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Head to head · Browser automation · October 2026 research run

Airtop vs Steel

Steel scores 70.4 (BB) on agent readiness against Airtop's 55.3 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Airtop leads on reliability. Both do browser automation. Steel accepts x402. Airtop doesn't.

AirtopSwitchboard Visual Technologies, Inc. (dba Airtop) · HTTP API C55.3/100#453 of 629 SteelNen Labs, Inc. · HTTP API BB70.4/100#129 of 629

Which one, for what

Airtop C

Good for Agents that need a hosted browser with natural-language page calls, saved logins handed over by a person, and proxies and CAPTCHA solving in one service.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 69 against 58

Watch for

No published rate for what a browser minute, a GB of proxy traffic or an AI call costs in credits

Steel BB

Good for Agents that need a real cloud browser with persistent profiles, stored logins, CAPTCHA solving and a human takeover path, and teams that want an open-source runtime they can also self-host.

Ahead on

  • Schema & documentation, 86 against 76
  • Agent ergonomics, 79 against 65
  • Security & auth, 56 against 46
  • Payments & pricing, 75 against 25
  • Maintenance & community, 82 against 24

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
  • An agent can pay per call over x402, with no account
  • Runs on your own machine
  • Free to start without a card
  • Open source

Watch for

Three incidents of more than an hour hit the API or session creation in the 90 days to 8 October 2026, the longest 5 hours 41 minutes

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runAirtopSteelEdge
Reliability16%206958Airtop +11
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.27686Steel +10
Agent ergonomics13%16.26579Steel +14
Security & auth14%17.54656Steel +10
Payments & pricing10%12.52575Steel +50
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.82482Steel +58
Transparency & trust7%8.86164Steel +3
Negative events≤1500
Total55.3 · C70.4 · BB

Facts side by side

FactAirtopSteel
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorSwitchboard Visual Technologies, Inc. (dba Airtop)Nen Labs, Inc.
Hosted endpointhttps://api.airtop.ai/apihttps://api.steel.dev
TransportsHTTPHTTP, stdio
AuthAPI keyAPI key
PricingFreemiumFreemium
x402noyes, from $0.01/call
LicenceProprietary cloud service under Airtop's terms of use. The Node and Python SDKs are MIT per npm and PyPIProprietary cloud service under Steel's terms. steel-browser and the Node and Python SDKs are Apache-2.0. The MCP server and the CLI are MIT
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-07-012026-10-02
Terms last updated2025-07-292025-02-05
Privacy policy last updated2025-09-022026-02-05
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessnot found in the textyes
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot found in the textyes
Terms or service can change without noticenot found in the textyes
Arbitration or class-action waiveryesyes
Popularity16 stars, 16k npm/wk, 246 PyPI/wk47k npm/wk, 63k PyPI/wk

Verdicts

Airtop

The cloud browser API has a public OpenAPI 3.1 document, Markdown docs, natural-language page calls with a per-call credit cap, and a status page with no incident in the last 90 days. Credit rates for browser time, proxy traffic and AI calls are not published, and the developer changelog's last entry is dated 3 September 2025.

Steel

The hosted API has a public OpenAPI document, per-unit prices, $30 of starting credit and x402 payment for scrape, screenshot and PDF calls. The status page records three API or session-creation incidents of more than an hour in 90 days, and the documented CDP connection puts the API key in the URL.

Before you call either

Airtop

  1. Terminate every session with DELETE /v1/sessions/{id}. Sessions bill in 30-second increments and idle ones last 10 minutes by default
  2. Set costThresholdCredits on AI calls and read meta.usage.credits afterwards. Credit rates are not published, so measure them
  3. Use page-query with configuration.outputSchema for structured output. prompt-content and summarize-content are deprecated
  4. When calling REST without the SDK, poll session status until running before creating a window. Only the SDK waits for you
  5. Airtop's integrated proxy cannot reach LinkedIn, ticketing sites and some banks and streaming services. Bring a custom proxy for those

Steel

  1. Use POST /v1/scrape for pages you only need to read. It starts no session and costs $5 per 1,000 calls, or $0.01 a call by x402
  2. Release every session with POST /v1/sessions/{id}/release and set inactivityTimeout. Browser time bills by the minute, rounded up
  3. Build the CDP URL as wss://connect.steel.dev?apiKey=<key>&sessionId=<id> and keep it out of logs, because it carries the key
  4. Launch sessions end after 15 minutes at most, and timeout cannot be changed on a live session
  5. CAPTCHA solving and Steel's managed proxies on Launch need $10 of paid balance. Free credit does not count

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Airtop or Steel?

Steel scores 70.4 (BB) on agent readiness against Airtop's 55.3 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Airtop leads on reliability.

Do Airtop and Steel need an API key?

Both need an API key. An agent can also pay Steel per call over x402, with no account.

Can an agent call Airtop and Steel without installing anything?

Yes. Airtop has a hosted endpoint at https://api.airtop.ai/api and Steel at https://api.steel.dev.

Are Airtop and Steel open source?

No open-source release is listed for Airtop. Steel is open source (Proprietary cloud service under Steel's terms. steel-browser and the Node and Python SDKs are Apache-2.0. The MCP server and the CLI are MIT).

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