# Collibra vs OpenMetadata

> OpenMetadata scores 66.6 (B) to Collibra's 64.6 (B) for data catalogues. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/collibra-vs-openmetadata
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/collibra-vs-openmetadata.md (~2,500 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/collibra-vs-openmetadata.min.md (~830 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/collibra-vs-openmetadata.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-09

OpenMetadata scores 66.6 (B) on agent readiness against Collibra's 64.6 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Collibra leads on transparency & trust. Both do data catalogues.

- Collibra: grade B, 64.6/100, rank #346 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/collibra.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/collibra.json
- OpenMetadata: grade B, 66.6/100, rank #281 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/openmetadata.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/openmetadata.json
- Best company knowledge search and data catalogues for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/company-knowledge/index.md
- All 63 knowledge comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/company-knowledge/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Collibra (B)

Good for: An organisation that already runs Collibra and wants an agent to look up assets, glossary terms, lineage and data quality, or to write assets and classifications under a governed role.

Ahead on:
- Transparency & trust, 82 against 51

Also in its favour:
- Runs on your own machine
- No incidents deducted, where OpenMetadata loses 4 points for them

Watch for: No published price, trial or self-serve sign-up. The pricing address returns 404 and the site links a demo request and a product tour

### OpenMetadata (B)

Good for: Teams running OpenMetadata who want agents to search the catalogue, read lineage and data-quality results, find root causes and create tests or lineage under the user's own permissions.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 84 against 66
- Agent ergonomics, 85 against 75
- Payments & pricing, 20 against 0
- Maintenance & community, 89 against 76

Also in its favour:
- Free to start without a card
- Open source

Watch for: The 16 default tools take about 50,000 characters of definitions, 12,285 of them for search_metadata alone


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Collibra | OpenMetadata | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 66 | 84 | OpenMetadata +18 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 83 | 85 | OpenMetadata +2 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 75 | 85 | OpenMetadata +10 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 68 | 65 | Collibra +3 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 0 | 20 | OpenMetadata +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 76 | 89 | OpenMetadata +13 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 82 | 51 | Collibra +31 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | -4 | |
| **Total** | | **64.6 · B** | **66.6 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Collibra | OpenMetadata |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | Model platform |
| Vendor | Collibra | Collate, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP, stdio | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under the Master Collibra Agreement, with the Developer Terms for the REST APIs and CLI. The local MCP server (chip) is Apache-2.0, and the CLI binary ships under a Binary Code Licence Agreement | Apache-2.0 for the platform. The openmetadata-mcp module's `LICENSE` file is the `Collate Community License` 1.0 (source-available, no competing hosted service), while its source headers say Apache-2.0. Collate's hosted service is closed |
| Tools exposed | 30 | 16 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `io.github.open-metadata/openmetadata-mcp` |
| Last release | 2026-10-04 | 2026-09-29 |
| Terms last updated | couldn't be read | 2022-08-29 |
| Privacy policy last updated | couldn't be read | 2022-08-24 |
| Customer content may train models | couldn't be read | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | couldn't be read | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | couldn't be read | yes |
| Terms or service can change without notice | couldn't be read | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | couldn't be read | yes |
| Popularity | 37 stars | 15k stars, 41k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**Collibra.** Each REST API has an OpenAPI 3.0 definition, the developer portal publishes llms.txt and Markdown pages, and every MCP tool carries read-only and destructive annotations. Access needs a sales contract, since no price, trial or self-serve sign-up is published, and no general API rate limit was found in the reviewed documentation.

**OpenMetadata.** MCP built into every instance at /mcp and on by default since 2.0, with nothing extra to install. The 16 default tools take about 50,000 characters of definitions, 12,285 of them for search_metadata alone.

## Before you call either

### Collibra

1. Ask a Collibra administrator to register an OAuth application. Integration applications use client credentials, and MCP clients need a user application with a redirect URI
2. Reuse each access token for its 5 minutes. The token endpoint answers 429 once a client drains its pool of 100 tokens, refilled at 30 a minute
3. Page large reads with `cursor=` and `sortField=ID`. Cursor and offset parameters cannot be combined, and Search API `limit` plus `offset` cannot exceed 10,000
4. Keep Import API files to 10,000 assets or fewer and run at most 8 imports at once. Retry a job that fails on a concurrency error
5. Expect `discover_data_assets` and `discover_business_glossary` to consume Collibra Units and to need the `dgc.ai-copilot` permission. Use `search_asset_keyword` for free keyword search

### OpenMetadata

1. Set `entityType` for data-quality questions. testCase and testSuite are outside the default search scope
2. Match a table's tests on `originEntityFQN`, not `entityFQN`. Column-level tests store the column's FQN there
3. Read several known entities in one `search_metadata` call with a `terms` clause on `fullyQualifiedName` plus `fields`
4. Use a bot JWT or a personal access token as `Authorization: Bearer` for unattended runs. OAuth needs a browser sign-in
5. Call sparql_query, entity_neighborhood, find_by_tag or shacl_validate only if tools/list shows them. They appear only when the operator enabled RDF

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Collibra or OpenMetadata?

OpenMetadata scores 66.6 (B) on agent readiness against Collibra's 64.6 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Collibra leads on transparency & trust.

### Can an agent call Collibra and OpenMetadata without installing anything?

Collibra runs on your own machine, with no hosted endpoint listed. No hosted endpoint is listed for OpenMetadata.

### Are Collibra and OpenMetadata open source?

No open-source release is listed for Collibra. OpenMetadata is open source (Apache-2.0 for the platform. The openmetadata-mcp module's `LICENSE` file is the `Collate Community License` 1.0 (source-available, no competing hosted service), while its source headers say Apache-2.0. Collate's hosted service is closed).


## For agents

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

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- [Alation vs Collibra](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/alation-vs-collibra.md)
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