Sonar synthesises answers. Amygdala grounds them.
Perplexity Sonar generates AI answers with citations. Amygdala provides the authority layer underneath: verified, ranked profiles you can use to ground those answers in real expertise. Use Sonar for synthesis, Amygdala for verification.
| Feature | Amygdala | Perplexity Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| What it returns | Ranked authority profiles (JSON) | AI-generated prose answers with citations |
| Output format | Structured JSON, deterministic | Generated text, non-deterministic |
| Search type | Semantic authority search | LLM-powered answer synthesis |
| Authority scoring | ✓ Built-in authority ranking | ✗ No authority ranking or verification |
| Infrastructure | 100% EU (Hetzner Helsinki, Mistral, Weaviate) | US-based (San Francisco) |
| GDPR compliance | ✓ Full, no US API/index data transfers | ✗ US-based, requires SCCs for EU use |
| MCP support | ✓ 4 native tools | ⚠ Limited MCP availability |
| Hallucination risk | None: returns verified indexed data | Present: LLM can fabricate citations |
| Free tier | $50 starter credits | No free tier on Sonar API |
| Pricing | $25/1K searches | $5/1K (basic), $18/1K (Pro Search) |
The best AI pipelines don't choose between synthesis and verification — they use both.
What Amygdala adds to your stack
Sonar synthesises content and can hallucinate. Amygdala returns structured JSON from a verified index — the same query always returns the same ranked authorities. Use Sonar for answers, Amygdala for source verification.
Before your AI cites a source, verify it. Pass any social handle to Amygdala's match endpoint and know instantly whether they're a ranked authority or just noise. No other search API offers this.
Amygdala runs on Hetzner (Helsinki, Finland), Mistral AI (Paris), and Weaviate (Amsterdam). For EU teams, this eliminates third-country transfer obligations entirely.
API comparison
Both respond to "who are the top AI safety experts?" The output shape is fundamentally different.
curl "https://api.perplexity.ai/chat/completions" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer pplx-..." \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"model": "sonar",
"messages": [{
"role": "user",
"content": "Who are the top experts on AI safety?"
}]
}'{
"choices": [{
"message": {
"role": "assistant",
"content": "The field of AI safety has several prominent researchers
including Stuart Russell, Paul Christiano, and Yoshua Bengio.
Stuart Russell is known for his work on value alignment and
co-authored the influential textbook 'Artificial Intelligence:
A Modern Approach'. Paul Christiano...",
"citations": [
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_safety",
"https://80000hours.org/problem-profiles/artificial-intelligence/"
]
}
}]
}curl "https://api.amygdala.eu/api/v1/index?query=AI+safety&limit=5" \ -H "Authorization: Bearer amyg_..."
{
"duration": 0.084,
"results": [
{
"sdu": "2941...207",
"name": "Stuart Russell",
"rank": 1,
"country_name": "United States",
"topic": "AI Safety"
},
{
"sdu": "1839...561",
"name": "Paul Christiano",
"rank": 2,
"country_name": "United States",
"topic": "AI Safety"
}
]
}{
"results": [{
"name": "Stuart Russell",
"bio": "Professor at UC Berkeley. Pioneer of AI safety research.",
"country": "United States",
"topics": ["AI Safety", "Machine Learning"],
"socials": {
"twitter": { "handle": "@stuartjrussell", "followers": 52400 },
"linkedin": { "handle": "stuart-russell-ai", "followers": 18200 }
}
}]
}Pricing comparison
$5/1K for search (raw results). Sonar Pro: $18/1K requests plus token costs. No free API tier.
Per result: LLM-generated prose with citation URLs. Non-deterministic output — the same query gives different answers. Hallucination risk on names and facts.
$50 in free credits on signup. No credit card required.
Per result: name, authority rank, country, verified social handles with follower counts, bio, peer network, authority score, and signal growth — structured JSON, deterministic, zero hallucination risk.
One search returns up to 25 complete authority profiles. To get equivalent verified data from Sonar, you'd need to parse prose, cross-reference sources, and manually assess each name's credibility.
Start freeWhen to use which
Use Sonar to generate a draft answer, Amygdala to ground it in verified authorities before showing it to users. Your LLM gets answers backed by real, ranked expertise rather than potentially hallucinated attributions.
Learn how authority-ranked data reduces LLM hallucinations →No credit card required. Full API access from day one.