Head to head · Design files · October 2026 research run
Figma API + MCP vs Melius
Figma API + MCP scores 66 (B) on agent readiness against Melius's 54.1 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Melius leads on reliability. Both do design files.
Which one, for what
Good for Design-to-code agents and teams already paying for Dev or Full seats.
Ahead on
- Schema & documentation, 86 against 70
- Agent ergonomics, 60 against 51
- Security & auth, 74 against 43
- Payments & pricing, 30 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 84 against 66
- Transparency & trust, 73 against 55
Watch for
View and Collab seats get 6 MCP calls a month on paid plans
Melius C
Good for An agent producing batches of ad creative, product images or short videos on a shared canvas that people then review, with many models behind one key.
Ahead on
- Reliability, 69 against 59
Watch for
API keys have no scopes. A key works with its creator's role in every team the creator belongs to
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Figma API + MCP | Melius | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 59 | 69 | Melius +10 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 86 | 70 | Figma API + MCP +16 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 60 | 51 | Figma API + MCP +9 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 74 | 43 | Figma API + MCP +31 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 30 | 20 | Figma API + MCP +10 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 84 | 66 | Figma API + MCP +18 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 73 | 55 | Figma API + MCP +18 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 66 · B | 54.1 · C |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Figma API + MCP | Melius |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Figma | Melius AI, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | https://api.figma.com/v1 | https://api.melius.com/api/v1 |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | proprietary | Proprietary service under Melius's terms of service. The mel CLI on npm is MIT, with no public source repository found |
| Tools exposed | 35 | 75 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | com.figma.mcp/mcp | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-24 | 2026-09-10 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-03-11 | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | no date given |
| Customer content may train models | yes, with an opt-out | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | yes |
| Popularity | 456k npm/wk | 9 npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3.5/5 (2) | none |
Verdicts
Figma API + MCP
OpenAPI spec, TypeScript types and an llms.txt index for the REST API. View and Collab seats get 6 MCP calls a month on paid plans.
Melius
One backend serves a 59-operation REST API with a public OpenAPI spec, a hosted MCP server with OAuth sign-in and a JSON-only CLI, and the status page shows no incidents since July 2026. API keys carry no scopes and work with their creator's role, and no rate-limit numbers, changelog or per-model credit prices are published.
Before you call either
Figma API + MCP
- Pass
ids=anddepth=toGET /v1/files/:key. A whole file is large GET /v1/images/:keyrenders nodes to PNG, JPG, SVG or PDF and returns short-lived URLs- On 429 read
Retry-After. Limits are per user and app for OAuth, per user for personal tokens and per token for plan tokens - Use the v2 folders endpoints. The v1 projects endpoints were deprecated on 10 August 2026
- Confirm the credit cost with the user when
weave_run_toolreturnscost_confirmation_required
Melius
- Generate by creating a node on a canvas, starting a run with POST /nodes/{nodeId}/runs, then polling GET /node-runs/{nodeRunId} until
statusis finished or failed - Over MCP, call
get_guidefirst,show_presencebefore node changes andcanvas_plan_layoutbeforebulk_create_nodes - On 429 wait
Retry-Afterseconds. After a timeout or 5xx on a write, read the canvas or run state before resubmitting, because there are no idempotency keys - Read credit costs from GET /generation/models?category=image before a bulk run. A 400 can mean the team is out of credits
- Downloads arrive as a ZIP from a signed URL. Fetch that URL without the
Authorizationheader
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Figma API + MCP or Melius?
Figma API + MCP scores 66 (B) on agent readiness against Melius's 54.1 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Melius leads on reliability.
Do Figma API + MCP and Melius need an API key?
Both take an API key or an OAuth sign-in.
Can an agent call Figma API + MCP and Melius without installing anything?
Yes. Figma API + MCP has a hosted endpoint at https://api.figma.com/v1 and Melius at https://api.melius.com/api/v1.
Other comparisons with Figma API + MCP or Melius
Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/figma-mcp-vs-melius.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/figma-mcp.json·/api/v1/tools/melius.json - From a terminal
anchor compare figma-mcp melius(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "figma-mcp", "b": "melius"}at/mcp, no key