Scite Pricing 2026: Connect, Basic, Pro, MCP & API
Scite pricing explained: free Connect, Basic and Pro annual costs, MCP credits, Assistant and Search access, API, trial, cancellation and refund rules.
Scite currently has three individual plan levels: Connect, Basic and Pro. Connect is free and designed for using Scite through MCP-enabled tools such as ChatGPT and Claude. Basic provides the full Scite Search and Assistant experience for $20 per month equivalent billed yearly. Pro costs $50 per month equivalent billed yearly and adds API access, larger Collections and specialized research datasets.
The current pricing page is annual-first for paid individual plans. Basic therefore costs $240 per year and Pro $600 per year. Scite does not currently expose a comparable public month-to-month individual price on the live pricing card.
Quick verdict
Connect is a useful free tier for researchers who mainly want evidence inside an external AI assistant, but it is not a free version of the full Scite web platform. Basic is the best-value individual tier because it unlocks Search, Assistant, Smart Citation Reports, citation alerts and 1,000-paper Collections. Pro is justified when API access, 2,500 monthly MCP credits, 10,000-paper Collections or patent, clinical-trial and grant datasets are part of the research workflow. The seven-day trial should be used before paying because Scite's Terms say fees are non-refundable.
Key takeaways
- Connect is free with 25 MCP credits/month
- Connect has no full Assistant or Search access
- Basic is $20/month equivalent billed yearly, totaling $240/year
- Basic includes 250 MCP credits/month, full Assistant and Search, Smart Citation Reports and Collections up to 1,000 papers
- Pro is $50/month equivalent billed yearly, totaling $600/year
- Pro includes 2,500 MCP credits/month, API access, Collections up to 10,000 papers and patent, clinical-trial and grant datasets
- Basic and Pro include a 7-day free trial
- Trials automatically convert into the selected subscription unless canceled
- Current individual paid prices are shown as billed yearly
- Scite's Terms say fees are non-refundable
- The Terms also contain a 30-day advance cancellation clause for avoiding some future subscription charges
Scite pricing checked on September 25, 2026 against the live Scite pricing page, current Terms, MCP page and API documentation.:
S
Scite Tested
Scientific research platform for Smart Citations, evidence-grounded AI search and citation context
Best for: Researchers, academics and evidence-focused teams that want to understand not just whether a paper was cited, but whether later literature supports, contrasts or simply mentions its findings.
Features and capabilities4.9
Usability and implementation4.7
Pricing and value transparency4.5
Integrations, security and trust4.6
Key features
- Zotero Plugin and Browser Extension
- Full-Text Search
- Collections
- Article Reports
- Scite MCP
Pros
- G2 rates scite.ai 4.7/5 from 27 reviews, with users frequently praising sourced answers, research accuracy and faster literature-review workflows.
- Smart Citations classify citation statements as supporting, contrasting or mentioning, providing more context than a raw citation count.
- Scite searches full text rather than only titles and abstracts and currently reports more than 1.6 billion Smart Citations across hundreds of millions of articles.
Cons
- G2 users report occasional slow performance, repetitive responses and results that are related but not precise enough for a narrow research question.
- The free Connect plan is designed for MCP use and does not include the full Scite Assistant or Search interface.
Free plan(unverified)
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Scite pricing at a glance
| Plan | Price | MCP credits | Search/Assistant | Main limits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Connect | Free | 25/month | No full access | MCP research only |
| Basic | $20/month equivalent, billed $240/year | 250/month | Full access | Collections up to 1,000 papers |
| Pro | $50/month equivalent, billed $600/year | 2,500/month | Full access | Collections up to 10,000 papers, API and specialized datasets |
| Team / Academic / Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Organization access | Custom seats, admin and institutional terms |
Scite Connect pricing
Connect costs $0 and does not require a credit card. It includes 25 MCP credits per month.
The plan is designed for using Scite inside external AI tools rather than for full access to the Scite website. The live pricing page explicitly says Connect does not include full Assistant or Search access.
Scite Basic pricing
Basic costs $20 per month equivalent when billed yearly, for a current annual total of $240.
Basic includes full Assistant and Search access, 250 MCP credits per month, Smart Citation Reports, citation alerts, dashboards and Collections with up to 1,000 papers.
For most individual researchers who want to use Scite directly, Basic is the practical entry point.
Scite Pro pricing
Pro costs $50 per month equivalent billed yearly, for a current annual total of $600.
Pro includes everything in Basic plus API access, 2,500 MCP credits per month, Collections up to 10,000 papers and specialized patent, clinical-trial and grant datasets.
The current pricing card also advertises a limited-time $60 API credit. Because it is explicitly promotional, SearchSagar does not treat it as a permanent Pro entitlement.
Team, Academic and Enterprise pricing
Scite offers Team, Academic and Enterprise options with custom or seat-based pricing. These plans are intended for labs, universities, libraries, publishers and research organizations.
Final commercial terms can include organization-wide access, administration, integrations, data access and support.
What are MCP credits?
MCP credits control how much Scite can be used inside supported external AI tools. Connect includes 25 each month, Basic 250 and Pro 2,500.
MCP credits are separate from the normal concept of full Search and Assistant access in the Scite web platform. Connect can therefore run out of MCP usage even though it has no paid subscription charge.
Scite MCP supported tools
Scite currently lists ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and other MCP-compatible tools. Users authenticate their Scite account inside the supported client and invoke Scite for scientific search and citation context.
Basic vs Pro Collection limits
Basic supports Collections up to 1,000 papers. Pro raises that limit to 10,000.
The higher limit is relevant for large evidence portfolios, systematic monitoring, institutional research teams and users tracking a field over long periods.
API pricing and access
Pro includes API access, and Scite also offers broader API and data-access arrangements through sales.
Current public API documentation covers Assistant, Search, Smart Citation data and other research endpoints. Large-scale commercial usage can require separate negotiated terms.
Specialized datasets on Pro
Pro adds patent, clinical-trial and grant datasets. These can be useful for pharmaceutical, biotechnology, competitive-intelligence and translational research use cases.
Researchers who only need journal literature may not receive enough extra value from these datasets to justify the jump from Basic.
Does Scite have a free trial?
Yes. Basic and Pro currently include a seven-day free trial.
The pricing page says the trial automatically enrolls the user in the selected subscription once the seven days end unless the trial is canceled first.
Scite refund policy
Scite's current Terms state that all fees are non-refundable.
This means users should not assume a standard post-purchase money-back period even when a billing mistake or service issue occurs. Any exception would need to come from Scite support rather than the published Terms.
Scite cancellation policy
The pricing page says users can cancel from the Subscription section by selecting Cancel Plan. For trials, cancel before the seven-day period ends to avoid conversion.
The Terms also state that avoiding a charge for the following subscription month can require cancellation at least 30 days in advance, with later requests applying to the following cycle. Because this wording is stricter than the simplified pricing-page wording, buyers should cancel early and confirm the effective date shown in the account.
Are monthly plans available?
The current individual pricing page presents Basic at $20 per month equivalent and Pro at $50 per month equivalent, both explicitly billed yearly.
SearchSagar therefore does not claim a current month-to-month individual price. If Scite offers a monthly option to a specific account or region, the checkout screen should be treated as the authoritative price.
Additional costs
Institutional access to paywalled full text can depend on library holdings or separate article-access arrangements. API usage beyond plan or promotional allowances can also create additional commercial cost.
Scite's Article Galaxy and publisher access workflows may involve separate content-purchase or institutional entitlements.
Which Scite plan offers the best value?
Choose Connect if you only want occasional Scite evidence inside ChatGPT, Claude or another MCP client. Choose Basic for most individual researchers using Scite Search and Assistant directly. Choose Pro for API work, larger Collections or specialized datasets. Choose Team/Academic/Enterprise for organization-wide deployment.
Scite pricing compared with alternatives
SciSpace Basic is free and Premium costs $20 monthly or $12 annual-equivalent with 1,200 Agent credits. Elicit Basic is free, while current annual Elicit pricing lists Plus at $11 per user per month, Pro at $39 and Scale at $89. Consensus Pro costs $20 monthly or $144 yearly, with Deep at $65 monthly or $540 yearly.
The products meter different work. Scite meters MCP and plan-level research access, SciSpace meters Agent tasks, Elicit meters advanced research workflows and Consensus meters deeper AI review capacity.
Related Scite articles
Final pricing verdict
Scite Basic is the strongest value for individual researchers who need citation intelligence and the full platform. Connect is genuinely useful, but it should be viewed as an MCP connector tier rather than a free version of Search and Assistant.
Pro should be chosen for concrete reasons: API access, 10,000-paper Collections or specialized datasets. The annual commitment and non-refundable fees make the seven-day trial important for both Basic and Pro.
Expert tip
Use the trial on one real workflow: run a literature search, inspect Smart Citations for key papers, upload a manuscript to Reference Check and connect Scite through MCP. If those four steps do not materially improve your research process, Pro-level capacity is unlikely to solve the mismatch.
— SearchSagar editorial team
Frequently asked questions
How much is Scite Basic?
Scite Basic costs $20 per month equivalent billed yearly, for a current annual total of $240.
How much is Scite Pro?
Scite Pro costs $50 per month equivalent billed yearly, for a current annual total of $600.
Is Scite free?
Scite Connect is free and includes 25 MCP credits per month, but it does not include the full Search or Assistant interface.
Does Scite offer a free trial?
Yes. Basic and Pro currently include a seven-day trial that automatically converts to the selected subscription unless canceled.
Does Scite offer refunds?
Scite's current Terms state that fees are non-refundable.
Can I cancel Scite?
Yes. Scite can be canceled from the Subscription area, but its Terms contain advance-notice language, so users should cancel early and confirm the effective date.