Microsoft ends Bing Search APIs on August 11, alternative costs 40-483% more

Microsoft will retire its Bing Search and Bing Custom Search APIs on August 11, 2025, the company announced on May 12, 2025. The retirement announcement, posted three months before the shutdown date, affects developers who integrate Bing's search capabilities into applications and services.

According to Microsoft's Azure Updates documentation, "Bing Search APIs will be retired on August 11, 2025. Any existing instances of Bing Search APIs will be decommissioned completely, and the product will no longer be available for usage or new customer signup." The retirement encompasses all Bing Search API tier levels and affects both individual developers and enterprise partnerships.

The shutdown impacts multiple API services within Microsoft's search infrastructure. According to the official retirement notice, "this retirement will apply to partners who are using the F1 and S1 through S9 resources of Bing Search, or the F0 and S1 through S4 resources of Bing Custom Search." This scope indicates that both free tier users and paying enterprise customers face the same August deadline.

Microsoft has disabled new deployments for the affected services. According to documentation published on May 12, "New deployments are not available and existing resources will be disabled." Current API users can continue accessing the service until the August retirement date but cannot create additional instances or expand their usage.

The Bing Web Search API provided developers with programmatic access to Bing's search capabilities across multiple content types. According to Microsoft's technical documentation, "Bing Web Search API enables safe, ad-free, location-aware search results, surfacing relevant information from billions of web documents. Help your users find what they're looking for from the world-wide-web by harnessing Bing's ability to comb billions of webpages, images, videos, and news with a single API call."

The API supported sophisticated search operations including result filtering, pagination, and result highlighting. Documentation shows the service allowed developers to "filter the response to include or exclude specific answers such as news or images, return webpages that Bing discovered within the last week, and more." These capabilities enabled applications ranging from enterprise search tools to content aggregation services.

Microsoft recommends customers consider "Grounding with Bing Search" as an alternative, which integrates with Azure AI Agents. According to the retirement announcement, "Customers may want to consider Grounding with Bing Search as part of Azure AI Agents. Grounding with Bing Search allows Azure AI Agents to incorporate real-time public web data when generating responses with an LLM."

The Grounding with Bing Search service operates differently from the traditional API model. According to Azure documentation, "When a user sends a query, Azure AI Agents decide if Grounding with Bing Search should be leveraged or not. If so, it will leverage Bing to search over public web data and return relevant chunks. Lastly, Azure AI Agents will use returned chunks to generate a response." This system processes search results through language models rather than providing direct access to search data.

The alternative service includes significant operational differences from the retiring APIs. Documentation indicates that "Developers and end users don't have access to raw content returned from Grounding with Bing Search. The model response, however, includes citations with links to the websites used to generate the response, and a link to the Bing query used for the search."

Several technical considerations affect developers evaluating the migration path. The Grounding service operates within Azure's compliance framework with specific data handling requirements. According to Microsoft, "Any Bing search query that is generated and sent to Bing for the purposes of grounding is transferred, along with the resource key, outside of the Azure compliance boundary to the Grounding with Bing Search service."

The service supports multiple configuration parameters for search customization. According to technical documentation, developers can specify "The number of search results to return in the response. The default is 5 and the maximum value is 50." Additional parameters include freshness filters, market specification, and language configuration options.

Azure AI Foundry integrates the Grounding service across multiple programming environments. According to documentation, "Azure AI foundry support Python SDK C# SDK JavaScript SDK REST API Basic agent setup Standard agent setup." This broad language support enables migration for applications built with different technology stacks.

The service requires specific model compatibility within Azure's AI infrastructure. Documentation specifies that "Grounding with Bing Search works with all Azure OpenAI models that Azure AI Foundry Agent Service supports, except gpt-4o-mini, 2024-07-18." This limitation may affect applications requiring specific model versions.

Search result presentation follows particular display requirements under the new system. According to Microsoft's usage guidelines, developers must "display both website URLs and Bing search query URLs in your custom interface." These requirements maintain attribution standards while providing user access to original sources.

The retirement affects the broader search API marketplace where Microsoft and Google dominate indexing infrastructure. The Search Engine Roundtable noted on May 14 that "We knew the Bing Search APIs were moving, we were told that five years ago but I am not sure if this is related at all." This suggests the retirement represents a strategic shift rather than an unexpected development.

Microsoft continues expanding AI-integrated search capabilities through other services. Recent developments include Copilot Search integration and enhanced Azure AI Agent functionality. The company's focus shifts toward AI-mediated search experiences that process and synthesize information rather than providing raw search data access.

Developers affected by the retirement face a 90-day migration window from the May 12 announcement to the August 11 shutdown. Microsoft directs users with questions to contact support through the Bing Search API Partner Support channel. The company also recommends reviewing the Azure Retirement Workbook for comprehensive information about service transitions.

Grounding service costs significantly more than retiring APIs

The recommended alternative represents a substantial price increase compared to the retiring Bing Search APIs. According to Microsoft's pricing documentation, Grounding with Bing Search costs $35 per 1,000 transactions for both regular and custom search plans.

The original Bing Search APIs used tiered pricing structures with multiple cost levels. According to industry reports, the service had experienced significant price increases in May 2023, raising costs from previous levels. The S2 tier charged $15 per 1,000 transactions, while the S1 tier cost $25 per 1,000 transactions. An S3 tier offered pricing at $6 per 1,000 transactions.

Comparing current Grounding service pricing to the retiring API tiers reveals significant cost increases. Against the S2 tier pricing of $15 per 1,000 transactions, the $35 alternative represents a 133% increase. The S1 tier comparison shows a 40% increase from $25 to $35 per 1,000 transactions. The most dramatic difference appears when comparing to S3 tier pricing, where the increase from $6 to $35 represents a 483% cost escalation.

The pricing model includes transaction limits that may affect high-volume users. According to Microsoft documentation, the Grounding service supports "150 transactions per second" and "1 Million transactions per day." These limits may constrain applications that previously operated under different usage patterns with the retiring APIs.

Additional costs emerge from the service's integration requirements. According to Microsoft's technical specifications, "This tool can only be used as a knowledge source for the Foundry Agent Service, in combination with other data sources." This dependency means users must also pay for Azure AI Agent Service usage alongside the Grounding service fees.

The functional architecture differs significantly from traditional API access models. Microsoft documentation indicates that "Developers and end users don't have access to raw content returned from Grounding with Bing Search." Instead, the system processes search results through language models before delivering responses to applications.

These operational changes affect cost calculations beyond direct transaction pricing. The AI-mediated approach may require multiple processing steps for single search operations, potentially affecting overall usage costs compared to direct API access patterns. Organizations evaluating migration paths must consider both the higher per-transaction costs and the additional infrastructure requirements within Azure's ecosystem.

Why this matters

The Bing Search API retirement significantly impacts marketing teams who rely on programmatic search data for competitive intelligence, content optimization, and market research. Marketing professionals who built automated systems for monitoring search rankings, analyzing competitor visibility, or tracking keyword performance across Bing's platform must identify alternative data sources within the three-month transition period.

Many marketing automation tools integrate directly with search APIs to provide ranking reports, keyword research capabilities, and competitive analysis features. These integrations will cease functioning after August 11, forcing marketing teams to evaluate third-party alternatives or develop new data collection strategies. The shift toward AI-mediated search results through Grounding with Bing Search may provide different data formats that require updated analysis methodologies.

The retirement also reflects broader industry trends toward AI-enhanced search experiences that prioritize summarized results over traditional link-based responses. Marketing teams must adapt their search engine optimization strategies to account for AI-generated content summaries and citation-based traffic patterns rather than direct click-through mechanisms.

The cost implications compound the operational challenges facing marketing teams. Organizations that relied on affordable API access for market research, competitive analysis, or automated monitoring systems now face significantly higher operational costs. The 40-483% price increase for the alternative service may force budget reallocations or reduced data collection activities.

Marketing automation platforms that integrated Bing Search APIs for rank tracking, keyword research, or competitive intelligence features must evaluate whether the increased costs justify continued service integration. Some organizations may need to seek alternative data providers or develop internal data collection capabilities to maintain current analysis workflows.

Timeline

May 12, 2025: Microsoft announces Bing Search and Custom Search API retirement scheduled for August 11, 2025. Announcement posted on Azure Updates and Microsoft Learn documentation.

May 13, 2025: Microsoft updates API documentation with retirement warnings across all Bing Search service pages.

May 14, 2025: Search Engine Roundtable reports on the retirement announcement, noting industry awareness of potential API changes dating back five years.

August 11, 2025: Scheduled retirement date for all Bing Search and Custom Search APIs.

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• January 31, 2025: Grounding with Bing Search enhances Azure AI Agent Service - Microsoft integrates real-time web data capabilities into AI agents as alternative to traditional search APIs.
• April 4, 2025: Microsoft launches Copilot Search in Bing - New AI-powered search interface combines traditional results with generative summaries, indicating strategic shift toward AI-mediated search experiences.
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