-salary. | Plain Markdown, one beacon per result: its own words, quoted, when it was updated, until when it’s open, and where it was seeded from. Typed JSON on request. |
| Before the first call | An account and API key from the OpenWeb Ninja developer portal (also sold on RapidAPI). | One empty request to /v1/connect, which returns a token. No account, email or card. |
| Free | Not stated on its pages | Free: 600 finds a minute and 20,000 a day for each connected agent |
| Paid | Not stated on its pages | Free for agents |
| Acting on a result | job_apply_link is the primary apply link; apply_options lists links from other publishers, each flagged is_direct. | A hiring beacon has the employer’s Apply link; every other beacon is messaged through AgentBeacon, and the business replies there. A business that hasn’t taken over the beacon AgentBeacon seeded for it isn’t told, so a message to it waits 30 days. |
| Limits on keeping or showing results | Not stated on its pages | Agents read beacons and message them; the terms say reading one doesn’t give the right to reuse it freely. |
| AI in its terms | Not stated on its pages | Built for AI agents. An agent may act only with its owner’s permission, and the terms don’t let AgentBeacon train AI models on what businesses write. |
| Coverage | Not stated on its pages | Hiring in Austin, Texas, and remote; home services around Austin, for now |
| MCP server | Official OpenWeb Ninja MCP server (npm @openwebninja/mcp-server) includes a jsearch tool: https://github.com/OpenWeb-Ninja/openwebninja-mcp | https://api.agentbeacon.sh/mcp/search, with no sign-in |
Try AgentBeacon
Connect, then find:
curl https://api.agentbeacon.sh/v1/connect \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data-binary '{}'
curl -G https://api.agentbeacon.sh/v1/beacons \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $AGENTBEACON_TOKEN" \
--data-urlencode "q=remote analytics engineer jobs over 130k"Or let the JavaScript client connect for you. The Python client, agentbeacon-sdk, works the same way.
npm install @agentbeacon/sdk
import { find } from "@agentbeacon/sdk";
console.log(await find("remote analytics engineer jobs over 130k"));Agent apps that take MCP servers can add https://api.agentbeacon.sh/mcp/search, which needs no sign-in. The jobs docs have the full code, every parameter and each line of the answer.
One result, as it read on October 15, 2026:
## Hiring: Analytics Engineer at Ontic. $135,000–$145,000 a …
> Hiring: Analytics Engineer at Ontic. $135,000–$145,000 a year. Full-time, remote. Apply: [website: open this beacon]
Expires Oct 17, 00:00 CDT · Updated yesterday
Location: anywhere
Verification (agentbeacon.sh): Seeded by AgentBeacon from Ontic’s job board, read again every day. Its employer isn’t on AgentBeacon yet: a message waits 30 days for it to join.
Link: https://agentbeacon.sh/beacon/369348e4-b3d0-490f-82b4-a666041243cfWhat AgentBeacon doesn’t do yet
- Jobs come from the job boards of a growing list of companies, in Austin and remote.
- Businesses are in Austin, Texas, for now.
- It shows no phone numbers or websites: a business is reached by messaging its beacon through AgentBeacon.
Questions people ask
What do I need before I can use AgentBeacon?
One empty request to /v1/connect, which returns a token. No account, email or card.
Is AgentBeacon free?
Free: 600 finds a minute and 20,000 a day for each connected agent.
What do I need before I can use JSearch?
An account and API key from the OpenWeb Ninja developer portal (also sold on RapidAPI).
Is JSearch free?
Its pages listed no free use when we read them on October 15, 2026.
Sources
Every line about another company comes from its own pages. Prices and terms change, so check the source before you rely on one.
JSearch, read on October 15, 2026:
- agents.openwebninja.com/manifest.json: “Returns live job postings from Google for Jobs covering LinkedIn, Indeed, Glassdoor, ZipRecruiter and other public job sites”
- agents.openwebninja.com/zcj/v8c3szxamb6i/services/jsearch/openapi.json: “The primary link to apply for the job.”
- agents.openwebninja.com/zcj/v8c3szxamb6i/services/jsearch/openapi.json: “Alternative apply links from other publishers.”
- openwebninja.com/documentation: “Sign up, manage subscriptions, and access API keys”
- github.com/OpenWeb-Ninja/openwebninja-mcp: “Official Model Context Protocol server for OpenWeb Ninja APIs”