# Bitfinex API vs Bitstamp API (slim)

> Bitfinex scores 58.4 (C) to Bitstamp's 50.4 (D) for exchange market data. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bitfinex-vs-bitstamp.md (~3,750 tokens) · this version ~1,480 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bitfinex-vs-bitstamp.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bitfinex-vs-bitstamp
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-04
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

Bitfinex API scores 58.4 (C) on agent readiness against Bitstamp API's 50.4 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Both do exchange market data.

- Bitfinex API: C 58.4, rank #675 of 1349 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/bitfinex.min.md
- Bitstamp API: D 50.4, rank #942 of 1349 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/bitstamp.min.md
- Bitfinex API, good for An agent trading spot, margin or derivatives, or lending on the funding market, with scoped keys, official clients and paper trading. Ahead on Reliability, 85 against 63; Payments & pricing, 40 against 20; Maintenance & community, 41 against 28.
- Bitstamp API, good for An agent that needs a long-running regulated spot venue in the EU, UK and US with a sandbox and per-endpoint key permissions, and can do its own signing.

| Category | Bitfinex API | Bitstamp API |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 85 | 63 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 48 | 51 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 61 | 58 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 62 | 60 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 40 | 20 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 41 | 28 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 49 | 53 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Bitfinex API | Bitstamp API |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | iFinex Inc. | Bitstamp Ltd. |
| Licence | Proprietary hosted API under Bitfinex's API Terms of Service, which our reader couldn't load. The official client libraries (Node, Python, Go, Ruby) are MIT or Apache-2.0 | Proprietary hosted API under Bitstamp's terms of use, which our reader couldn't load |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-07-18 | 2026-08-28 |
| Popularity | 480 stars | none |

Why the edge:
- Reliability, Bitfinex API +22: Bitfinex API 85 (Read with the hosted lines on the v2 API at api.bitfinex.com. bitfinex.statuspage.io is a Statuspage site with history back to May 2021 (20). Its feed has no entry between 25 March 2026 and 3 November 2026, so the last 90 days are clean on the record; the feed logs platform-wide outages only (a 14-hour maintenance in March 2026, a 3-hour outage in August 2025), so smaller incidents may go unrecorded. Judgement call (30). Rate limits with numbers, 10 to 90 a minute per IP and the WebSocket connection limits (15). `ERR_RATE_LIMIT` and the 60-second block are documented, with no Retry-After; orders take a `cid` but no idempotency key or retry guidance was found (10 of 15). No SLA found (0). Generally available (10). 20 + 30 + 15 + 10 + 0 + 10 = 85.); Bitstamp API 63 (Read with the hosted lines on the HTTP API v2 at www.bitstamp.net/api/v2/. status.bitstamp.net is a Statuspage site with component history (20). Its feed for 5 August to 3 November 2026 has 17 entries, among them withdrawals failing on 14 networks for about 3 hours on 21 August, database maintenance with login failures and intermittent trading interruptions for about 1 hour 44 minutes on 23 September, a 39-minute halt of all markets on 5 August, and delistings and single-asset suspensions. One major (10). Rate limits with numbers, 400 a second and 10,000 per 10 minutes (15). Limit errors are named (400.002, 400.067, 400.068) but there is no Retry-After or backoff guidance, duplicate client order ids are allowed, and the only retry guidance is to check the order after a 500.016 timeout (8 of 15). No SLA found (0). Generally available (10). 20 + 10 + 15 + 8 + 0 + 10 = 63.)
- Payments & pricing, Bitfinex API +20: Bitfinex API 40 (No machine payment protocol (0). The fees page is public without login (20), though it shows zero maker and taker with no tiers or date. The API is free, public endpoints need no account, and paper trading needs no money (20). A person must sign up in a browser with identity checks and mint the key (0). 0 + 20 + 20 + 0 = 40.); Bitstamp API 20 (No machine payment protocol (0). The fee schedule page loaded empty, the API's fee endpoints need a key, and no rate could be read, so fees are scored as not published (0, unchecked). The API is free, public endpoints need no key and the sandbox needs no money (20). A person must sign up in a browser with identity checks and mint the key (0). 0 + 0 + 20 + 0 = 20.)
- Maintenance & community, Bitfinex API +13: Bitfinex API 41 (Read as a closed service with open clients. The last dated change we could read is bitfinex-api-node 9.1.0 on 18 July 2026, 108 days before the check; the docs changelog stops in October 2024 (10). Not three dated releases in the last 90 days (0). The bitfinexcom organisation pushes often (bfx-report on 3 November 2026) and the clients have issue trackers, but support articles answered 403 and no reply times were read (10 of 25). Official clients current in four languages, Node 9.1.0 of July 2026 and Python 4.0.0 of October 2025; not in the MCP registry (15). The Node client has a dependency history of security fixes (its last GitHub release notes name two) and no CI was read (6 of 10). 10 + 0 + 10 + 15 + 6 = 41.); Bitstamp API 28 (Read as a closed service. The last dated API change is 28 August 2026, 67 days before the check (20). Only one dated entry in the last 90 days, after 1 July and 12 June (0). No public repository or issue tracker, support pages did not load and support.bitstamp.net did not resolve; a changelog exists (8 of 25). No official SDKs and no MCP registry presence of Bitstamp's own (0). No package to assess (0). 20 + 0 + 8 + 0 + 0 = 28.)