> Source: https://txtfetch.com/compare/unstructured
> Plain-text twin — every page on txtfetch.com has one. https://txtfetch.com/text

---

# txtfetch vs Unstructured.io

Unstructured.io is open-core etl for rag pipelines, priced per page. Here's an honest comparison: pricing math, capabilities, and where each tool wins.

at a glance

Unstructured.io

**Billing**: per page (pay-as-you-go)

**Rate used below**: $0.03/page

**Free tier**: 15,000 pages/month free.

txtfetch

**Billing**: per document, regardless of page count

**Rate used below**: flat monthly quota (see plans)

**Free tier**: 500 documents/month, free, ongoing (Hobby plan)

capability table

| Capability | Unstructured.io | txtfetch |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Billing unit | per page | per document |
| Format coverage | ~25 file types | 615 formats (Apache Tika, checked) |
| OCR for scans / images | yes | yes |
| Table extraction | yes | yes* |
| Complex layout fidelity | partial | partial* |
| Structured field extraction | no | not yet* |
| Self-hosted option | yes | no* |
| Single HTTP endpoint | partial | yes |

Vendor-published benchmarks are marked directional throughout. See sources below. \* txtfetch notes: Tables come back as structured rows and cells, not flattened text. Use ?format=markdown for GFM pipe tables, or ?format=json for table elements with a cells array. Output is clean linear or structured text, not a visual layout reconstruction. That's by design, but worth knowing. Structured markdown and element-JSON document output ship today (?format=markdown / ?format=json). Schema-defined field extraction means pulling typed fields per your own schema. That feature is on the roadmap, not shipped yet. We won't claim it early. No shipped self-host or VPC artifact today. It is on the roadmap. Apache Tika itself is free to run yourself. See the page below for what that takes.

Weighing self-hosting against either API? See [what running Apache Tika yourself actually takes](https://txtfetch.com/compare/self-hosted-tika).

the cost calculator

## Per page vs per document, worked out.

A 300-page PDF is 300 units of billing to Unstructured.io. It's one document to txtfetch. Adjust the numbers to your own workload.

[Interactive cost calculator — adjust pages per document and documents per month to compare pricing against Unstructured.io]

where unstructured wins

-   Purpose-built chunking strategies (by-title, by-similarity) tuned specifically for RAG retrieval, not just text extraction.
-   Open-source core you can self-host and modify if you need full control over the pipeline.
-   Deep partitioning options per element type (titles, narrative text, tables, images) for teams that want to post-process structure, not just plain text.

where txtfetch wins

-   Breadth: 615 formats, each with a real Apache Tika parser behind it. That's [checked against the exact build we run](https://txtfetch.com/formats/coverage), not a curated list of a dozen file types.
-   One HTTP endpoint. Pass a URL or upload a file, and get text back. No SDK and no async job polling required.
-   Priced per document, so a 300-page report doesn't cost 300x a one-pager.
-   A durable free tier (500 documents/month, ongoing) rather than a time-boxed trial.

What we don't claim yet: schema-defined structured field extraction, or an uptime SLA. Those ship later. See the capability table above.

next step

Ready to switch? See [what your code looks like after migrating from Unstructured.io](https://txtfetch.com/migrate/unstructured): the call you run today, the call that replaces it, and a drop-in adapter.

sources

-   [Unstructured.io: Pricing](https://unstructured.io/pricing) Accessed 2026-07

## Check the numbers yourself.

The benchmark runs against a committed corpus. You can re-run it.

[See the benchmarks →](https://txtfetch.com/benchmarks)

[Get an API key →](https://app.txtfetch.com/signup)