Head to head · Shipping rates · October 2026 research run
Karrio vs Shippo
Shippo scores 61.9 (C) on agent readiness against Karrio's 48.7 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Karrio leads on reliability. Both do shipping rates.
Which one, for what
Karrio D
Good for A team that wants to host its own multi-carrier API with its own carrier contracts and can maintain a Django and PostgreSQL stack.
Ahead on
- Reliability, 76 against 59
Also in its favour
- Open source
Watch for
No release since 2026.1.32 on 23 June 2026, 107 days before this check, and fix pull requests opened in September 2026 were still open
Shippo C
Good for An agent that quotes and buys parcel labels across USPS, UPS, FedEx and DHL Express for a small or mid-size shipper, with a free test mode and public unit prices.
Ahead on
- Schema & documentation, 83 against 68
- Agent ergonomics, 64 against 57
- Security & auth, 52 against 44
- Maintenance & community, 77 against 29
- Transparency & trust, 61 against 56
Also in its favour
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
- No incidents deducted, where Karrio loses 7 points for them
Watch for
No idempotency key on label purchase or other writes. Only the Reporting API accepts one
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Karrio | Shippo | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 76 | 59 | Karrio +17 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 68 | 83 | Shippo +15 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 57 | 64 | Shippo +7 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 44 | 52 | Shippo +8 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 40 | 40 | even |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 29 | 77 | Shippo +48 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 56 | 61 | Shippo +5 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -7 | 0 | |
| Total | 48.7 · D | 61.9 · C |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Karrio | Shippo |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Karrio, Inc. | Shippo |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | https://api.goshippo.com |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| Price for shipping rates | not published | $0.01 per call |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | LGPL-3.0 for the server, SDK and modules. Code under ee/ is under the Karrio Enterprise licence and needs a subscription for production use. The MCP package in packages/mcp is Apache-2.0 | Proprietary service under Shippo's terms of use. The SDKs and the goshippo/ai repository (skills and MCP bridge) are MIT |
| Tools exposed | none | 4 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | com.shippo/shippo-mcp |
| Last release | 2026-06-23 | 2026-10-01 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-04-08 | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2025-04-08 | 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 | yes | 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 | 799 stars, 338 PyPI/wk | 3 stars, 73k npm/wk, 20k PyPI/wk |
Verdicts
Karrio
A current OpenAPI 3.0.3 contract with 65 paths, a free LGPL-3.0 server and 30 carrier connectors suit a team that hosts it. The last release was 23 June 2026, the @karrio/mcp package the docs install is absent from npm, and api.karrio.io didn't resolve on 8 October 2026.
Shippo
Per-label and per-call prices are public, test keys are self-serve, and the OpenAPI spec, llms.txt and Markdown docs are open to a fetch. Label purchase has no idempotency key, API keys carry no scopes, and the status page logged carrier-side incidents on most days between July and October 2026.
Before you call either
Karrio
- Run your own instance with Docker Compose and call it at
http://localhost:5002. Don't rely onapi.karrio.io, which didn't resolve on 8 October 2026 - Don't run
npx karrio-mcpornpx -y @karrio/mcp. Neither name is published on npm, so build the server frompackages/mcpin the repository - Change the default
admin@example.comanddemologin before the instance is reachable, and upgrade to 2026.1.32 or later so passwords aren't stored as MD5 - Don't blind-retry
POST /v1/shipmentswith aserviceset orPOST /v1/shipments/{id}/purchase. Fetch the shipment and check its status first, since no idempotency key exists - Use a test-mode API key while building. Send it as the HTTP Basic username or as
Authorization: Token key_...
Shippo
- Build and test with a shippo_test_ key. Test and live object IDs are separate, and the hosted MCP server has no test mode
- Send
Authorization: ShippoToken <key>, not Bearer, and pinShippo-API-Version: 2018-02-08 - Before retrying a failed POST /transactions, list recent transactions. There is no idempotency key, and a second purchase is a second charge
- Pass
async: falseon shipments and transactions, or poll the object until its status leaves QUEUED - Set
resultson list calls (under 200). Defaults vary by resource, and list calls are limited to 50 a minute on live keys
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Karrio or Shippo?
Shippo scores 61.9 (C) on agent readiness against Karrio's 48.7 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Karrio leads on reliability.
Do Karrio and Shippo need an API key?
Karrio needs an API key. Shippo takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.
Can an agent call Karrio and Shippo without installing anything?
No hosted endpoint is listed for Karrio. Shippo has a hosted endpoint at https://api.goshippo.com.
Are Karrio and Shippo open source?
Karrio is open source (LGPL-3.0 for the server, SDK and modules. Code under `ee/` is under the Karrio Enterprise licence and needs a subscription for production use. The MCP package in `packages/mcp` is Apache-2.0). No open-source release is listed for Shippo.
Other comparisons with Karrio or Shippo
Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/karrio-vs-shippo.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/karrio.json·/api/v1/tools/shippo.json - From a terminal
anchor compare karrio shippo(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "karrio", "b": "shippo"}at/mcp, no key