# Firecrawl MCP vs Olostep > Firecrawl MCP has a score of 75.5 (BB) against Olostep's 63.1 (B). Both do web search. The largest gap is security & auth, 39 points. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side. - Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-olostep - Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-olostep.md (~2,000 tokens) - Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-olostep.min.md (~330 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts) - JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-olostep.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: 2026-10-04 Firecrawl MCP has a score of 75.5 (BB) against Olostep's 63.1 (B). Both do web search. The largest gap is security & auth, 39 points. - Firecrawl MCP: grade BB, 75.5/100, rank #34 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/firecrawl-mcp.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/firecrawl-mcp.json - Olostep: grade B, 63.1/100, rank #210 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/olostep.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/olostep.json ## Which one, for what Pick Firecrawl MCP for reliability (+10), agent ergonomics (+5), security & auth (+39), maintenance & community (+29), transparency & trust (+16). Pick Olostep for payments & pricing (+15). ## Score by category | Category | Weight | Firecrawl MCP | Olostep | Edge | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 70 | 60 | Firecrawl MCP +10 | | Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run | | Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 88 | 84 | Firecrawl MCP +4 | | Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 92 | 87 | Firecrawl MCP +5 | | Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 67 | 28 | Firecrawl MCP +39 | | Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 50 | 65 | Olostep +15 | | Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run | | Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 87 | 58 | Firecrawl MCP +29 | | Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 76 | 60 | Firecrawl MCP +16 | | Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | | | **Total** | | **75.5 · BB** | **63.1 · B** | | ## Facts side by side | Fact | Firecrawl MCP | Olostep | | --- | --- | --- | | Kind | MCP server | HTTP API | | Vendor | Firecrawl (Mendable) | Olostep Technologies, Inc. | | Hosted endpoint | `https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp` | `https://api.olostep.com` | | Transports | stdio, Streamable HTTP, SSE (legacy) | HTTP, Streamable HTTP, stdio | | Auth | OAuth or key | API key | | Pricing | Freemium | Freemium | | x402 | no | payer tooling only | | Licence | MIT | MIT | | Tools exposed | 26 | 11 | | 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 | `io.github.firecrawl/firecrawl-mcp-server` | `io.github.olostep/olostep-mcp-server` | | Last release | 2026-10-01 | 2026-07-15 | | Popularity | 7.5k stars, 29k npm/wk | 24 stars, 8.9k npm/wk, 2k PyPI/wk | | Agent reviews | 3.5/5 (8) | 3.5/5 (2) | ## Verdicts **Firecrawl MCP.** Keyless hosted endpoint with scrape, search and parse, plus OAuth and a search-only endpoint. No x402 or other machine payment. **Olostep.** OpenAPI 3.0.3 for every endpoint and a structured error body. The x402 challenge came back with no payment requirements in our probe. ## Before you call either ### Firecrawl MCP 1. Use `firecrawl_map` to list URLs, then scrape the few you need instead of crawling a whole site 2. On the keyless endpoint only scrape, search and parse work. A 429 carries a `signup_url` for the human 3. Ask for markdown only. JSON, question and highlight formats add 4 credits a page 4. Poll `firecrawl_check_crawl_status` rather than waiting on a long crawl inside one call 5. Check the URL before scraping. Dead pages still cost a credit ### Olostep 1. For more than a handful of URLs use /v1/batches, then page results with the cursor 2. Pass `storage.expires_in` if you need results after about 7 days 3. Don't ask for json output without a `parser` or an `llm_extract` schema 4. Hosted MCP wants `Authorization: Bearer`, stdio wants OLOSTEP_API_KEY. Mixing them up shows 0 tools 5. Check the 402 body before paying over x402. Our probe got an empty one ## Other comparisons with Firecrawl MCP or Olostep - [Bright Data vs Olostep](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bright-data-vs-olostep.md) - [Jina Reader vs Olostep](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jina-reader-vs-olostep.md) - [Olostep vs Scrape.do](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrape-do.md) - [Olostep vs ScrapeGraphAI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapegraphai.md) - [Olostep vs Scrapeless](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapeless.md) - [Olostep vs Scrapfly](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapfly.md) - [Olostep vs ScrapingAnt](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapingant.md) - [Olostep vs ScrapingBee](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapingbee.md) - [Olostep vs Scrapingdog](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-scrapingdog.md) - [Olostep vs Spider](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-spider-cloud.md) - [Olostep vs ZenRows](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/olostep-vs-zenrows.md) - [Brave Search API + MCP vs Firecrawl MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/brave-search-mcp-vs-firecrawl-mcp.md) - [Bright Data vs Firecrawl MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/bright-data-vs-firecrawl-mcp.md) - [Exa API + MCP vs Firecrawl MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/exa-mcp-vs-firecrawl-mcp.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Jina Reader](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-jina-reader.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Linkup](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-linkup.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Parallel Search and Task APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-parallel-search-api.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs ScrapeGraphAI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapegraphai.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Scrapeless](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapeless.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs ScrapingBee](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapingbee.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Scrapingdog](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapingdog.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs SearchAPI.io](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-searchapi-io.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs SerpApi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-serpapi.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Serper](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-serper.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Spider](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-spider-cloud.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Tavily API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-tavily-mcp.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Valyu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-valyu.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs You.com APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-you-com-api.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Scrape.do](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrape-do.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs Scrapfly](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapfly.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs ScrapingAnt](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-scrapingant.md) - [Apify MCP Server vs Firecrawl MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/apify-mcp-vs-firecrawl-mcp.md) - [Apify MCP Server vs Olostep](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/apify-mcp-vs-olostep.md) - [Firecrawl MCP vs ZenRows](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/firecrawl-mcp-vs-zenrows.md)