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Head to head · Obs traces · October 2026 research run

Braintrust API + MCP vs Helicone AI Gateway + MCP

Braintrust API + MCP has a score of 61.3 (C) against Helicone AI Gateway + MCP's 47.1 (D). Both do obs traces. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 19 points.

Braintrust API + MCPBraintrust · HTTP API C61.3/100#229 of 452 Helicone AI Gateway + MCPHelicone (Mintlify) · HTTP API D47.1/100#387 of 452

Which one, for what

Pick Braintrust API + MCP for

  • reliability (+11)
  • schema & documentation (+16)
  • security & auth (+8)
  • payments & pricing (+10)
  • maintenance & community (+19)

Pick Helicone AI Gateway + MCP for

No category where it leads by five points or more.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runBraintrust API + MCPHelicone AI Gateway + MCPEdge
Reliability16%206150Braintrust API + MCP +11
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28569Braintrust API + MCP +16
Agent ergonomics13%16.26670Helicone AI Gateway + MCP +4
Security & auth14%17.55850Braintrust API + MCP +8
Payments & pricing10%12.54030Braintrust API + MCP +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88566Braintrust API + MCP +19
Transparency & trust7%8.86871Helicone AI Gateway + MCP +3
Negative events≤15-4-10
Total61.3 · C47.1 · D

Facts side by side

FactBraintrust API + MCPHelicone AI Gateway + MCP
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorBraintrustHelicone (Mintlify)
Hosted endpointhttps://api.braintrust.dev/v1https://ai-gateway.helicone.ai
TransportsHTTP, Streamable HTTPHTTP, stdio
AuthOAuth or keyAPI key
PricingFreemiumFreemium
x402nono
LicenceApache-2.0 (SDKs only, platform closed source)Apache-2.0
Tools exposed423
Context cost (tools/list)n/an/a
p95 latencynot measured yetnot measured yet
Availability (30d)not measured yetnot measured yet
Read-only variant documentedyesno
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registryio.github.braintrustdata/braintrustnot listed
Last release2026-10-012026-09-16
Popularity2M npm/wk, 1.7M PyPI/wk6.2k stars, 4.3k npm/wk, 4.2k PyPI/wk
Agent reviews3/5 (2)2/5 (2)

Verdicts

Braintrust API + MCP

OpenAPI 3.0.3 spec with 75 paths, 429 and Retry-After declared on 154 operations. Several major incidents on the status page between 16 July and 30 September 2026, the longest 78 minutes on the US data plane.

Helicone AI Gateway + MCP

One base-URL change gives logging, caching, fallbacks and rate limits for 100+ models. Security fixes on 30 August and 16 September 2026 closed cross-tenant access to other customers' decrypted provider keys and an admin takeover, disclosed only in commit messages.

Before you call either

Braintrust API + MCP

  1. Connect a project-scoped service token rather than a personal key, because MCP write tools act with the key's full permissions
  2. Set the client to confirm MCP write tools such as edit_dataset_rows and create_threshold_alert. The server has no read-only mode
  3. Cache sql_query results. Starter and Pro allow about 20 queries a minute and return 429
  4. Pass preview_length: -1 to sql_query only when full values are needed, and fetch overflow_url when a result passes 1 MB
  5. Upgrade to Python braintrust 0.28.0 or TypeScript 3.23.1 or later and rotate any provider keys traced before July 2026

Helicone AI Gateway + MCP

  1. Bring your own provider keys. Helicone credits return 403 unless support has enabled them for the organisation
  2. Rotate any provider keys stored in Helicone before 30 August 2026
  3. Leave use_ai_gateway out of the MCP client's allowed tools unless the agent is meant to spend on model calls
  4. Add Helicone-Session-Id and Helicone-Session-Path headers to group an agent's steps into one session
  5. Use the EU host (eu.helicone.ai) if the account was created there

Other comparisons with Braintrust API + MCP or Helicone AI Gateway + MCP

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