Google’s search API shutdown sends agent discovery toward rival intermediaries
A long-running structured search route is disappearing just as agent builders need machine-readable web discovery.
Google has closed the Custom Search JSON API to new customers and says existing access ends on January 1, 2027, without a self-serve replacement for whole-web JSON results. Apify is pitching a paid Web Search endpoint and MCP tool alongside other providers, while Google’s official options focus on site-limited or enterprise search. Removing one of the web’s direct machine-readable search routes shifts agent builders—and their query revenue, retrieval choices and customer relationship—toward alternative search intermediaries.