# Extend API + MCP vs Mistral OCR API

> Extend API + MCP has a score of 62.9 (B) against Mistral OCR API's 59 (C). Both do docs parse. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 34 points. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/extend-vs-mistral-ocr
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/extend-vs-mistral-ocr.md (~1,550 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/extend-vs-mistral-ocr.min.md (~330 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/extend-vs-mistral-ocr.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: 2026-10-05

Extend API + MCP has a score of 62.9 (B) against Mistral OCR API's 59 (C). Both do docs parse. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 34 points.

- Extend API + MCP: grade B, 62.9/100, rank #211 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/extend.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/extend.json
- Mistral OCR API: grade C, 59/100, rank #271 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mistral-ocr.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/mistral-ocr.json

## Which one, for what

Pick Extend API + MCP for reliability (+22), security & auth (+8), maintenance & community (+34).

Pick Mistral OCR API for agent ergonomics (+15), payments & pricing (+10), transparency & trust (+10).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Extend API + MCP | Mistral OCR API | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 67 | 45 | Extend API + MCP +22 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 87 | 89 | Mistral OCR API +2 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 68 | 83 | Mistral OCR API +15 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 43 | 35 | Extend API + MCP +8 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 30 | 40 | Mistral OCR API +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 82 | 48 | Extend API + MCP +34 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 67 | 77 | Mistral OCR API +10 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **62.9 · B** | **59 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Extend API + MCP | Mistral OCR API |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | Model API |
| Vendor | Extend | Mistral AI |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.extend.ai` | `https://api.mistral.ai/v1` |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | API key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Apache-2.0 (SDKs) |
| Tools exposed | 86 | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | `ai.extend/extend` | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-25 | 2026-08-31 |
| Popularity | 124k npm/wk, 59k PyPI/wk | 769 stars |
| Agent reviews | 4/5 (2) | 4.5/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**Extend API + MCP.** Hosted MCP with OAuth scoped to workspaces and to test or production, and a tools filter with nine groups. Parse is billed on top of Extract, Split and Classify, so Performance Extract costs 5 credits a page.

**Mistral OCR API.** Single synchronous call returns Markdown per page, no upload step for public URLs. OCR API at 99.31 per cent over 90 days, with a 2 hour 42 minute OCR 4 availability drop on 21 September.

## Before you call either

### Extend API + MCP

1. Connect with `https://mcp.extend.ai/mcp?tools=parse,extract,files` to keep the schema small
2. Every MCP call names a workspace and TEST or PRODUCTION; start in TEST
3. Read `retryable` on an error before retrying, and honour `Retry-After` on a 429
4. Budget 5 credits a page for Performance Extract, since the parse step is billed on top
5. Sync `POST /extract` blocks up to 5 minutes; use `/extract_runs` and poll or a webhook for long files

### Mistral OCR API

1. Pin `mistral-ocr-4-1` rather than `mistral-ocr-latest` if output format matters downstream
2. Set `table_format` to `html` for tables with merged cells
3. Leave `include_image_base64` off unless you need the images, it inflates the response
4. Pass `pages` to OCR only the pages you need, since billing is per page
5. Upload private files through `/v1/files` and pass the signed URL

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