Yes Brainly was always free, however in order for you to get answers, and see them, you would have to make an account, and then answer questions in order to get points, which you could use to view answers of questions you have, also not only view answers to questions you have, but also to ask questions with the points you earned from answering other peoples questions.
It is free actually but you can ask unlimited questions always. But you can't search up as many questions, there was a limit of 10. Now since this virus it has changed and Brainly is free for people who are still in school which would be us homeschoolers.
So to answer you no it didn't always use to be free. You can still get Brainly premium but for now it's free.
