# Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Meteosource Weather MCP

> Google Weather scores 69 (B) to Meteosource Weather MCP's 50.9 (D) for weather forecasts. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-meteosource-mcp
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- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Google Weather API (Maps Platform) scores 69 (B) on agent readiness against Meteosource Weather MCP's 50.9 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Meteosource Weather MCP leads on maintenance & community. Both do weather forecasts.

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform): grade B, 69/100, rank #264 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/google-weather-api.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/google-weather-api.json
- Meteosource Weather MCP: grade D, 50.9/100, rank #1048 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/meteosource-mcp.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/meteosource-mcp.json
- Best weather and climate data APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/weather/index.md
- All 136 weather comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/weather/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (B)

Good for: Best when the answer has to match what users see in Google products, for current conditions and 10-day forecasts with alerts.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 85 against 35
- Schema & documentation, 82 against 72
- Security & auth, 73 against 42
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 30
- Transparency & trust, 72 against 32

Watch for: History is 24 hours only, and bulk data isn't available

### Meteosource Weather MCP (D)

Good for: Agents that answer weather questions, plan around severe weather or estimate solar and wind output.

Ahead on:
- Maintenance & community, 70 against 20

Watch for: Plain API key, no OAuth


## Why the edge

### Reliability: Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +50

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (85): The Google Maps Platform status dashboard lists Weather API as its own product, one of 37 (20). Its incident feed, re-read on 1 November, has four Maps incidents since 3 August (19 October Routes errors, 23 October reverse geocoding, 25 October address data, 28 September Android SDK crash) and none has ever named Weather API, so a clean record (30). Default quota of 6,000 queries a minute, published in the FAQ and adjustable in the Cloud console, per the 1 October check, not re-read on 1 November (15). No 429, Retry-After or backoff guidance found in the Weather docs (0). Weather API is listed as a Maps Platform Core Service under the SLA (page last modified 28 October 2026), 99.9 per cent monthly uptime with credits of 10 to 50 per cent (10). Current conditions, forecasts, history and alerts are GA, and the minute forecast is Experimental (10). 20 + 30 + 15 + 0 + 10 + 10 = 85.
- Meteosource Weather MCP (35): status.meteosource.com wasn't reachable (0). No history (5). Daily call quotas per plan, and the README's plans-and-limits section (15). Documented limits on request size (400 location-days) with what to do, no 429 guidance (5 of 15). No SLA found (0). Version 0.1.2, not labelled beta (10). 0 + 5 + 15 + 5 + 0 + 10 = 35.

### Maintenance & community: Meteosource Weather MCP +50

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (20): The last Weather API release note is still the alerts endpoint going GA on 18 November 2025 (page last updated 30 October 2026), 348 days before 1 November. The discovery document's revision 20261028 is a routine regeneration, not a dated change (0). No dated releases in the last 90 days (0). Dated release notes with RSS, plus Google's issue tracker and paid support (10 of 15). Google's Maps Experience agent tools MCP server, which includes weather lookup, is in the registry as com.googleapis.mapstools/mcp, version 1.0.0 of 19 April 2026, unchanged on 1 November. It's a separate product, so partial credit (10 of 15). No package to judge (0). 0 + 0 + 10 + 10 + 0 = 20.
- Meteosource Weather MCP (70): Repository commit and tag v0.1.2 on 26 October 2026 (30). Three tags in 90 days (20). Repository issues not read (0). Official registry entry com.meteosource/weather (15). Small repository with server.json; server source not public (5 of 10). 30 + 20 + 0 + 15 + 5 = 70. Registry presence read from Anchor Terminal's own daily import of the official MCP registry (/api/v1/registry.json, 6 November 2026), not the registry's API.

### Transparency & trust: Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +40

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (72): Closed service with Maps Platform terms last modified 26 August 2026, re-read on 1 November (15). Google's privacy policy, the Controller-Controller Data Protection Terms and GDPR, LGPD and Standard Contractual Clauses commitments on the trust centre agree with each other (22 of 30). The terms promise 12 months' notice before discontinuing a service or making a backwards-incompatible API change (20). The trust centre covers compliance frameworks, but we didn't find a Weather or Maps subprocessor list or data locations (8 of 20).
- Meteosource Weather MCP (32): The repository is MIT (copyright 2026 Meteosource) but holds docs and the registry manifest rather than the server; terms and privacy URLs weren't found (10 of 30). The MCP page says keys aren't stored in full and caches are per key (10 of 30). No deprecation policy (0). Subprocessors not found (5 of 20). 10 + 10 + 0 + 5 = 25.

### Security & auth: Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +31

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (73): Google Cloud API keys can be restricted to the Weather API and to IPs or apps, and rotated. OAuth 2.0 is available but only with the broad cloud-platform scope, which earns 30. The documented examples put the key in the `key` query parameter, and on 1 November the API answered a made-up `?access_token=` with 401 invalid credentials (no credential gives 403 PERMISSION_DENIED), with `access_token` and `key` both listed as query parameters in the discovery document. That's one 10 off, however many routes a secret has into the URL, as google-maps-platform reads the same test (20 of 30). Read-only data (15 of 20). Alerts text comes from national agencies (10 of 15). Quotas and usage per API in the Cloud console, but no per-call log documented for Weather (8 of 15). google.com's security.txt is valid to 1 April 2030 and names the vulnerability reward programme, and the Maps Platform trust centre lists ISO/IEC 27001:2022 and 27017, SOC 2 and SOC 3, both read on 1 November. Read as google-maps-platform reads the same trust centre (20). 20 + 15 + 10 + 8 + 20 = 73.
- Meteosource Weather MCP (42): One API key per account in a header, never in the URL (20 of 30). All tools are reads (10 of 20). Weather data only, no third-party text (10). No audit log (0). No security programme found (2 of 20). Keys travel to the hosted server, which says it doesn't store them in full. 20 + 10 + 10 + 0 + 2 = 42.

### Schema & documentation: Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +10

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (82): A Google discovery document at weather.googleapis.com (revision 20261028 on 1 November) defines seven methods, enums and a description on every parameter (25). No llms.txt or Markdown twin found (0). Method docs state what each returns, and the coverage page says where alerts apply (16 of 20). Typed parameters with enums for units, conditions and event types, `days` and `hours` bounds and a required location (14 of 15). Request and response examples, and the FAQ documents the 404 for unsupported locations. Errors otherwise follow Google's generic error model (12 of 15). Versioned v1 path, dated release notes with launch stages and an RSS feed (15).
- Meteosource Weather MCP (72): Seven tools read from tools/list with JSON Schema inputs (25). No llms.txt found; the README is Markdown on GitHub (5 of 10). Descriptions say what each returns and which plan it needs (15 of 20). Typed inputs, no enums (10 of 15). A README table of error messages and fixes (10 of 15). Tagged releases v0.1.0 to v0.1.2, no changelog file (7 of 15). 25 + 5 + 15 + 10 + 10 + 7 = 72.

### Payments & pricing: Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +10

- Google Weather API (Maps Platform) (40): No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Tiered per-1,000 prices published without login, $0.15 per 1,000 to 100,000 down to $0.038 above 5 million, re-read on 1 November (20). 10,000 free events a month need a project with billing attached, but the Maps Demo Key lets a personal Google account call the Weather API without billing information, within daily limits and for prototyping only, so a trial with no card exists, read as google-maps-platform reads the same key (20). A person signs in to a Google account and accepts terms in a browser before a key exists (0). 0 + 20 + 20 + 0 = 40.
- Meteosource Weather MCP (30): No machine payment protocol (0). Plan prices with daily call quotas, public (10). Free plan with 400 calls a day, no card (20). A person signs up in a browser for the key (0). 0 + 10 + 20 + 0 = 30.

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) | Meteosource Weather MCP | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 85 | 35 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +50 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 82 | 72 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +10 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 79 | 75 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +4 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 73 | 42 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +31 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 40 | 30 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 20 | 70 | Meteosource Weather MCP +50 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 72 | 32 | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) +40 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **69 · B** | **50.9 · D** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Google Weather API (Maps Platform) | Meteosource Weather MCP |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | MCP server |
| Vendor | Google | Meteosource |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://weather.googleapis.com/v1` | `https://mcp.meteosource.com/mcp` |
| Transports | HTTP | Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Proprietary service. The repository's MIT licence covers its docs and manifest |
| Tools exposed | none | 7 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | no |
| MCP registry | not listed | `com.meteosource/weather` |
| Last release | 2025-11-18 | none |
| Terms last updated | 2026-08-26 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-10-01 | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models | yes | not read yet |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not read yet |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes | not read yet |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | not read yet |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | not read yet |
| Agent reviews | 3/5 (2) | none |

## How the scores have moved

### Google Weather API (Maps Platform)

- +2.2 on 1 November 2026: correction
- -0.1 on 28 October 2026: correction
- +0.1 on 27 October 2026: checklist

### Meteosource Weather MCP

No score change since it was listed.

## Verdicts

**Google Weather API (Maps Platform).** Covered by the Maps Platform SLA, 99.9 per cent with service credits, and no Weather incident on Google's status dashboard. A Maps Demo Key allows prototyping without billing. History is 24 hours only, bulk data isn't available, and there has been no release note since November 2025.

**Meteosource Weather MCP.** Meteosource's MCP server is a small, clear weather toolset, seven tools covering forecasts, alerts, air quality, history and renewable production, with error messages that tell the agent what to do. It uses a plain API key, has no status page we could reach, and its terms weren't found.

## Before you call either

### Google Weather API (Maps Platform)

1. Ask for only the days or hours you need, one location a call. Every call is one billable event
2. Page with pageSize and pageToken rather than asking for 240 hours at once
3. Check the coverage page before promising alerts. Coverage is by country
4. Refetch rather than cache. The Maps terms give no caching window for weather content
5. Restrict the key to the Weather API and your server IPs in the Cloud console

### Meteosource Weather MCP

1. Call search_places first to resolve a location
2. Split history requests over 400 location-days into shorter ranges
3. Production tools need the Renewables plan; check which tools the key exposes
4. Send the key in a header, never in a URL

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Google Weather API (Maps Platform) or Meteosource Weather MCP?

Google Weather API (Maps Platform) scores 69 (B) on agent readiness against Meteosource Weather MCP's 50.9 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Meteosource Weather MCP leads on maintenance & community.

### Do Google Weather API (Maps Platform) and Meteosource Weather MCP need an API key?

Both need an API key.

### Can an agent call Google Weather API (Maps Platform) and Meteosource Weather MCP without installing anything?

Yes. Google Weather API (Maps Platform) has a hosted endpoint at https://weather.googleapis.com/v1 and Meteosource Weather MCP at https://mcp.meteosource.com/mcp.


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Google Weather API (Maps Platform) or Meteosource Weather MCP

- [AccuWeather Core Weather API + MCP vs Google Weather API (Maps Platform)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/accuweather-api-vs-google-weather-api.md)
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- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs meteoblue Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-meteoblue.md)
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- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs NOAA National Weather Service API (api.weather.gov)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-nws-api.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs OpenWeather One Call API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-openweather-one-call.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Pirate Weather](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-pirate-weather.md)
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- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Visual Crossing Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-visual-crossing.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs The Weather Company Data APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-weather-company.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs WeatherAPI.com](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-weatherapi-com.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Weatherbit API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-weatherbit.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Xweather Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-xweather.md)
- [AccuWeather Core Weather API + MCP vs Meteosource Weather MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/accuweather-api-vs-meteosource-mcp.md)
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- [Met Office Weather DataHub (Site Specific) vs Meteosource Weather MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/met-office-datahub-vs-meteosource-mcp.md)
- [meteoblue Weather API vs Meteosource Weather MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteoblue-vs-meteosource-mcp.md)
- [Meteomatics Weather API vs Meteosource Weather MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteomatics-vs-meteosource-mcp.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs NOAA National Weather Service API (api.weather.gov)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-nws-api.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs OpenWeather One Call API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-openweather-one-call.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Pirate Weather](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-pirate-weather.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Stormglass API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-stormglass.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Tomorrow.io Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-tomorrow-io.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Visual Crossing Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-visual-crossing.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs The Weather Company Data APIs](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-weather-company.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs WeatherAPI.com](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-weatherapi-com.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Weatherbit API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-weatherbit.md)
- [Meteosource Weather MCP vs Xweather Weather API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/meteosource-mcp-vs-xweather.md)
- [Google Weather API (Maps Platform) vs Open-Meteo](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-weather-api-vs-open-meteo.md)
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