Xiaohongshu / RedNote API pricing explained: what one read costs, the free tier, and when it is cheaper than a scraper
Short answer: LinkDigest prices a read in credits. An image note is 1 credit (up to 6 images, +1 per further 6); a video is 1 credit plus 1 per started minute; a search that finds notes on Xiaohongshu or Douyin is 4 credits; a comparison over a batch is 1 credit per started ten notes; translation, breakdown and consumer insight are +1 each per note. Sign-up gives 10 credits with no card. After that: $1.50 for 50, $5 for 250, $39 for 2,000 (one-time, never expiring), or $9 a month for 500 and $49 a month for 3,500. A link that has already been read is free to read again, and a read that fails is not charged.
Disclosure: LinkDigest is the author's own service. Prices are the ones on /pricing; the comparisons below cite their sources.
Worked examples
| what | credits | at $5 / 250 |
|---|---|---|
| one image note, 6 images or fewer | 1 | $0.02 |
| one 12-image note | 2 | $0.04 |
| one 3-minute video | 4 | $0.08 |
| one note with English translation and consumer insight | 3 | $0.06 |
| search a topic (4) + read 5 image notes (5) + comparison (1) | 10 | $0.20 |
| the measured Penang comparison: 6 notes, 2026-10-18 | 26 | $0.52 |
| the measured camping-gear run: search + 4 notes + comparison, 2 cached | 7 | $0.14 |
The seven Japan city reports of 2026-11-06 cost 5–12 credits each (the reports).
The free tier
10 credits on sign-up, Google or e-mail, no card. A free account reads at full depth until the credits run out; in the console, a long video that does not fit the balance is read transcript-first and whole instead of being cut off. Search on a free account draws on a daily quota shared by free accounts; paid plans have only an hourly safety brake, not a search count.
The call that shows the price before it spends
curl -s -X POST https://linkdigest.dev/api/v1/digest \
-H "Authorization: Bearer ld_live_..." \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"url": "https://xhslink.com/o/...", "format": "json", "max_credits": 3}'
max_credits is your ceiling for one link: a note that would cost more comes back 402 with the price and nothing spent. The console quotes the price before a batch runs.
When it is cheaper than a scraper
Versus running MediaCrawler or a browser yourself. The open-source route is free to download and costs an engineer's time: a logged-in account (with the ban risk on it), a machine running a browser, maintenance every time the site changes, and then OCR and speech-to-text on top, because a RedNote note's substance is in its images and video. LinkDigest returns the text already extracted; the comparison page has the detail (LinkDigest vs MediaCrawler).
Versus agency research. In Japan, RedNote account management is sold on contracts of six months or more (takpa, press release), KOL casting from ¥400,000 (on the bakery, press release), and a ten-page RedNote review report as a manual service (withera, announcement). A five-note report with Japanese comparison runs about 20 credits here when every note is read fresh — under $0.50 on a pack.
Versus per-request data APIs. Those return fields (caption, counts, media URLs) and leave the reading to you; one LinkDigest credit buys the note read, OCR'd, transcribed and summarised with checked quotes (comparison pages).
What is not metered, and what is not sold
- Not metered: a link already read, a failed read, a search that finds nothing, a link refused by
max_credits. - Not sold: Xiaohongshu accounts, cookies, posting or account management; follower or impression data; the full comment thread (only the top comments the share page embeds — measured).
Platform notes: Xiaohongshu, Douyin. Pay by card (Stripe) or Alipay (¥9.9 for 50, ¥36 for 250, ¥288 for 2,000).