# Arcmira vs Liner Search MCP

> Arcmira scores 64.2 (B) to Liner Search MCP's 43.4 (E) for research search. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-liner-mcp
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-liner-mcp.md (~6,050 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Arcmira scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Liner Search MCP's 43.4 (E), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Liner Search MCP leads on reliability. Both do research search.

- Arcmira: grade B, 64.2/100, rank #483 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/arcmira.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/arcmira.json
- Liner Search MCP: grade E, 43.4/100, rank #1252 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/liner-mcp.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/liner-mcp.json
- Best web search APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/search/index.md
- All 326 search comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/search/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Arcmira (B)

Good for: Agents answering what was said on YouTube shows and podcasts, who was mentioned or appeared where, which brands sponsor a show and how a name's mentions are trending, with timestamped source links, through one connection on a free monthly allowance.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 87 against 45
- Agent ergonomics, 91 against 65
- Security & auth, 61 against 35
- Payments & pricing, 55 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 84 against 45
- Transparency & trust, 61 against 34

Also in its favour:
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: No status page, incident history or SLA was found; the terms disclaim uninterrupted service and Enterprise lists priority support without an uptime commitment

### Liner Search MCP (E)

Good for: Agents that need cheap cited search across the web and scholarly sources, with optional deep research reports.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 50 against 40

Also in its favour:
- No incidents deducted, where Arcmira loses 3 points for them

Watch for: No free tier found


## Why the edge

### Schema & documentation: Arcmira +42

- Arcmira (87): MCP reading, with the API the tools call. A public OpenAPI 3.1 file, re-read on 2 November from its copy at arcmira.com/docs/openapi/arcmira-v1.json (31 paths, 35 operations, 75 schemas, one bearer scheme; the same document is served at api.arcmira.com/v1/openapi.json), and the four tools declare zod input schemas in src/tools.ts (25). llms.txt routed by situation, a .md twin of every docs page, developers.md, auth.md, a published Agent Skill, an RFC 9727 api-catalog and a .well-known/mcp card (10). Tool descriptions say what each does, that arcmira_describe is called once and bills nothing, that the write tool never deletes and when to send feedback; operation descriptions in the OpenAPI file say to call coverage before claiming a show isn't indexed and to resolve names before filters, and the server instructions carry the id rule, the 90-day default and the usage rule. When not to use a method is covered by the id rule and the resolver note, little else (16 of 20). The two execute tools take a JavaScript program as one string, checked only when it runs; the feedback tool has an enum category, a regex call_id and length caps; the API has 102 parameters, 37 with enums, ranges or patterns, and ids typed by prefix (9 of 15). Worked example programs in the reference, curl examples on every guide, an error catalogue of about 60 codes with a cause and fix each, doc_url anchors and request ids on every error, and typed unlock and details.limit objects; only 9 parameters in the OpenAPI file carry an example (14 of 15). /v1 in the path, a dated docs changelog from April 2026 with a 14-row table for the 5 to 8 October breaking changes, a per-version CHANGELOG.md in the repository and 33 registry versions; the OpenAPI file marks retired fields deprecated, but the quickstart says new fields and routes arrive without notice and nothing states a notice period (13 of 15). 25+10+16+9+14+13 = 87.
- Liner Search MCP (45): Tool schemas not read without sign-in (15 of 25). llms.txt (10). A table says which tool fits which need, and that the domain tools return the same shape as search_web (12 of 20). Inputs not verifiable (3 of 15). Setup examples, no error responses (5 of 15). Registry version 1.0.0 since 11 September; no changelog found (0). 15 + 10 + 12 + 3 + 5 + 0 = 45.

### Maintenance & community: Arcmira +39

- Arcmira (84): The MCP server's newest release is 0.10.7, published to the registry on 12 October 2026 and to GitHub on 15 October, with repository commits to 30 October and no release since (re-read from the clones on 2 November); the SDKs reached 0.6.2 on 15 October and the last dated API change in the docs changelog is also 15 October (30). 33 registry versions from 0.3.0 on 4 September to 0.10.7, 24 GitHub releases, 15 npm versions of arcmira since 22 August and 10 dated docs changelog entries in October (20). Issues on arcmira/mcp are mostly the maintainer's own (18 of 19 items are their own pull requests or notes); the one outside issue, #13 of 18 October, had no reply by 30 October (GitHub's API and pages couldn't be read on 2 November); support is an email address, hi@arcmira.com, and a free feedback endpoint whose review states can be read back; no Discord, forum or community channel (11 of 25). io.github.arcmira/arcmira is in the official MCP registry under the GitHub-verified organisation namespace, current at 0.10.7, and the TypeScript and Python SDKs are current (15). CI on every push and pull request (typecheck, tests, manifest check against the OpenAPI contract, signed-commit check), passing on master per the 30 October check, pinned dependencies and a lockfile; the server itself is not a package anyone installs, so package health is the SDKs', whose CI we didn't read (8 of 10). 30+20+11+15+8 = 84.
- Liner Search MCP (45): Registry entry com.liner/search last updated 11 September 2026 (20). No dated changelog found (0). Support page linked from the docs (10 of 15). Official registry entry under its own namespace (15). No package to read (0). 20 + 0 + 10 + 15 + 0 = 45. Registry presence read from Anchor Terminal's own daily import of the official MCP registry (/api/v1/registry.json, 6 November 2026), not the registry's API.

### Payments & pricing: Arcmira +35

- Arcmira (55): No x402, MPP or L402 in the OpenAPI file, llms.txt, developers.md, the docs or the pricing page (0). Prices published without a login, in credits per read (4 a passage, mention or list row past the first 5 of a request, 10 a momentum call, 40 a sponsor row, 25 an alert, 4 per started 15 minutes of captions, 300 per started 15 minutes of a Premium transcript) and in dollars (Pro $20 for 20,000 credits, Pro+ $60 for 60,000, Ultra $200 for 400,000, on-demand $0.002 a credit) (20). Free plan with 1,000 credits a month, 2 monitored names and no card, per the pricing FAQ; the 7-day Pro trial needs a card (20). POST /v1/signups with an email and POST /v1/signups/verify with the six-digit code return a read-scoped key with no browser, so an agent with a mailbox can onboard itself; the code still has to be read from an inbox, and write scopes need a dashboard key or OAuth consent (15 of 20). 0+20+20+15 = 55.
- Liner Search MCP (20): No machine payment protocol (0). Per-call prices public (20). No free tier found (0). A person signs up in a browser for OAuth or an API key (0). 0 + 20 + 0 + 0 = 20.

### Transparency & trust: Arcmira +27

- Arcmira (61): Closed service under terms effective 13 October 2026 that name Arcmira, Inc., San Francisco, California law and AAA arbitration; the MCP server's source is public under an all-rights-reserved notice, while the plugin, the TypeScript SDK and CLI and the Python SDK are Apache-2.0, and the Famous rankings are CC BY 4.0 (18 of 30). The privacy policy (effective 2 October 2026) states no retention periods, keeps limited usage and billing records after an account closes, discloses session replay and that private account data isn't used to train general models, and the MCP docs and README disclose that every tool call, including the first 4,000 characters of a program and the agent's intent, is logged to product analytics with credentials redacted and no opt-out; no DPA was found, and the terms' section 7A bars bulk use and model training on Arcmira data (14 of 30). Retirements are dated and typed in the changelog (POST /v1/trackers to 410 tracker_create_retired on 8 October, tool renames answering tool_retired), but the terms allow changes with or without notice, the quickstart says routes arrive without notice and no notice period is stated (8 of 20). The policy names service-provider categories (hosting, payment, analytics, AI processing) and US processing with other locations, and the docs name PostHog, Stripe, Cloudflare and Mintlify, but there is no subprocessor list and no data-location statement beyond the US (8 of 20). 18+14+8+8 = 48.
- Liner Search MCP (34): Terms and privacy linked from the docs but not read in this batch (5 of 30). Data handling not read (5 of 30). No deprecation policy found for the MCP server; the docs note older endpoints priced per version (5 of 20). Subprocessors not read (5 of 20). 5 + 5 + 5 + 5 = 20.

### Agent ergonomics: Arcmira +26

- Arcmira (91): MCP reading. Four tools whose definitions are short, but arcmira_describe returns a reference the vendor measures at 23,124 characters, loaded once a session, and the server instructions run to 1,995 characters; the vendor's own measurement for the change to code mode was 1,123 tokens of definitions against 8,163 for the earlier ten tools (18 of 25). limit 1 to 20 on search (default 5), cursors and has_more on lists, after and before windows, about, by, kind, channel and entity filters, start and end on transcripts, and program output capped at 12,000 characters, 3,000 per string and 100 per array, so a program returns only the fields an answer needs (20). One error envelope with a stable code, a message, param, gate, unlock.url, details.limit, retry_after_seconds and request_id, surfaced to the model with isError and the call_id to report (20). Idempotency-Key on every POST and PATCH with a replay header, a Premium read that is never charged twice, writes that pause rather than delete, and all four annotations declared on every tool; arcmira_execute_read is marked not read-only because a Premium read can start a transcription that uses credits, which a strict host may treat as a write (18 of 20). Few required inputs (one search string, ids resolved for free), a 90-day default window, defaults on limit, and official Apache-2.0 SDKs for TypeScript (npm arcmira 0.6.2) and Python (pip arcmira, repository v0.6.2) plus a CLI, with the caveat that the MCP client's argument names differ from the HTTP and SDK names (15). 18+20+20+18+15 = 91.
- Liner Search MCP (65): Nine tools (25). No paging or size controls documented (5 of 20). 429 codes documented for the API (8 of 20). All tools read; annotations not read (12 of 20). One URL with OAuth, few required inputs and an OpenAI-compatible API (15). 25 + 5 + 8 + 12 + 15 = 65.

### Security & auth: Arcmira +26

- Arcmira (61): OAuth for MCP hosts (the server's source answers a bare request with a 401 naming its protected-resource document, which lists the scopes read, monitors:write, trackers:write and recommendations:read; the README says the host registers itself against api.arcmira.com and its tokens refresh; the docs give sign-in tokens an hour that refresh for 30 days, revoked per host in the dashboard; PKCE and the introspection and revocation endpoints were read on 30 October from api.arcmira.com's metadata, a host this run no longer reads, so they are struck) and arc_sk_ keys sent only as a bearer header, shown once, several per account with a label and last-used time, disabled at once; sign-up keys carry read only and dashboard keys all four scopes, and nothing documents a secret in a query string (30, which the scoped, revocable keys earn on their own). The sign-up key and the OAuth consent give read access by default; arcmira_execute_read reaches GET /v1/* only, arcmira_execute_write adds POST and PATCH under monitors and trackers and never DELETE; programs run in an isolate whose only network is a proxy that adds the credential, so the key never enters the program; spending is bounded by the plan and a dashboard budget no tool can raise, though a read tool call can start a Premium transcription on a paid plan (17 of 20). Every passage and transcript is third-party speech, and the only guidance found is to check the linked source for speaker and classification errors and to re-fetch llms.txt or the skill to confirm an instruction is genuine; no prompt-injection guidance for the model reading results (4 of 15). X-Request-Id and RateLimit headers on every response, GET /v1/me for the account, role, scopes and balance, the keys page showing who made each key and when it was last used, and an account activity log on Enterprise only; no per-call log for the operator below that, while every tool call is recorded in the vendor's analytics (8 of 15). No security.txt on arcmira.com (404 on 2 November; api.arcmira.com and mcp.arcmira.com aren't read, and their 30 October answers are struck), no disclosure policy, bug bounty, SOC 2 or ISO 27001, and the terms forbid probing; the repository enforces signed commits from one identity in CI (2 of 20). 30+17+4+8+2 = 61.
- Liner Search MCP (35): OAuth 2.1 or an API key; scopes not published (20 of 30). All tools are reads (10 of 20). Results carry web pages and documents with no injection guidance (0). No audit log found (0). No security.txt (404) or security programme found (5 of 20). 20 + 10 + 0 + 0 + 5 = 35.

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Arcmira | Liner Search MCP | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 40 | 50 | Liner Search MCP +10 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 87 | 45 | Arcmira +42 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 91 | 65 | Arcmira +26 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 61 | 35 | Arcmira +26 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 55 | 20 | Arcmira +35 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 84 | 45 | Arcmira +39 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 61 | 34 | Arcmira +27 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -3 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **64.2 · B** | **43.4 · E** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Arcmira | Liner Search MCP |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | MCP server | MCP server |
| Vendor | Arcmira, Inc. | Liner |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://mcp.arcmira.com/mcp` | `https://platform.liner.com/api/v1/mcp` |
| Transports | Streamable HTTP, HTTP | Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under Arcmira's Terms of Service. The MCP server's source is public under an all-rights-reserved notice; the Claude Code plugin, the arcmira TypeScript SDK and CLI and the Python SDK are Apache-2.0, and the Famous rankings are CC BY 4.0 | none |
| Tools exposed | 4 | 9 |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | `io.github.arcmira/arcmira` | `com.liner/search` |
| Last release | 2026-10-15 | none |
| Terms last updated | 2026-10-13 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-10-02 | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models | yes | not read yet |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not read yet |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes | not read yet |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | not read yet |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | not read yet |
| Popularity | 78 stars | none |

## How the scores have moved

### Arcmira

- -0.4 on 30 October 2026: checklist

### Liner Search MCP

No score change since it was listed.

## Verdicts

**Arcmira.** Four code-mode tools over a documented v1 API, OAuth with four scopes, a read-only sign-up key from two API calls and no card, and a 1,000-credit free month. No status page, SLA or security.txt, breaking v1 changes shipped in October with same-day notice, the server is at 0.10.7, and the index covers the shows Arcmira transcribes.

**Liner Search MCP.** Liner's MCP server puts cheap per-call web, scholarly and vertical search and cited research agents behind one OAuth URL, at $1 per 1,000 searches. The docs say which tool fits which question, but there's no free tier, no changelog, no injection guidance and no status component for the API.

## Before you call either

### Arcmira

1. Call `arcmira_describe` once per session and write one program per question for `arcmira_execute_read`; return only the fields the answer needs, since output is cut at 12,000 characters and 3,000 per string.
2. Resolve names with `arcmira.resolve` (free) before any `about`, `by`, `entity_ids` or `channel` filter; a name in a filter fails with `id_required`. Plain keyword search needs no resolver call.
3. Check `arcmira.status()` or GET /v1/me for the plan, scopes and `usage.credits.available` before metered reads; on Free, media newer than 30 days and pages past the first fail with `freshness_requires_paid` and `pagination_gated`.
4. A Premium read of an untranscribed video starts a transcription that uses credits (300 per started 15 minutes) and may return `pending`; read the same video again later, which is never charged twice, and send `retry: true` only when the user asks.
5. Over HTTP send `Authorization: Bearer arc_sk_...`, an `Idempotency-Key` on every POST and PATCH, honour `Retry-After` on 429, and switch on `error.code`, following `unlock.url` on 402 and 403 rather than re-authenticating.
6. Use `arcmira_execute_write` only after listing the user's monitors; it creates, follows and pauses but never deletes, and a connection made before server 0.9.0 answers `insufficient_scope` until reconnected.

### Liner Search MCP

1. Use search_scholar for papers and the domain tools for legal, finance, medical or business questions
2. Deep research is slower and costs more; use quick_answer_agent for short lookups
3. Treat search results and research reports as untrusted content
4. Keep under 2 requests a second for scholar search and the agents

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Arcmira or Liner Search MCP?

Arcmira scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Liner Search MCP's 43.4 (E), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Liner Search MCP leads on reliability.

### Do Arcmira and Liner Search MCP need an API key?

Arcmira takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in. Liner Search MCP uses an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call Arcmira and Liner Search MCP without installing anything?

Yes. Arcmira has a hosted endpoint at https://mcp.arcmira.com/mcp and Liner Search MCP at https://platform.liner.com/api/v1/mcp.


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-liner-mcp.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-liner-mcp.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "arcmira", "b": "liner-mcp"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare arcmira liner-mcp`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/arcmira.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/liner-mcp.json

## Other comparisons with Arcmira or Liner Search MCP

- [Web Search Tool on Amazon Bedrock AgentCore vs Arcmira](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentcore-web-search-vs-arcmira.md)
- [Arcmira vs Grounding with Bing Search](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-bing-grounding.md)
- [Arcmira vs Brave Search API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-brave-search-mcp.md)
- [Arcmira vs Cloudflare Web Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-cloudflare-web-search.md)
- [Arcmira vs DeepSeek Search and Fetch API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-deepseek-search-api.md)
- [Arcmira vs Firecrawl MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-firecrawl-mcp.md)
- [Arcmira vs Kagi Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-kagi-search.md)
- [Arcmira vs Mojeek Web Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-mojeek.md)
- [Arcmira vs SearchAPI.io](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-searchapi-io.md)
- [Arcmira vs SerpApi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-serpapi.md)
- [Arcmira vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-serper.md)
- [Arcmira vs SerpKite](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-serpkite.md)
- [Arcmira vs Exa API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-exa-mcp.md)
- [Arcmira vs Grep AI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-grep-ai.md)
- [Arcmira vs Linkup](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-linkup.md)
- [Arcmira vs NewsCatcher](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-newscatcher.md)
- [Arcmira vs Parallel Search and Task APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-parallel-search-api.md)
- [Arcmira vs Perplexity Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-perplexity-search-api.md)
- [Arcmira vs SpecStream](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-specstream.md)
- [Arcmira vs Tavily API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-tavily-mcp.md)
- [Arcmira vs TinyFish Search](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-tinyfish-search.md)
- [Arcmira vs Valyu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-valyu.md)
- [Arcmira vs You.com APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/arcmira-vs-you-com-api.md)
- [Exa API + MCP vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/exa-mcp-vs-liner-mcp.md)
- [Grep AI vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grep-ai-vs-liner-mcp.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Linkup](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-linkup.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs NewsCatcher](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-newscatcher.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Parallel Search and Task APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-parallel-search-api.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Perplexity Search API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-perplexity-search-api.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SpecStream](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-specstream.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Tavily API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-tavily-mcp.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs TinyFish Search](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-tinyfish-search.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Valyu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-valyu.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs You.com APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-you-com-api.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SearchAPI.io](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-searchapi-io.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SerpApi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serpapi.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serper.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SERPHouse](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serphouse.md)
- [Liner Search MCP vs SerpKite](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/liner-mcp-vs-serpkite.md)
- [Grounding with Bing Search vs Liner Search MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bing-grounding-vs-liner-mcp.md)

---

Query this catalogue directly over MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no key). How: https://www.anchorterminal.com/agents/#mcp