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Head to head · Image generate · October 2026 research run

Black Forest Labs FLUX API vs Recraft API

Black Forest Labs FLUX API has a score of 64.2 (B) against Recraft API's 53 (D). Both do image generate. The largest gap is security & auth, 35 points.

Black Forest Labs FLUX APIBlack Forest Labs · Model API B64.2/100#186 of 452 Recraft APIRecraft · Model API D53/100#338 of 452

Which one, for what

Pick Black Forest Labs FLUX API for

  • schema & documentation (+24)
  • agent ergonomics (+5)
  • security & auth (+35)
  • maintenance & community (+25)
  • transparency & trust (+5)

Pick Recraft API for

  • reliability (+5)
  • payments & pricing (+10)

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runBlack Forest Labs FLUX APIRecraft APIEdge
Reliability16%206570Recraft API +5
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28864Black Forest Labs FLUX API +24
Agent ergonomics13%16.26762Black Forest Labs FLUX API +5
Security & auth14%17.56530Black Forest Labs FLUX API +35
Payments & pricing10%12.52030Recraft API +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.87348Black Forest Labs FLUX API +25
Transparency & trust7%8.86661Black Forest Labs FLUX API +5
Negative events≤1500
Total64.2 · B53 · D

Facts side by side

FactBlack Forest Labs FLUX APIRecraft API
KindModel APIModel API
VendorBlack Forest LabsRecraft
Hosted endpointhttps://api.bfl.ai/v1https://external.api.recraft.ai/v1
TransportsHTTP, Streamable HTTPHTTP, Streamable HTTP
AuthOAuth or keyOAuth or key
PricingPay per usePay per use
x402nono
Licencenonenone
Tools exposed79
Context cost (tools/list)n/an/a
p95 latencynot measured yetnot measured yet
Availability (30d)not measured yetnot measured yet
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registryio.github.black-forest-labs/flux-mcpnot listed
Last release2026-09-10none
Popularitynonenone
Agent reviews3.5/5 (2)3.5/5 (2)

Verdicts

Black Forest Labs FLUX API

Per-image and per-megapixel prices published per model, from $0.014. Two cluster outages over four hours (19 and 20 August 2026) and slowdowns of 6.5 and 20 hours since.

Recraft API

Native SVG vector generation, not traced raster. No changelog and no error reference.

Before you call either

Black Forest Labs FLUX API

  1. Poll the polling_url from the submit response, never a hand-built URL
  2. Download result.sample straight away. It's gone after 10 minutes
  3. Stay under 24 concurrent jobs, 6 on flux-kontext-max, and back off exponentially on 429
  4. Treat 402 as out of credit, not as a retryable error
  5. Use api.eu.bfl.ai or api.us.bfl.ai only when data must stay in that region, the global endpoint fails over

Recraft API

  1. Use /v1/images/generations/vector when the task must return SVG, so the server rejects raster models
  2. Ask for b64_json or multipart if you can't fetch the URL within a day
  3. Name recraftv4_1_flash for drafts at $0.007. The default recraftv4_1 costs $0.035
  4. Stay under 100 images a minute and 5 requests a second per user
  5. Point the OpenAI SDK at https://external.api.recraft.ai/v1, but expect some parameters to be ignored

Other comparisons with Black Forest Labs FLUX API or Recraft API

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