Elicit
Elicit is an AI research assistant that searches academic papers and clinical trials and turns a research question into a cited summary or report. It is mainly used for literature reviews, systematic reviews and evidence gathering.
#11 in AI AssistantsAI Research ToolsFree plan
Who it's for
Best for
Researchers mapping a new field who need a quick cited summary of the literature
Students starting a literature review who lack the exact search keywords
Not for
Business analysts who need current market data rather than academic papers- Researchers who need full-text reading access for every retrieved paper
Free plan$0
Pro$75/seat/mo
Scale$375/seat/mo
Features
Research agent
Gathers evidence from scientific databases, journals, public data and uploaded documents, then produces fully cited reports, tables, figures, calculations and slides.
Paper and trial search
Searches more than 138 million academic papers and 545,000 clinical trials, using semantic search so exact keywords are not needed to find relevant results.
Customizable research reports
Builds research briefs using a process inspired by systematic reviews, and the papers and information covered in each report can be adjusted.
Systematic review support
Automates screening and data extraction for systematic reviews, with partial support for search and report generation.
Library and routines
Sources found during a project can be stored and organized in a library for reuse, while routines keep work updated as new research appears.
What users say
Pros
- Surfaces highly relevant papers that never showed up in Google Scholar because the phrasing did not match.
- Plain-language questions about a new field return a summary with references, with no hallucinated citations noticed in medical queries.
- Results arrive ranked by study design, putting randomized trials and human research above animal work.
Cons
- Full text could not be read for some papers, leaving gaps when deeper detail is needed.
- Applied, up-to-date questions are poorly served, since the references returned are almost all academic papers.
A selection of the review sources we used:
Summarized from public user reviews and community discussions. View details
Global Traffic Rank
Top 100k
Alternatives
Rank#11 in category#7 in category#9 in category#16 in category
Free planYesYesYesYes
ProSurfaces relevant papers, cited summaries, and quality rankingsClear, current answers backed by sourcesReal citations, faster literature search, paper reading helpcited answers, book summaries, audio overviews, quick onboarding
Better forChecking whether published evidence supports or opposes a specific question or health claim.Generating audio overviews and study guides from uploaded notes, slides, or documents.
Weaker atScreening studies and extracting structured data into comparison tables for systematic reviews.Searching external academic databases directly instead of relying on uploaded documents.