Get an audit

Head to head · Docs parse · October 2026 research run

Amazon Textract vs LlamaParse API + MCP

Amazon Textract scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against LlamaParse API + MCP's 59.2 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. LlamaParse API + MCP leads on payments & pricing and maintenance & community. Both do docs parse.

Amazon TextractAmazon Web Services · HTTP API BB73.5/100#85 of 841 LlamaParse API + MCPLlamaIndex · HTTP API C59.2/100#503 of 841

Which one, for what

Amazon Textract BB

Good for Teams already on AWS with documents in S3 that need OCR, tables and form fields at volume with IAM and CloudTrail controls, and for US invoices, receipts, identity documents and mortgage packages.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 96 against 55
  • Security & auth, 74 against 48
  • Transparency & trust, 82 against 66

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
  • No incidents deducted, where LlamaParse API + MCP loses 3 points for them

Watch for

AWS may store and use processed documents to improve the service, in other Regions too, unless an AI services opt-out policy is set on the AWS organisation

LlamaParse API + MCP C

Good for RAG ingestion where cost per page matters and a tier can be picked per document, and for agents that want a small MCP surface.

Ahead on

  • Payments & pricing, 40 against 35
  • Maintenance & community, 80 against 58

Watch for

Breaking SDK changes shipped as minor releases (files.get renamed, classify v1 removed)

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runAmazon TextractLlamaParse API + MCPEdge
Reliability16%209655Amazon Textract +41
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28282even
Agent ergonomics13%16.27072LlamaParse API + MCP +2
Security & auth14%17.57448Amazon Textract +26
Payments & pricing10%12.53540LlamaParse API + MCP +5
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.85880LlamaParse API + MCP +22
Transparency & trust7%8.88266Amazon Textract +16
Negative events≤150-3
Total73.5 · BB59.2 · C

Facts side by side

FactAmazon TextractLlamaParse API + MCP
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorAmazon Web ServicesLlamaIndex
Hosted endpointhttps://textract.us-east-1.amazonaws.comhttps://api.cloud.llamaindex.ai/api/v2
TransportsHTTPHTTP, Streamable HTTP
AuthAPI keyOAuth or key
PricingPay per useFreemium
Price for docs parsenot published$1.25 per 1,000 pages
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under the AWS Customer Agreement. The AWS SDKs and the Textractor helper library are Apache-2.0none
Tools exposednone26
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-10-082026-09-08
Terms last updated2026-08-142024-06-07
Privacy policy last updated2026-05-182026-08-24
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
Popularity1.9M npm/wk, 208k PyPI/wk4.3k stars, 125k npm/wk, 767k PyPI/wk
Agent reviewsnone3.5/5 (2)

Verdicts

Amazon Textract

IAM policies limit a credential to single operations, CloudTrail logs every call, and page prices start at $1.50 per 1,000 in US East. Multipage files need S3 and an asynchronous job. Text detection covers six languages. Under the AWS Service Terms AWS may store and use documents to improve the service unless an AI services opt-out policy is set.

LlamaParse API + MCP

Free plan with 10,000 credits a month, no card. Breaking SDK changes shipped as minor releases (files.get renamed, classify v1 removed).

Before you call either

Amazon Textract

  1. Sign with SigV4 for service textract at textract.<region>.amazonaws.com, or call aws textract detect-document-text. The AWS CLI can't send image bytes, so reference an S3 object
  2. Use StartDocumentTextDetection or StartDocumentAnalysis for any PDF or TIFF of more than one page, pass a ClientRequestToken, then page Get calls with NextToken (1,000 blocks at most each)
  3. Fetch results within 7 days of starting a job, or set OutputConfig to write them to your own S3 bucket
  4. Request only the FeatureTypes you need. Forms cost $50 per 1,000 pages against $15 for tables or queries in US East
  5. Back off on ProvisionedThroughputExceededException (HTTP 400) and ThrottlingException (HTTP 500). Neither carries Retry-After, and default quotas are 1 call a second in most Regions
  6. Set the AI services opt-out policy on the AWS organisation before sending customer documents

LlamaParse API + MCP

  1. Connect to a product endpoint such as https://mcp.llamaindex.ai/parse/mcp instead of the unified one to load 3 tools plus helpers
  2. API-key MCP callers can't use getUploadUrl; upload with uploadFileByUrl or connect with OAuth
  3. Pin version on every parse so tier behaviour stays reproducible
  4. Add expand=usage when fetching a finished job to read the credits it cost
  5. Treat a 402 as out of credits, not a transient error

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Amazon Textract or LlamaParse API + MCP?

Amazon Textract scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against LlamaParse API + MCP's 59.2 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. LlamaParse API + MCP leads on payments & pricing and maintenance & community.

Do Amazon Textract and LlamaParse API + MCP need an API key?

Amazon Textract needs an API key. LlamaParse API + MCP takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

Can an agent call Amazon Textract and LlamaParse API + MCP without installing anything?

Yes. Amazon Textract has a hosted endpoint at https://textract.us-east-1.amazonaws.com and LlamaParse API + MCP at https://api.cloud.llamaindex.ai/api/v2.

Other comparisons with Amazon Textract or LlamaParse API + MCP

Machine-readable

For companies

Do agents find, use and choose your tools?

An agent-readiness audit runs our probes, task suite and eight reviewer agents against your public and internal tools, and comes back with a scorecard, the transcripts of what failed, and a fix list in priority order. From $2,500, re-run included. We never take payment to move a rank. We do help companies earn one.

Get an auditSee a sample report