Head to head · LLM inference · October 2026 research run
Amazon Bedrock vs Vercel AI Gateway
Amazon Bedrock scores 81.7 (A) on agent readiness against Vercel AI Gateway's 67.8 (B), and leads in every scored category. Both do llm inference.
Best model APIs and inference for AI agents · All 830 models comparisons
Which one, for what
Best for Teams already on AWS who want Claude, GPT-6, Nova, Llama and other models under one IAM, billing and VPC boundary, with regional data controls and an SLA.
Ahead on
- Schema & documentation, 94 against 74
- Agent ergonomics, 92 against 83
- Security & auth, 98 against 79
- Payments & pricing, 30 against 20
- Transparency & trust, 85 against 71
Also in its favour
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
- No incidents deducted, where Vercel AI Gateway loses 3 points for them
Watch for
An AWS account, IAM setup and a Region choice come before the first call, and an agent can't sign up alone
Best for Teams that want one key, one bill, budgets and failover in front of many model providers, especially on Vercel with OIDC.
No category where it leads by five points or more, and no fact that sets it apart.
Watch for
The free monthly credit needs a valid payment method on the team, and its amount is not stated in the reviewed docs
Why the edge
Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.
Schema & documentation Amazon Bedrock +20
Amazon Bedrock 94
Model reading. No OpenAPI, but the bedrock-runtime and bedrock Smithy models are public in aws/api-models-aws with types, required members and enums, counted as for S3 (25). llms.txt for the user guide with about 2,000 lines, each page with a Markdown twin (10). Model cards state context, output limits, endpoints and supported functions per model, and the guide now recommends bedrock-runtime for new work, but support for each API, endpoint and feature changes model by model (16 of 20). Structured outputs compile JSON Schema to a grammar, with minimum, maximum and string lengths supported, though some inference profiles don't support it, such as Haiku 4.5 through the India profile (13 of 15). Every operation lists typed errors with HTTP codes and links to a troubleshooting page with causes and fixes, and examples run through the guide (15). API version 2023-09-30 and a dated document history with an RSS feed, newest entry 30 October 2026, with structured outputs for Claude on both endpoints added on 18 October (15).
Vercel AI Gateway 74
Router, scored on the API lines. Vercel's OpenAPI 3.0.3 document has AI Gateway management paths (budgets, routing rules, virtual model configs, routers) and POST /api-keys. It does not cover the inference routes on ai-gateway.vercel.sh or /v1/models, /v1/credits, /v1/generation and /v1/report, which follow the OpenAI and Anthropic formats and the REST reference page (12 of 25). Every docs page is served as Markdown, and vercel.com/llms.txt lists AI Gateway and the keyless model list (10). The docs say when to use AI Gateway, which API format suits which client, and what each control leaves out, such as BYOK spend outside budgets (16 of 20). providerOptions.gateway fields are documented in tables with types, and the model list names each model's supported parameters. The request bodies have no published schema of their own (9 of 15). cURL, TypeScript and Python examples on most pages, and error tables in the FAQ, the REST reference and the Token Pass pages. The Chat Completions error list omits 402 (13 of 15). Paths carry /v1, the changelog is dated, with 95 entries naming AI Gateway from 3 August to 30 October 2026, and @ai-sdk/gateway keeps a CHANGELOG. The changelog sitemap dates one AI Gateway entry to 25 March 2025, before the alpha (14 of 15).
Security & auth Amazon Bedrock +19
Amazon Bedrock 98
Model reading. IAM with SigV4, roles and STS session credentials, policies down to a model or inference-profile ARN, short-term API keys that expire within 12 hours, long-term keys with expiry and reset, and condition keys that can deny bearer tokens altogether (30). The security page says customer data isn't shared with model providers or used to improve the base models (20). The abuse detection page says Bedrock stores no inputs or outputs by default, and a per-Region none mode blocks models that require retention, but Claude Fable 5 and 5.1 keep all traffic up to 30 days and GPT-6 and GPT-5.x keep flagged traffic up to 30 days (13 of 15, a judgement call; Anthropic's own API got 12 for the same Fable exception without an account-level block). CloudTrail logs API calls, and model invocation logging can send prompts and responses to S3 or CloudWatch Logs (15). Bedrock is in ISO, SOC and CSA STAR Level 2 scope, HIPAA eligible and FedRAMP High in GovCloud (US-West) per its security page, with a vulnerability disclosure programme on HackerOne, and the aws.amazon.com security.txt, expired on 6 October, was renewed with Expires 2027-10-16 when read on 6 November (20). Up from 96 on 6 October for that reason.
Vercel AI Gateway 79
Router, read on the model lines. AI Gateway API keys belong to a team, can be limited to one project and given an expiry and a budget, are deactivated when their creator leaves the team, and can be revoked without authentication by reporting a leaked key. Keys carry no per-model or read-only scope apart from the Token Pass key type. On Vercel, project OIDC tokens replace long-lived keys (24 of 30). Vercel says it does not train on prompts, and the AI Product Terms make that a warranty only for Enterprise subscriptions. Provider training is filtered only when disallowPromptTraining or ZDR is set, the filter does not apply to BYOK, and the terms say Stealth Model providers may train on inputs (12 of 20). The gateway does not keep prompt or response content. Provider ZDR is free per request on Pro and Enterprise and not available on Hobby, and BYOK keys are skipped under ZDR unless marked (12 of 15). Per-request logs record status, provider attempts, tokens, cost and authentication method, with routing details kept 30 days and Trace Drains and spend reports on paid plans (13 of 15). Valid security.txt with HackerOne (re-read on 1 November, expires 28 September 2027), SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001:2022 as Vercel states them, and a public bulletin for the April 2026 incident, closed on 16 October 2026 (18 of 20).
Transparency & trust Amazon Bedrock +14
Amazon Bedrock 85
Closed service under the AWS Customer Agreement and Service Terms, with the SDKs and Smithy models under Apache-2.0 (18, as for S3). The data retention, abuse detection and security pages agree that Bedrock stores nothing by default, name the models that retain traffic and for how long, and say retained data isn't shared with providers. The retention page's default mode says AWS 'may retain the data for safety and abuse-prevention purposes' without a period, and a legacy provider_data_share mode is kept though sharing isn't supported (25 of 30). A written lifecycle policy with Legacy and EOL dates per model, but the legacy table's 34-day Legacy periods for five Claude models in some Regions contradict its own 6-month floor (15 of 20, down from 18). AWS's sub-processor list, per the 4 October S3 check, and per-Region, geographic and global inference options, with global routing able to process data in any commercial Region (18 of 20).
Vercel AI Gateway 71
Closed service under the Terms of Service last updated 19 October 2026, the AI Product Terms with an AI Gateway section, and Token Pass terms on its docs page. Routed models carry the terms of 64 providers listed in the Notices and Licence Information, and the SDK is Apache-2.0 (18 of 30). The FAQ, the ZDR page and the logs page agree that prompt and response content is not kept. The terms place content sent to providers under the providers' own terms, give the no-training warranty only to Enterprise and bar sensitive personal information in Input. The DPA covers Pro and Enterprise, not Hobby, and the privacy notice gives retention criteria, not periods (17 of 30). No deprecation policy found. Model retirements carry dates in the model list, and the AI Product Terms let Vercel change fees, change or end anything in beta without notice, and end Token Pass with a pro-rata refund (8 of 20). Provider terms are listed per provider and regional inference names four regions, while the gateway itself may process a request in any Vercel region. The subprocessor list on security.vercel.com was not read (12 of 20).
Payments & pricing Amazon Bedrock +10
Amazon Bedrock 30
No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Per-token prices per model, tier and Region on the public pricing page, filled from AWS's public price feed (20). New accounts get up to $200 in Free Tier credits and the Free Tier page lists Bedrock among eligible services, and the Free Tier FAQ says most new customers don't need a payment method, but AWS may still ask for one, so half, as for S3 (10). A person signs up for AWS in a browser and sets up IAM before any key exists (0).
Vercel AI Gateway 20
No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Per-token prices for every model are public in the keyless model list and the catalogue, and add-on prices are on the pricing page (20). A monthly free credit exists, but the getting-started page and the FAQ say the team must add a valid payment method before using it (0). A person signs up in a browser. Keys can then be created through POST /v1/api-keys, which needs a Vercel access token from that account (0).
Agent ergonomics Amazon Bedrock +9
Amazon Bedrock 92
Model reading of the checklist (tool use, structured output, caching, context, batch, SDKs, errors). Converse takes tools with toolChoice auto, any or a named tool and strict: true, but forced choice depends on the model behind it (17 of 20). Structured outputs on supported models only (13 of 15). Explicit and implicit prompt caching, cache reads at $0.20 per million on Opus 5.5, 0.05x input, with 5-minute and 1-hour TTLs (15). 1M-token context on Opus 5.5, Sonnet 5.5 and Nova 2 Lite, a judgement call since Bedrock has no default model (15). Batch at half price on supported models, but the pricing page shows none for Opus 5.5 or Sonnet 5.5, while Flex is half price on Nova (7 of 10). AWS SDKs in every major language plus token generators for Python, JavaScript and Java (10). Typed errors with recovery advice per code (15).
Vercel AI Gateway 83
Router, read on the model lines. Tool calling is documented on all six surfaces and 303 of 498 models carry the tool-use tag on 1 November, with behaviour depending on the model routed (16 of 20). Structured output is documented per surface and tagged on 278 models (13 of 15). caching: 'auto' adds Anthropic cache markers, cache_ttl asks for one-hour entries, x-session-affinity keeps a conversation on one provider, and cache-read prices are listed per model (14 of 15). 162 models list a context of one million tokens or more, a judgement call since a router has no default model (15). The SDK source has a gateway-batch.ts file, but no batch endpoint or batch discount was found in the docs (2 of 10). The AI SDK for TypeScript, the AI SDK for Python in beta, and the OpenAI and Anthropic SDKs with a changed base URL (10). Errors return message and type, an exceeded budget answers 402 apart from a 429, the SDK has ten typed Gateway*Error classes, and the FAQ maps each status to a fix (13 of 15).
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Amazon Bedrock | Vercel AI Gateway | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 80 | 79 | Amazon Bedrock +1 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 94 | 74 | Amazon Bedrock +20 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 92 | 83 | Amazon Bedrock +9 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 98 | 79 | Amazon Bedrock +19 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 30 | 20 | Amazon Bedrock +10 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 81 | 79 | Amazon Bedrock +2 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 85 | 71 | Amazon Bedrock +14 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | -3 | |
| Total | A 81.7/100 | B 67.8/100 |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Amazon Bedrock | Vercel AI Gateway |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | Model API | Model router |
| Vendor | Amazon Web Services | Vercel Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | https://bedrock-runtime.us-east-1.amazonaws.com | https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh/v1 |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Pay per use |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under the AWS Customer Agreement and Service Terms. Third-party models carry their providers' licence terms. The AWS SDKs and the Smithy service models are Apache-2.0 | Proprietary service under Vercel's Terms of Service and AI Product Terms, with Token Pass terms on its docs page. Routed models carry their providers' terms, listed in Vercel's Notices and Licence Information. The @ai-sdk/gateway provider is Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-30 | 2026-10-30 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-10-01 | 2026-06-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-05-18 | 2026-06-01 |
| Customer content may train models | yes, with an opt-out | yes, with an opt-out |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | yes |
| Popularity | 21.8M npm/wk | 29.6M npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3/5 (4) |
How the scores have moved
Amazon Bedrock
No score change since it was listed.
Verdicts
Amazon Bedrock
Bedrock reaches Claude, GPT-6, Nova, Llama and other families through one IAM-controlled API, with a 99.9 per cent SLA and a per-Region zero-retention switch. Setup needs an AWS account, IAM permissions and a Region, capabilities vary by model, and some Regions gave five older Claude models about 34 days of notice.
Vercel AI Gateway
Token prices pass through with no markup, prompts are not stored by the gateway, and budgets, provider failover and per-request logs are built in. The free monthly credit needs a card on file, rate limits are not published as numbers, no SLA covers the API, and the contractual promise not to train on content applies to Enterprise subscriptions only.
Before you call either
Amazon Bedrock
- Use the geographic or global inference ID from the model card, such as
global.anthropic.claude-opus-5-5. Global routing is cheaper but can process data in any commercial Region - Set
data_retention_modetononein each Region before sending sensitive data. Models that need retention then return ValidationException - Back off with jitter on 429 ThrottlingException, 503 and 529
overloaded_error, and honourRetry-Afterwhen it's sent - Generate short-term API keys from an IAM role for production. Long-term keys create an IAM user and AWS marks them exploration only
- Call ListFoundationModels in your Region and read
modelLifecyclebefore pinning a model ID. Claude 3.x IDs in several Regions stop working on 13 November 2026 and requests don't redirect
Vercel AI Gateway
- Read
GET https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh/v1/modelswithout a key to pick a model ID and check its price, context, ZDR and no-training flags before calling - Set
zeroDataRetentionordisallowPromptTrainingto true inproviderOptions.gatewayon sensitive requests. Default routing ignores provider retention and training policies - Treat a 429 as retryable and honour
retry-afterwhen present. A 402 withquota_for_entity_exceededis a spent budget, so do not retry it - On a Token Pass key, a 403 with
no_providers_availablemeans spent credit or a model outside the pass. Retry with a standard AI Gateway key, which bills credits - Set
inferenceRegionwhen data residency matters. The defaultglobalmay run inference outside the user's jurisdiction
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Amazon Bedrock or Vercel AI Gateway?
Amazon Bedrock scores 81.7 (A) on agent readiness against Vercel AI Gateway's 67.8 (B), and leads in every scored category.
Do Amazon Bedrock and Vercel AI Gateway need an API key?
Both take an API key or an OAuth sign-in.
Can an agent call Amazon Bedrock and Vercel AI Gateway without installing anything?
Yes. Amazon Bedrock has a hosted endpoint at https://bedrock-runtime.us-east-1.amazonaws.com and Vercel AI Gateway at https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh/v1.
Other comparisons with Amazon Bedrock or Vercel AI Gateway
- Amazon Bedrock vs Claude API
- Amazon Bedrock vs Antseed
- Amazon Bedrock vs Azure OpenAI in Foundry Models
- Amazon Bedrock vs BlockRun.AI
- Amazon Bedrock vs Cerebras Inference
- Amazon Bedrock vs Cloudflare AI Gateway
- Amazon Bedrock vs Cloudflare Workers AI
- Amazon Bedrock vs Cohere Chat API (Command models)
- Amazon Bedrock vs DeepInfra
- Amazon Bedrock vs DeepSeek API
- Amazon Bedrock vs Eden AI
- Amazon Bedrock vs Glimpse
- Amazon Bedrock vs Fireworks AI Inference
- Amazon Bedrock vs Gemini Developer API
- Amazon Bedrock vs GroqCloud
- Amazon Bedrock vs Hugging Face Inference Providers
- Amazon Bedrock vs Inkling 2 Small
- Amazon Bedrock vs Jais 3
- Amazon Bedrock vs Meta Model API
- Amazon Bedrock vs MiniMax API
- Amazon Bedrock vs Mistral AI API
- Amazon Bedrock vs Muse Spark Open
- Amazon Bedrock vs Nemotron 3.5 Super VL
- Amazon Bedrock vs Novita AI
- Amazon Bedrock vs OpenAI API
- Amazon Bedrock vs OpenRouter
- Amazon Bedrock vs Prism Inference
- Amazon Bedrock vs Router.com (Ramp Router)
- Amazon Bedrock vs Beam 1.0
- Amazon Bedrock vs RouterPlus
- Amazon Bedrock vs SambaCloud
- Amazon Bedrock vs SiliconFlow
- Amazon Bedrock vs Simplismart
- Amazon Bedrock vs StepFun API
- Amazon Bedrock vs SWE-2 Flash
- Amazon Bedrock vs Tencent Cloud TokenHub
- Amazon Bedrock vs Together AI Inference
- Amazon Bedrock vs Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform)
- Amazon Bedrock vs xAI API (Grok)
- Claude API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Azure OpenAI in Foundry Models vs Vercel AI Gateway
- BlockRun.AI vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Cerebras Inference vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Cloudflare Workers AI vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Cohere Chat API (Command models) vs Vercel AI Gateway
- DeepInfra vs Vercel AI Gateway
- DeepSeek API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Glimpse vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Fireworks AI Inference vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Gemini Developer API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- GroqCloud vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Inkling 2 Small vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Jais 3 vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Meta Model API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- MiniMax API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Mistral AI API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Muse Spark Open vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Nemotron 3.5 Super VL vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Novita AI vs Vercel AI Gateway
- OpenAI API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- OpenRouter vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Beam 1.0 vs Vercel AI Gateway
- SambaCloud vs Vercel AI Gateway
- SiliconFlow vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Simplismart vs Vercel AI Gateway
- StepFun API vs Vercel AI Gateway
- SWE-2 Flash vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Together AI Inference vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Vercel AI Gateway vs Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform)
- Vercel AI Gateway vs xAI API (Grok)
- Antseed vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Eden AI vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Hugging Face Inference Providers vs Vercel AI Gateway
- LiteLLM vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Router.com (Ramp Router) vs Vercel AI Gateway
- RouterPlus vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Tencent Cloud TokenHub vs Vercel AI Gateway
- Prism Inference vs Vercel AI Gateway
Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/amazon-bedrock-vs-vercel-ai-gateway.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/amazon-bedrock.json·/api/v1/tools/vercel-ai-gateway.json - From a terminal
anchor compare amazon-bedrock vercel-ai-gateway(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "amazon-bedrock", "b": "vercel-ai-gateway"}at/mcp, no key