NZBgeek is one of the best known NZB indexers, and it’s also one of the cheapest. Signing up is free, but you need a paid membership to actually search and download, and that costs $12 a year. It also works with Sonarr, Radarr and SABnzbd, and it has a friendly community behind it. You’ll also need a Usenet provider, since NZBgeek only finds the files. UsenetServer is the one we pair with NZBgeek, and it’s the account you’ll actually download through.
What Is NZBgeek?
NZBgeek is an automatic indexer that’s been running since 2012. It scans Usenet, sorts what it finds into categories and gives you an NZB file for each post. That file tells your newsreader where to find the pieces, and your Usenet provider does the actual download. Paying members are called Very Important Geeks, or VIGs, and they get the members’ forum and monthly giveaways.
Is There a Free Tier?
Not really, not any more. You can register on NZBgeek for free, but a free account doesn’t let you search properly, grab NZBs or use the API. Accounts that sit there without a membership can also get deleted. So think of signing up as the step before you pay, not a way to try it out. If you want something free to start with, see our list of free NZB sites.
NZBgeek Pricing: How Much Does NZBgeek Cost?
NZBgeek keeps its price low next to most indexers. Here’s what it costs in 2026.
| Plan | Price |
|---|---|
| 6 months | $6 |
| 1 year | $12 |
| 5 years | $40 |
| Lifetime | $80 |
At $12 a year that’s a dollar a month, which is about as cheap as a paid indexer gets. Better still, the five year plan brings it under 70 cents a month. You can pay with PayPal or Bitcoin.
The price only covers the indexer, though. You still need a Usenet provider to download what you find, and that’s a separate cost. Most people pair it with UsenetServer at $5.99 a month, and we line the rest up on our Usenet providers page.
Is the NZBgeek Lifetime Plan Worth It?
The lifetime plan is the one people ask us about most, so here’s how we’d think about it. It only makes sense if you’re sure you’ll still be on Usenet years from now, and that’s a harder thing to be sure of than it sounds.
Indexers come and go, but NZBgeek has been running since 2012 and it’s one of the few still here from that era, so it’s a better bet than most. What would worry us more is the other direction, that you stop downloading long before you’ve had your money’s worth, and most people do.
If you’re new to Usenet we’d start with the year and see whether you’re still using it in twelve months. If you’ve been at this for years already and you know you’re not stopping, the lifetime plan is a reasonable buy.
What a VIG Membership Gets You
Once you pay, you get all of NZBgeek:
- Unlimited NZBs
- Full API access for Sonarr, Radarr and your newsreader
- Custom searches and spam filtering
- Your own dashboard
- Content requests
- The members’ forum and monthly giveaways
Easynews is our top choice among the best NZB search options. It’s a complete all-in-one service with unlimited high-speed Usenet access plus a Usenet search that gives you accurate results. It’s easy to use. Just log into your Easynews account, type what you want into the search bar, and hit enter.
Other features:
- Highest retention rates / largest Usenet archive
- Retention grows daily (no Usenet posts are expired)
- Fast and accurate results
- Easy to use, fully customizable search interface
- No NZBs, indexers, or newsreaders needed
- Works on any device (mobile and desktop)
It also saves you the hassle and cost of paying for NZB indexers, since you get unlimited access and unlimited Usenet search with your Easynews account.
Exclusively through Usenet.com: Get 3 FREE Months of Easynews – Includes 30 day MBG + Free Upgrade to Unlimited (normally 150GB/mo)
Using It With Sonarr, Radarr and SABnzbd
First, copy your API key from your NZBgeek profile. Then add it as a Newznab indexer in Sonarr or Radarr, or in NZBHydra2 if you use more than one indexer. After that, your apps will search it and send the NZBs to your newsreader on their own. Our SABnzbd review shows how the newsreader side works.
If you’d rather do it by hand, search on the site, click the NZB icon next to what you want, and open the file in your newsreader.
An Indexer, Not a Provider
This trips up nearly everyone who’s new, so it’s worth being clear. NZBgeek doesn’t give you anything to download. It’s a search engine, it finds the files and hands you an NZB, and then you need a Usenet provider with an actual server to go and fetch them.
So if you buy NZBgeek on its own, nothing happens. You need both, and the provider is the part that matters more for speed and for whether the file is still there, because retention and completion come from the provider’s servers, not the indexer.
We compare them on our best Usenet providers page, and our UsenetServer review explains why it’s the one we use most, and the short version is that UsenetServer is $5.99 a month when you take twelve months and get three free on top.
Should You Use NZBgeek or Something Else?
Price isn’t really the thing that separates indexers, because they’re all cheap. What separates them is what they index and whether you can get in.
NZBgeek is open to anyone, which already puts it ahead of DrunkenSlug, which is invite only most of the year. It’s broader than NZBKing and more reliable than some of the smaller ones, and the API works properly with the automation tools, which is why so many people run it alongside something else.
Where it loses is on free access, since there isn’t any, and if that’s what you’re after our free NZB sites page covers the ones that do let you in without paying. If you want the full comparison across all of them, that’s on our best NZB sites page.
Is NZBgeek Worth It?
Yes, because for $12 a year you get a well-run indexer that works with all the usual apps, and a community that’s easy to deal with. It’s also a good first indexer if you’re new, because it’s cheap and easy to set up. A lot of people add a second one later, since two indexers find more than one. NZBPlanet, GingaDaddy and DrunkenSlug are good picks, and our best NZB sites list has more.