Overview
When building AI-powered applications, developers often need specialized APIs to handle specific tasks. layahost and Context.dev serve very different purposes: layahost is a hosted API for typed decisions on text, while Context.dev is a web context API for scraping, crawling, and extracting structured data from the web. This comparison will help you understand their features, pricing, and best use cases.
What is layahost?
layahost provides a simple API that takes a piece of text and a question with predefined answers (e.g., yes/no, multiple choice, score) and returns the answer with probabilities for each option. It's designed for tasks like content moderation, spam filtering, support intent detection, routing, priority scoring, and language detection. The API is compatible with the Jev System One wire format, so existing Jev SDKs work with minimal changes. It's hosted in the EU and priced flat at $5 per million decisions.
What is Context.dev?
Context.dev is a web context API for AI products and agents. It allows you to scrape any URL, crawl entire websites, convert pages to LLM-ready Markdown, extract structured data into your own schema, capture screenshots, and retrieve brand intelligence (logos, colors, fonts, company data). It's YC-backed and designed for quick integration by developers or coding agents. Pricing is not detailed in the provided content, but it offers a no-card-required start.
Feature Comparison
| Feature | layahost | Context.dev |
|---|---|---|
| Primary Function | Typed decisions on text | Web scraping, crawling, extraction, brand intelligence |
| Core API Endpoints | /v1/decide, /v1/systemone | /v1/scrape/markdown, /web/extract, /brand, /logos |
| Input Types | Text (up to 32,000 chars) | URLs, domains, emails, tickers, merchant descriptors |
| Output Types | JSON with answer options and probabilities | Markdown, HTML, structured JSON, screenshots, logos |
| Use Cases | Moderation, spam, triage, routing, priority, language detection | Web scraping, RAG grounding, deep research, onboarding autofill, enrichment |
| Custom Models | Fine-tune private Laya checkpoints on your data | No custom model training |
| SDK Compatibility | Jev SDKs (Python, JavaScript) work with base URL change | Own SDKs (e.g., context.dev for Node.js) and REST API |
| Data Privacy | EU servers, in-memory processing, no training on data | Not specified |
| Free Tier | No; prepaid from $10 | No card required; likely free tier |
| Rate Limits | 600 req/min per key; 32 questions/request | Not specified |
Pricing
layahost Pricing
layahost uses a flat, prepaid pricing model: $5 per million decisions. There are no subscriptions or seats. Volume discounts are available: +10% credit from $100, +20% from $500. Rejected and failed requests are free. Credit never expires. A free demo is available to try the API.
Context.dev Pricing
The provided content does not detail Context.dev's pricing. It mentions "No card required" to start, suggesting a free tier or trial. For specific pricing, you would need to visit their website or contact sales.
Pros and Cons
layahost
Pros:
- Simple, flat pricing per decision regardless of text length.
- Jev-compatible API allows easy migration with existing SDKs.
- EU hosting with strong privacy (in-memory processing, no training on data).
- Custom model fine-tuning available for domain-specific decisions.
- High accuracy for text classification tasks (e.g., moderation, intent).
Cons:
- No free tier; requires prepaid credit from $10.
- Text-only; cannot process images directly.
- Accuracy may lag behind Jev on some benchmarks (per FAQ).
Context.dev
Pros:
- Comprehensive web data API: scraping, crawling, extraction, brand intelligence.
- LLM-ready markdown output and structured data extraction with schemas.
- Agent-friendly setup with one-line integration for coding agents.
- No card required to start; likely free tier or trial.
- Wide range of use cases: RAG, research, onboarding, enrichment.
Cons:
- Pricing not transparent in provided content; may be complex.
- No custom model training; relies on pre-built models.
- Data privacy details not specified; may not be EU-hosted.
Verdict
layahost and Context.dev serve fundamentally different needs. layahost is ideal for developers who need to make fast, reliable decisions on text data—such as moderating comments, routing support tickets, or detecting language—with simple flat pricing and strong EU privacy. Context.dev excels for teams building AI agents that require live web data, scraping, structured extraction, and brand intelligence, with an easy setup for coding agents.
Choose layahost if your primary need is text classification and decision-making. Choose Context.dev if you need to gather, enrich, and structure web data for AI applications. They can even complement each other: use Context.dev to fetch web content, then layahost to classify or route it.