# Dropcontact API + MCP vs People Data Labs

> People Data Labs scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Dropcontact API + MCP's 50.9 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Dropcontact API + MCP leads on security & auth and payments & pricing. Both do lead enrichment. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes…

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/dropcontact-vs-people-data-labs
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/dropcontact-vs-people-data-labs.md (~2,450 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/dropcontact-vs-people-data-labs.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/dropcontact-vs-people-data-labs.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

People Data Labs scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Dropcontact API + MCP's 50.9 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Dropcontact API + MCP leads on security & auth and payments & pricing. Both do lead enrichment.

- Dropcontact API + MCP: grade D, 50.9/100, rank #679 of 842. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/dropcontact.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/dropcontact.json
- People Data Labs: grade B, 64.2/100, rank #326 of 842. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/people-data-labs.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/people-data-labs.json

## Which one, for what

### Dropcontact API + MCP (D)

Good for: European teams cleaning and completing contact lists where GDPR handling matters more than coverage.

Ahead on:
- Security & auth, 59 against 43
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 35

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

Watch for: No OpenAPI spec, llms.txt or changelog

### People Data Labs (B)

Good for: Products and pipelines that enrich or search person and company records at volume and can write Elasticsearch or SQL queries.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 78 against 57
- Schema & documentation, 70 against 41
- Agent ergonomics, 77 against 60
- Maintenance & community, 79 against 18

Watch for: No OpenAPI file was found. The machine-readable material is a Postman collection and Elasticsearch mappings


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Dropcontact API + MCP | People Data Labs | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 57 | 78 | People Data Labs +21 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 41 | 70 | People Data Labs +29 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 60 | 77 | People Data Labs +17 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 59 | 43 | Dropcontact API + MCP +16 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 40 | 35 | Dropcontact API + MCP +5 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 18 | 79 | People Data Labs +61 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 71 | 67 | Dropcontact API + MCP +4 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **50.9 · D** | **64.2 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Dropcontact API + MCP | People Data Labs |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Dropcontact | People Data Labs, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.dropcontact.com/v1` | `https://api.peopledatalabs.com/v5` |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | API key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Proprietary service under the Services Subscription Agreement. The Python and JavaScript SDKs are MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | none | 2026-09-16 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-08-01 | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2020-06-04 | couldn't be read |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | none | 40 stars, 133k npm/wk, 30k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3.5/5 (2) | none |

## Verdicts

**Dropcontact API + MCP.** Pay on success, with credits refunded when no email is found. No OpenAPI spec, llms.txt or changelog.

**People Data Labs.** Monthly dated release notes, a free sandbox with synthetic data, response headers that report credits and rate limits, and a free plan of 100 records a month make the API easy to start with. No OpenAPI file was found, keys carry no scopes and may travel in the URL, and the agreement allows changes without notice.

## Before you call either

### Dropcontact API + MCP

1. Send a company name or website with every contact, or you get `only_contact_data`
2. Send only documented fields. New accounts get a 400 for unknown ones
3. Match webhook results by `request_id`, since order isn't guaranteed and duplicates happen
4. Poll no faster than every 30 seconds, as the not-ready response asks
5. Post an empty contact to read the credit balance at no cost

### People Data Labs

1. Send the key in the `X-Api-Key` header. The `api_key` query parameter puts the secret in URLs and logs
2. Build and test queries against `https://sandbox.api.peopledatalabs.com/v5/...` first. It costs no credits and allows five calls a minute
3. Set `size` deliberately on search. Every record returned costs one credit, and responses over 1 MB fail
4. Treat `404` on enrichment as no match, not an error, and `402` as credits exhausted. Neither is worth a retry
5. On `429`, wait until the `x-ratelimit-reset` time. Limits are fixed-window per key and per endpoint

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Dropcontact API + MCP or People Data Labs?

People Data Labs scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Dropcontact API + MCP's 50.9 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Dropcontact API + MCP leads on security & auth and payments & pricing.

### Do Dropcontact API + MCP and People Data Labs need an API key?

Dropcontact API + MCP takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in. People Data Labs needs an API key.

### Can an agent call Dropcontact API + MCP and People Data Labs without installing anything?

Yes. Dropcontact API + MCP has a hosted endpoint at https://api.dropcontact.com/v1 and People Data Labs at https://api.peopledatalabs.com/v5.


## For agents

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

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