# CoreWeave vs Modal

> Modal scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against CoreWeave's 61.5 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. CoreWeave leads on schema & documentation, security & auth and transparency & trust. Both do compute gpu. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/coreweave-vs-modal
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/coreweave-vs-modal.md (~2,150 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/coreweave-vs-modal.min.md (~630 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/coreweave-vs-modal.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: 2026-10-08

Modal scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against CoreWeave's 61.5 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. CoreWeave leads on schema & documentation, security & auth and transparency & trust. Both do compute gpu.

- CoreWeave: grade C, 61.5/100, rank #363 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/coreweave.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/coreweave.json
- Modal: grade B, 63.6/100, rank #302 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/modal.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/modal.json

## Which one, for what

### CoreWeave (C)

Good for: Teams that already run Kubernetes and need whole multi-GPU nodes or clusters for training and dedicated inference, with a contract and IAM.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 79 against 70
- Security & auth, 74 against 68
- Transparency & trust, 77 against 67

Also in its favour:
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install

Watch for: No self-serve route. CoreWeave's sales team approves an organisation and emails the activation link before a token can be created

### Modal (B)

Good for: Python teams that want GPU functions, batch jobs and HTTP endpoints from one decorator with scale to zero.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 70 against 50
- Payments & pricing, 30 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 85 against 80

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

Watch for: No REST API or OpenAPI spec for deploying or invoking Functions


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | CoreWeave | Modal | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 50 | 70 | Modal +20 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 79 | 70 | CoreWeave +9 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 58 | 57 | CoreWeave +1 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 74 | 68 | CoreWeave +6 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 30 | Modal +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 80 | 85 | Modal +5 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 77 | 67 | CoreWeave +10 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **61.5 · C** | **63.6 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | CoreWeave | Modal |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | Model platform |
| Vendor | CoreWeave, Inc. | Modal |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.coreweave.com` | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP |  |
| Auth | Token | API key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under CoreWeave's Terms of Service. The Terraform provider on GitHub is MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | 38 | none |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-02 | 2026-09-28 |
| Terms last updated | 2022-06-30 | 2026-05-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-02-24 | 2023-05-17 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Popularity | none | 514 stars, 941k npm/wk, 10.1M PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 4/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**CoreWeave.** Per-hour prices for 8-GPU H100, H200 and B200 nodes are public, the docs ship as Markdown with llms.txt and embedded OpenAPI specs, and IAM has read-only roles per service. An organisation must be approved by CoreWeave's sales team before any token exists, and no request rate limits were found in the reviewed documentation.

**Modal.** Scale to zero by default, per-second billing and about one-second container boots. No REST API or OpenAPI spec for deploying or invoking Functions.

## Before you call either

### CoreWeave

1. Create an API access token at console.coreweave.com/tokens with an expiry and send it as `Authorization: Bearer` to https://api.coreweave.com
2. Add GPUs by applying a NodePool resource (`compute.coreweave.com/v1alpha1`) to a CKS cluster with `instanceType` and `targetNodes`. `instanceType` can't be changed afterwards
3. Set `targetNodes` to 0 or delete the Node Pool when a job ends. Nodes are whole 8-GPU machines billed by the hour
4. Never pass `dry_run` to the MCP tool `coreweave_kubectl_apply` expecting a preview. The reference says the parameter is ignored and the manifest is applied
5. Use a separate Forge API key and https://api.inference.wandb.ai/v1 for Serverless Inference. A CoreWeave API access token doesn't work there

### Modal

1. Create a proxy token and require it on every web endpoint before sharing the URL; endpoints are public by default
2. Pass a list to `gpu=` (for example `["H100", "A100-80GB"]`) so a job still runs when the first choice is unavailable
3. Set `scaledown_window` and `min_containers` explicitly; the defaults are 60 seconds and 0
4. Use `.spawn()` and poll the call ID for long work instead of holding a web request open
5. Keep web endpoint traffic under 200 requests a second or ask Modal to raise the limit

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, CoreWeave or Modal?

Modal scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against CoreWeave's 61.5 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. CoreWeave leads on schema & documentation, security & auth and transparency & trust.

### Can an agent call CoreWeave and Modal without installing anything?

CoreWeave has a hosted endpoint at https://api.coreweave.com. No hosted endpoint is listed for Modal.


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with CoreWeave or Modal

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- [Baseten vs Modal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/baseten-vs-modal.md)
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- [Lambda Cloud vs Modal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lambda-vs-modal.md)
- [Modal vs Northflank](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/modal-vs-northflank.md)
- [Modal vs Replicate Deployments](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/modal-vs-replicate-deploy.md)
- [Modal vs Runpod](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/modal-vs-runpod.md)
- [Modal vs Vast.ai](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/modal-vs-vast-ai.md)