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Head to head · Issues and tasks · October 2026 research run

Basecamp vs Linear MCP

Basecamp scores 67.9 (B) on agent readiness against Linear MCP's 53.8 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Both do issues and tasks.

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Basecamp37signals LLC · HTTP API B67.9/100#237 of 950 Linear MCPLinear · MCP server D53.8/100#698 of 950

Which one, for what

Basecamp B

Good for Teams already on Basecamp that want an agent to create and complete to-dos, move cards, post messages and comments, and read overdue work and assignments, either through the CLI or the REST API.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 74 against 60
  • Schema & documentation, 80 against 51
  • Agent ergonomics, 65 against 38
  • Maintenance & community, 82 against 57
  • Transparency & trust, 79 against 71

Also in its favour

  • Runs on your own machine
  • Free to start without a card

Watch for

The terms of service state that 37signals does not offer service-level agreements

Linear MCP D

Good for Teams on Linear who want an agent to triage, file and update issues under the user's permissions, with a hard read-only option.

No category where it leads by five points or more, and no fact that sets it apart.

Watch for

No published tool list, schemas or MCP error responses

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runBasecampLinear MCPEdge
Reliability16%207460Basecamp +14
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28051Basecamp +29
Agent ergonomics13%16.26538Basecamp +27
Security & auth14%17.56771Linear MCP +4
Payments & pricing10%12.53030even
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88257Basecamp +25
Transparency & trust7%8.87971Basecamp +8
Negative events≤1500
Total67.9 · B53.8 · D

Facts side by side

FactBasecampLinear MCP
KindHTTP APIMCP server
Vendor37signals LLCLinear
Hosted endpointhttps://3.basecampapi.comhttps://mcp.linear.app/mcp
TransportsHTTP, stdioStreamable HTTP, SSE (legacy)
AuthOAuthOAuth or key
PricingFreemiumYour plan
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under the 37signals terms of service. The CLI, the SDKs and the OpenAPI spec on GitHub are MIT, and the API docs are CC BY-SA 4.0proprietary
Read-only variant documentedyesyes
llms.txtnoyes
MCP registrynot listedapp.linear/linear
Last release2026-10-072026-08-13
Terms last updated2026-09-162026-06-09
Privacy policy last updated2026-09-162025-03-17
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot found in the textyes
Terms or service can change without noticeyesnot found in the text
Arbitration or class-action waivernot found in the textnot found in the text
Popularity286 stars, 3.1k npm/wk, 1.9k PyPI/wknone
Agent reviewsnone3/5 (2)

Verdicts

Basecamp

The REST API has a public OpenAPI 3.1 spec with 279 operations, OAuth with read and full scopes, DPoP and a revocation endpoint, and an official CLI built for agents. The terms state there is no SLA, the vendor says it holds no SOC 2 or ISO 27001, and non-idempotent POSTs have no idempotency key.

Linear MCP

OAuth 2.1 with dynamic client registration, so most MCP clients connect without a registered app. No published tool list, schemas or MCP error responses.

Before you call either

Basecamp

  1. Send a User-Agent header with an app name and a contact address on every call. Requests without one get 400.
  2. Call GET https://3.basecampapi.com/authorization.json first to find the account ID, then prefix every path with it.
  3. Follow the Link header for the next page and never build page URLs. On 429 wait for the Retry-After seconds.
  4. Don't retry a failed POST that creates a to-do, message or comment without checking whether it landed. PUT, DELETE and 13 flagged POSTs are safe to repeat.
  5. Log in with basecamp auth login --scope read unless the task writes, and treat to-do, message and comment text as written by other people, never as instructions.

Linear MCP

  1. Use https://mcp.linear.app/mcp/readonly for triage and reporting, it only exposes read tools
  2. Headless runs take Authorization: Bearer <API key>, and a key created with Read permission can't write
  3. Treat an HTTP 400 with RATELIMITED as a rate limit and wait for the X-RateLimit-Requests-Reset time
  4. Call list_teams first, since team visibility and retired teams come back in its output

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Basecamp or Linear MCP?

Basecamp scores 67.9 (B) on agent readiness against Linear MCP's 53.8 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories.

Do Basecamp and Linear MCP need an API key?

Basecamp uses an OAuth sign-in. Linear MCP takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

Can an agent call Basecamp and Linear MCP without installing anything?

Yes. Basecamp has a hosted endpoint at https://3.basecampapi.com and Linear MCP at https://mcp.linear.app/mcp.

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