Perplexity Decisions API Adds Fast Web Search

This is a smart API-composition move: developers can connect live retrieval directly to structured decision pipelines without building a separate search-and-parse loop. The caveat is that retrieval quality, query construction, and evidence costs now become part of every decision threshold.

• –Web grounding runs one Fast Search per question and returns the retrieved evidence alongside probability-based answers.
• –Up to 100 grounded questions can be submitted in one request, making the feature useful for high-volume classification and routing.
• –The 27B model groups related questions and reuses state efficiently; Flash is cheaper but processes questions independently.
• –Fast Search costs $1 per 1,000 requests versus $5 for standard Search API calls, targeting routine and latency-sensitive retrieval.
• –Developers should reserve standard web search for difficult or ambiguous queries where retrieval depth matters more than speed.