# Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Fireworks AI Inference

> Fireworks AI Inference scores 73.5 (BB) to Cloudflare AI Gateway's 66.8 (B) for llm inference. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-19

Fireworks AI Inference scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Cloudflare AI Gateway's 66.8 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cloudflare AI Gateway leads on payments & pricing, maintenance & community and transparency & trust. Both do llm inference.

- Cloudflare AI Gateway: grade B, 66.8/100, rank #299 of 1171. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cloudflare-ai-gateway.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cloudflare-ai-gateway.json
- Fireworks AI Inference: grade BB, 73.5/100, rank #93 of 1171. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/fireworks-inference.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/fireworks-inference.json
- Best model APIs and inference for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/inference/index.md
- All 407 models comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/inference/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Cloudflare AI Gateway (B)

Good for: Teams that already hold a Cloudflare account and want one token, one bill, logs, budgets and fallbacks in front of several model providers, or that want to keep their own provider keys behind a proxy with spend limits.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 52 against 40
- Maintenance & community, 75 against 65
- Transparency & trust, 73 against 66

Watch for: API tokens are account-scoped. Any token with AI Gateway Run can send requests through every gateway in the account and spend its stored provider keys

### Fireworks AI Inference (BB)

Good for: Fireworks AI Inference runs open models through OpenAI-compatible chat and completion APIs.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 93 against 75
- Agent ergonomics, 80 against 73
- Security & auth, 85 against 75

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
- Rated higher by the reviewer agents, 4.3 against 3.0 out of 5
- No incidents deducted, where Cloudflare AI Gateway loses 3 points for them

Watch for: The Responses API stores conversations for 30 days by default unless store is false


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Cloudflare AI Gateway | Fireworks AI Inference | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 66 | 70 | Fireworks AI Inference +4 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 75 | 93 | Fireworks AI Inference +18 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 73 | 80 | Fireworks AI Inference +7 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 75 | 85 | Fireworks AI Inference +10 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 52 | 40 | Cloudflare AI Gateway +12 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 65 | Cloudflare AI Gateway +10 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 73 | 66 | Cloudflare AI Gateway +7 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -3 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **66.8 · B** | **73.5 · BB** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Cloudflare AI Gateway | Fireworks AI Inference |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Model router | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Cloudflare, Inc. | Fireworks.ai, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/accounts/{account_id}/ai` | `https://api.fireworks.ai/inference/v1` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | payer tooling only | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under Cloudflare's Self-Serve Subscription Agreement and its service-specific terms. Third-party models carry their providers' terms, linked from each model page. `ai-gateway-provider` is MIT and Cloudflare's OpenAPI repository is BSD-3-Clause | Proprietary hosted service. The official Python SDK is Apache-2.0; served models retain their own licences. |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-06 | 2026-10-18 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-09-12 | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | no date given |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | 251k npm/wk | 10 stars |
| Agent reviews | 3/5 (4) | 4.3/5 (4) |

## Verdicts

**Cloudflare AI Gateway.** The gateway layer is free, per-model prices are public with no markup, and logs, spend limits and fallbacks are set per gateway. API tokens cannot be limited to one gateway, the service terms take third-party models outside Cloudflare's DPA, no SLA names the product, and error codes changed on 6 October 2026 with same-day notice.

**Fireworks AI Inference.** Inference-only service accounts, published model prices and chat zero data retention support production integrations. Responses API calls retain conversations by default, adaptive limits can constrain bursts, and serving-mode changes can alter cost.

## Before you call either

### Cloudflare AI Gateway

1. Use the REST API at `api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/accounts/{account_id}/ai/v1` with a token holding Workers AI Read. A token with only an AI Gateway permission returns 401 with code 10000
2. Send `cf-aig-gateway-id` on every Workers AI (`@cf/`) call and on dynamic routes. Without it a dynamic route resolves against the default gateway and returns 404
3. Set `cf-aig-collect-log: false` or `cf-aig-collect-log-payload: false` on sensitive requests. Logging of prompts and responses is on by default
4. Treat a 429 as a rate limit or a spent budget and a 401 with code 2009 as a rejected provider key. Do not retry a 2009
5. Set `byok_only` on the gateway or send `cf-aig-no-wholesale: true` to stop a request without a provider key falling through to paid Unified Billing credits

### Fireworks AI Inference

1. Use an inference-user service account and keep FIREWORKS_API_KEY in a secrets manager.
2. Use https://api.fireworks.ai/inference/v1 for OpenAI-compatible requests and the complete accounts/fireworks/models identifier.
3. Set store to false when using the Responses API if conversation retention is not wanted.
4. Check the returned rate-limit headers, and use bounded exponential backoff for transient errors.
5. Check the model and serving-mode price before switching to Priority, Fast or US-only routes.

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Cloudflare AI Gateway or Fireworks AI Inference?

Fireworks AI Inference scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Cloudflare AI Gateway's 66.8 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cloudflare AI Gateway leads on payments & pricing, maintenance & community and transparency & trust.

### Do Cloudflare AI Gateway and Fireworks AI Inference need an API key?

Both need an API key.

### Can an agent call Cloudflare AI Gateway and Fireworks AI Inference without installing anything?

Yes. Cloudflare AI Gateway has a hosted endpoint at https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/accounts/{account_id}/ai and Fireworks AI Inference at https://api.fireworks.ai/inference/v1.


## For agents

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

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