Vespa is an open-source AI search engine, big-data serving engine, and vector database originally developed inside Yahoo and spun out as Vespa.ai AS. Vespa combines vector search, text search (BM25), structured filtering, and machine-learned ranking — including native tensor inference — into a single distributed serving engine that scales to billions of documents with sub-100ms latency. Vespa Cloud is the fully managed commercial offering operated by the Vespa.ai team across AWS and GCP, with Startup, Basic, Commercial, and Enterprise plans plus a Self-Managed option for customers running the open-source engine on their own infrastructure. Vespa is widely used at Spotify, Perplexity, Yahoo, Farfetch, and Elicit for search, recommendation, personalization, and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG).
Vespa publishes 9 API contracts indexed on the APIs.io network, including Query API, Documents API, Visit API, and 6 more. Tagged areas include Artificial Intelligence, Search, Vector Search, Big Data, and Machine Learning.
The Vespa catalog on APIs.io includes 1 JSON-LD context and 2 Spectral governance rulesets.
Vespa’s developer surface includes authentication, documentation, getting-started guide, engineering blog, pricing, developer console, support, and 35 more developer resources.
52.5/100developing▬ flatAgent24/100agent awareFront door AI6/6
dominant
Heartbeat100/100
alive
open core · Apache-2.0
Full breakdown ↓
scored 2026-11-06 · rubric v0.27.0 · Show this score on your site →
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Agent readiness — checks not met, largest first (exact, from this profile):
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Idempotency+9 pts — OpenAPI mutating operations declare an idempotency key — a header, a request-body property, or a named de-duplication token whose own description says so (verified); else common[].type matches /idempoten/i (documented)
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Standards this provider implements or carries. De facto ones are profiled and measured by the API Commons; formal ones come from the standards directory and are linked by the provider's own tags. The evidence column says how each claim was established — not that it was made.
The Vespa Deploy API (/application/v2) manages application packages on a Vespa configuration server. It supports preparing, activating, and tearing down application packages, se...
The Vespa Tenant API (/application/v2/tenant) manages tenants and applications hosted on a Vespa configuration server or Vespa Cloud control plane. It exposes operations for cre...
The Vespa Config API (/config/v2) lets services in a Vespa application retrieve their configuration from a Vespa configuration server using the config-server / config-proxy prot...
The Vespa Cluster Controller API (/cluster/v2) exposes runtime state and management endpoints for a Vespa content cluster — including node state queries, maintenance-mode transi...
The Vespa State API (/state/v1) exposes per-service health, version, and metrics endpoints for any Vespa node — used by orchestration tooling, monitoring agents, and load balanc...
Vespa exposes a family of metrics endpoints (/metrics/v1, /metrics/v2, /prometheus/v1) that publish Vespa engine and application metrics in JSON or Prometheus exposition format ...
Combine BM25 text relevance with vector similarity and structured filters in a single query executed by Vespa's multi-phase ranking pipeline.
Retrieval Augmented Generation
Serve grounded context to large language models by indexing documents, chunks, and embeddings in Vespa and retrieving them with hybrid search at sub-100ms latency.
Recommendation and Personalization
Power recommendation systems with machine-learned ranking, real-time feature updates, and tensor inference over user and item embeddings.
Ad Targeting and Real-Time Bidding
Match candidate ads against user context and serve ranked impressions within tight latency budgets using Vespa's distributed serving engine.
E-Commerce Search and Browse
Combine faceted navigation, structured filters, text relevance, and learned ranking for large product catalogs with frequent updates.
Streaming Search for Personal Data
Run "streaming search" mode that scans a user's personal corpus on demand — ideal for mail, messaging, and document search where each user has their own private index.
aid: vespa-ai
name: Vespa
description: Vespa is an open-source AI search engine, big-data serving engine, and vector database originally developed inside
Yahoo and spun out as Vespa.ai AS. Vespa combines vector search, text search (BM25), structured filtering, and machine-learned
ranking — including native tensor inference — into a single distributed serving engine that scales to billions of documents
with sub-100ms latency. Vespa Cloud is the fully managed commercial offering operated by the Vespa.ai team across AWS and
GCP, with Startup, Basic, Commercial, and Enterprise plans plus a Self-Managed option for customers running the open-source
engine on their own infrastructure. Vespa is widely used at Spotify, Perplexity, Yahoo, Farfetch, and Elicit for search,
recommendation, personalization, and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG).
type: Index
deliveryModel:
model: open-core
license: Apache-2.0
license_evidence:
repo: vespa-engine/vespa
spdx: Apache-2.0
stars: 7110
open_source: true
commercial: true
callable_host: true
label: Open core · an OSS project plus a commercial hosted product
confidence: medium
source:
- openapi
- pricing
- repository-license
generated: '2026-09-25'
method: derived
accessModel:
pricing: paid
onboarding: unknown
trial: false
try_now: false
public: false
label: Paid
confidence: medium
source:
- plans
- authentication
- security
generated: '2026-11-06'
method: derived
position: Producing
access: 3rd-Party
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/vespa-ai.png
tags:
- Artificial Intelligence
- Search
- Vector Search
- Big Data
- Machine Learning
- Semantic Search
- RAG
- Open Source
- Tensor
- Recommendations
tags_raw:
- AI
- Search
- Vector Database
- Big Data
- Machine Learning
- Semantic Search
- Retrieval Augmented Generation
- Open Source
- Tensor
- Recommendations
- Machine-Learning
- Open-Source
- Vector Search
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/vespa-ai/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
created: '2026-05-25'
modified: '2026-09-13'
specificationVersion: '0.23'
apis:
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-deploy-api
name: Vespa Deploy API
description: The Vespa Deploy API (/application/v2) manages application packages on a Vespa configuration server. It supports
preparing, activating, and tearing down application packages, session-based deployments, schema validation, and zero-downtime
updates of services, schemas, and rank profiles.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/deploy-rest-api-v2.html
tags:
- Deployment
- Configuration
- Application
- DevOps
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/deploy-rest-api-v2.html
type: Documentation
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/application-packages.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-tenant-api
name: Vespa Tenant and Application API
description: The Vespa Tenant API (/application/v2/tenant) manages tenants and applications hosted on a Vespa configuration
server or Vespa Cloud control plane. It exposes operations for creating tenants, listing applications, and binding application
sessions to a tenant.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/application-v2-tenant.html
tags:
- Tenants
- Application
- Multi-Tenancy
- Administration
tags_raw:
- Tenants
- Applications
- Multi-Tenancy
- Administration
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/application-v2-tenant.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-config-api
name: Vespa Config API
description: The Vespa Config API (/config/v2) lets services in a Vespa application retrieve their configuration from a
Vespa configuration server using the config-server / config-proxy protocol. It is primarily used by Vespa services and
tooling rather than end users, but is documented as a stable HTTP API.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/config-rest-api-v2.html
tags:
- Configuration
- Internal
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/config-rest-api-v2.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-cluster-api
name: Vespa Cluster Controller API
description: The Vespa Cluster Controller API (/cluster/v2) exposes runtime state and management endpoints for a Vespa content
cluster — including node state queries, maintenance-mode transitions, and storage cluster orchestration.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/cluster-v2.html
tags:
- Cluster
- Content
- States
tags_raw:
- Cluster
- Operations
- Content
- State
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/cluster-v2.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-state-api
name: Vespa State API
description: The Vespa State API (/state/v1) exposes per-service health, version, and metrics endpoints for any Vespa node
— used by orchestration tooling, monitoring agents, and load balancers to check liveness, readiness, and runtime metrics.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/state-v1.html
tags:
- Health
- Monitoring
- Metrics
- Observability
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/state-v1.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-metrics-api
name: Vespa Metrics API
description: Vespa exposes a family of metrics endpoints (/metrics/v1, /metrics/v2, /prometheus/v1) that publish Vespa engine
and application metrics in JSON or Prometheus exposition format for scraping by Prometheus, Grafana, or other observability
stacks.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/operations/metrics.html
tags:
- Metrics
- Prometheus
- Observability
- Monitoring
properties:
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/operations/metrics.html
type: Documentation
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/metrics-v1.html
type: Documentation
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/metrics-v2.html
type: Documentation
- url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/prometheus-v1.html
type: Documentation
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-ai-query-api
name: Vespa Query API
description: The Query API from Vespa — 1 operation(s) for query.
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/query-api.html
tags:
- Query
properties:
- type: OpenAPI
url: openapi/vespa-ai-query-api-openapi.yml
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/query-api.html
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/api/query.html
- type: GettingStarted
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/getting-started.html
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-ai-documents-api
name: Vespa Documents API
description: Single-document GET, POST, PUT, DELETE operations
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/document-v1-api-reference.html
tags:
- Documents
properties:
- type: OpenAPI
url: openapi/vespa-ai-documents-api-openapi.yml
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/document-v1-api-reference.html
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/writing/document-v1-api-guide.html
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reads-and-writes.html
- aid: vespa-ai:vespa-ai-visit-api
name: Vespa Visit API
description: Bulk visit (iteration) operations
humanURL: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/document-v1-api-reference.html
tags:
- Visit
properties:
- type: OpenAPI
url: openapi/vespa-ai-visit-api-openapi.yml
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reference/document-v1-api-reference.html
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/writing/document-v1-api-guide.html
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/reads-and-writes.html
common:
- type: SecurityPolicy
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/blob/master/SECURITY.md
- type: ContributionGuide
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md
- type: PostmanWorkspace
url: https://www.postman.com/kinlaneapi/vespa/overview
- type: AgenticAccess
url: agentic-access/vespa-ai-agentic-access.yml
- type: VulnerabilityDisclosure
url: security/vespa-ai-vulnerability-disclosure.yml
- type: DomainSecurity
url: security/vespa-ai-domain-security.yml
- type: Authentication
url: authentication/vespa-ai-authentication.yml
- type: Website
url: https://vespa.ai
- type: Documentation
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/
- type: GettingStarted
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/getting-started.html
- type: Tutorials
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/en/learn/tutorials/
- type: GitHubOrganization
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine
- type: GitHubRepository
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa
- type: License
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/blob/master/LICENSE
- type: Blog
url: https://blog.vespa.ai/
- type: BlogRSS
url: https://blog.vespa.ai/feed.xml
- type: Pricing
url: https://cloud.vespa.ai/pricing
- type: Console
url: https://console.vespa-cloud.com/
- type: Slack
url: https://slack.vespa.ai/
- type: Support
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/issues
- type: ChangeLog
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/releases
- type: SDKs
name: Vespa CLI (Go)
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/tree/master/client/go
- type: SDKs
name: pyvespa (Python)
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/pyvespa
- type: SDKs
name: pyvespa Documentation
url: https://vespa-engine.github.io/pyvespa/
- type: SDKs
name: vespa-feed-client (Java)
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa/tree/master/vespa-feed-client
- type: SDKs
name: vespa-search (JavaScript)
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa-search
- type: SampleApps
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/sample-apps
- type: PrometheusExporter
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa_exporter
- type: DockerImage
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/docker-image
- type: GitHubAction
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/setup-vespa-cli-action
- type: SpectralRules
url: rules/vespa-ai-rules.yml
- type: Vocabulary
url: vocabulary/vespa-ai-vocabulary.yml
- type: JSONLDContext
url: json-ld/vespa-ai-context.jsonld
- type: Plans
url: plans/vespa-ai-plans-pricing.yml
- type: RateLimits
url: rate-limits/vespa-ai-rate-limits.yml
- type: FinOps
url: finops/vespa-ai-finops.yml
- type: Features
data:
- Open-source under Apache 2.0
- Vector search with HNSW indexes
- BM25 text search and hybrid search
- Native tensor and ML model inference at serving time
- YQL (Vespa Query Language) for structured queries
- Multi-phase ranking (match-phase, first-phase, second-phase, global-phase)
- Document API with conditional writes, visits, and JSON Lines streaming
- Multi-tenant namespaces and document groups
- Real-time indexing with sub-100ms query latency
- Distributed content clusters with automatic sharding and replication
- Streaming search mode for personal/private corpora
- Built-in machine learning inference (TensorFlow, ONNX, XGBoost, LightGBM)
- Approximate nearest neighbor and exact nearest neighbor operators
- Application packages with schemas, services.xml, and rank profiles
- Container API for custom searchers, document processors, and handlers
- Self-managed (Apache 2.0) or fully managed Vespa Cloud (AWS, GCP)
- Vespa Cloud Startup plan from $0.05 / vCPU-hour, $0.005 / GiB-memory-hour
- Vespa Cloud Commercial plan with 24/7 1-hour SLA support
- Vespa Cloud Enterprise plan with $20k/month minimum and 15-minute SLA
- Up to 50% volume discounts and 15% committed-spend discount
sources:
- https://cloud.vespa.ai/price-calculator.html
- https://docs.vespa.ai/
updated: '2026-05-25'
- type: UseCases
data:
- name: Hybrid Search
description: Combine BM25 text relevance with vector similarity and structured filters in a single query executed by Vespa's
multi-phase ranking pipeline.
- name: Retrieval Augmented Generation
description: Serve grounded context to large language models by indexing documents, chunks, and embeddings in Vespa and
retrieving them with hybrid search at sub-100ms latency.
- name: Recommendation and Personalization
description: Power recommendation systems with machine-learned ranking, real-time feature updates, and tensor inference
over user and item embeddings.
- name: Ad Targeting and Real-Time Bidding
description: Match candidate ads against user context and serve ranked impressions within tight latency budgets using
Vespa's distributed serving engine.
- name: E-Commerce Search and Browse
description: Combine faceted navigation, structured filters, text relevance, and learned ranking for large product catalogs
with frequent updates.
- name: Streaming Search for Personal Data
description: Run "streaming search" mode that scans a user's personal corpus on demand — ideal for mail, messaging, and
document search where each user has their own private index.
- type: Integrations
data:
- name: AWS
- name: Google Cloud
- name: Prometheus
- name: Grafana
- name: TensorFlow
- name: ONNX Runtime
- name: XGBoost
- name: LightGBM
- name: Kubernetes
- name: LangChain
- name: LlamaIndex
- name: Haystack
- type: LinkedIn
url: https://www.linkedin.com/company/vespa-ai
- type: Portal
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/
- type: SourceCode
url: https://github.com/vespa-engine/vespa
- type: CommercialOffering
title: Vespa Cloud
url: https://cloud.vespa.ai/
- type: LlmsText
url: https://docs.vespa.ai/llms.txt
- name: MCP Documentation
url: https://blog.vespa.ai/public-mcp-interns/
type: MCPDocumentation
integrations:
- name: AWS
- name: Google Cloud
- name: LangChain
- name: LlamaIndex
- name: Haystack
- name: Prometheus
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
email: kin@apievangelist.com
x-merged-from:
- vespa
Vespa API — frequently asked questions
Does Vespa have an API?
Yes. APIs.io lists 9 APIs from Vespa, including Vespa Deploy API, Vespa Tenant and Application API and Vespa Config API, and 6 more.
Is there an OpenAPI specification for the Vespa API?
Yes. APIs.io indexes 3 OpenAPI specifications for Vespa, each linked for download from this page.
How do I authenticate with the Vespa API?
Vespa documents its authentication (http · 1 scheme). The details are profiled on APIs.io as Vespa Ai Authentication.
How much does the Vespa API cost?
Vespa publishes its prices; its Startup plan is $0.05/ hour as of 2026-10-07. APIs.io lists 5 pricing plans for Vespa, with each plan's price, limits and inclusions under Pricing on this page.
Is the Vespa API ready for AI agents?
Vespa has a Kin Score of 52.5 out of 100 (developing) and an Agent Readiness score of 24.2 (agent-aware), scored by API Evangelist on 2026-11-06.
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