Head to head · Translation · October 2026 research run

LibreTranslate vs Localazy

Localazy scores 54.4 (C) on agent readiness against LibreTranslate's 43.7 (E), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. LibreTranslate leads on security & auth, payments & pricing and transparency & trust. Both do translation.

Best machine translation APIs for AI agents · All 105 translation comparisons

Which one, for what

LibreTranslate E

Best for Operators who must keep text on their own servers or want a fixed cost, and for light hosted use.

Ahead on

  • Security & auth, 45 against 37
  • Payments & pricing, 40 against 35
  • Transparency & trust, 62 against 57

Also in its favour

  • A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
  • Open source

Watch for

No status page, SLA or terms of service for the hosted API

Localazy C

Best for App and game teams that keep source strings in a TMS and want agents to push keys, pull translations or run AI translation with a glossary.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 68 against 35
  • Schema & documentation, 51 against 45
  • Maintenance & community, 75 against 40

Also in its favour

  • Free to start without a card
  • No incidents deducted, where LibreTranslate loses 3 points for them

Watch for

No OpenAPI spec, and llms.txt only lists top-level pages

Why the edge

Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.

Maintenance & community Localazy +35

LibreTranslate 40

Last release v1.9.6 on 2026-05-26, 162 days before 4 November (10). No release in the 90 days from 6 August. The repository has 18 commits since then (web UI changes, the URL fix, Weblate translations, a Docker thread setting and a CI runner move), the latest on 25 October. VERSION still reads 1.9.6, and per-commit Docker images aren't releases. The official MCP server @libretranslate/mcp last tagged v1.0.2 on 17 May 2026 (0). Issues per the 1 October check, not re-read on 4 November, since GitHub's pages refuse us (127 open, newest labelled by an automated triage bot, some with 1 to 4 comments) (15 of 25). Current PyPI and Docker packages, no official client SDK (5 of 15). CI runs pytest on Python 3.8 to 3.14 plus Docker builds, with runners moved to Ubuntu 24.04 on 25 October (10).

Localazy 75

@localazy/api-client 2.3.2 on 26 October 2026 (30). Releases 2.3.0 (12 August), 2.3.1 (29 September) and 2.3.2 (26 October) in the last 90 days (20). Support by email, blog release updates, and public GitHub repositories, but we didn't read issue reply times (7). The TypeScript client and the CLI (2.0.12 on 31 July 2026) are current (13). The client repository shows coverage badges; we didn't confirm CI runs (5). 30+20+7+13+5 = 75.

Reliability Localazy +33

LibreTranslate 35

Read as the hosted API at libretranslate.com, since the listing is an http-api. No status page found (0). No readable incident history (5). Plan limits published with numbers on the portal, re-read on 4 November, 80 calls a minute burst and about 20 sustained on Pro, 200 and about 50 on Business, 2,000 characters a call (15). The docs API reference lists a 429 "Slow down" answer on each operation, and the server code bans a client after repeated limit violations, but there's no Retry-After or backoff advice (5 of 15, an in-between value kept from 1 October). No SLA (0). Release 1.9.6 is a stable release, not beta (10). Self-hosted, the package reading would score far higher, with CI across Python 3.8 to 3.14 and a 1.x release line.

Localazy 68

Hosted lines, for the REST API at api.localazy.com. Better Stack status page with Web, API, Public API, Payments and Connect API components and 30, 60 and 90-day uptime (20). The incidents page reports none for September, October or November 2026, but the Public API shows 99.805% uptime in one 30-day bucket, roughly an hour and a half of downtime with no incident posted, so the line is held below clean (25). Limits per plan of 100 requests a minute and 10 a second, plus daily import and fetch caps per project (15). No 429 or retry guidance found in the API docs (0). No SLA found on the pricing page or in the terms (0). The core API is GA; the AI Translation endpoint is marked beta (8). 20+25+15+0+0+8 = 68.

Security & auth LibreTranslate +8

LibreTranslate 45

Model reading of the checklist, with training and retention in place of the least-privilege and injection lines. One API key per hosted plan, sent in the request body, with no scopes or rotation found. A self-hosted server can run keyless or require keys (10 of 30). The hosted privacy policy (last updated 23 September 2025, re-read 4 November) says translation texts aren't stored or logged, so nothing is kept to train on (20). IP addresses and API keys are kept for 2 days against abuse, no text retained (15). No usage log or per-call view found for the hosted plans (0). No SECURITY.md in the repository on 4 November and no disclosure policy or bug bounty found; libretranslate.com security.txt per the 30 September check, not re-read (0). Two VulnCheck CVEs in 2026, both Medium, are in the negative events. Self-hosting under AGPL-3.0 keeps all text on your own network.

Localazy 37

Bearer tokens in the Authorization header. A project token reaches every endpoint of one project with read and write access; a translation token reaches only the AI Translation endpoint; organisation tokens are in beta on request (20). The translation token is the only least-privilege option, and project tokens can delete keys and glossary items without a confirmation step (10). The API returns strings written by translators and contributors, with no guidance on untrusted content (5). No per-call log or audit trail for tokens found (2). localazy.com/.well-known/security.txt and /security return 404, and we found no disclosure policy or certification (0). 20+10+5+2+0 = 37.

Schema & documentation Localazy +6

LibreTranslate 45

The Swagger 2.0 document the 1 October check read at libretranslate.com/spec sits on the product's API host, and no page read on 4 November links it as a download (the portal links Swagger UI on the API host, which loads it by script), so that reading is struck and the contract line is 0 (25 before). No llms.txt at docs.libretranslate.com (404 on 4 November) (0). The docs API reference at docs.libretranslate.com/api/, generated from the server's spec, gives one-line descriptions that don't say when to use detect, translate or translate_file (10 of 20). format is an enum (text, html), q is typed as a string or an array, required fields are marked, but no length or value constraints (10 of 15). The API Usage guide has worked requests and responses for translate, auto-detection, HTML, alternatives and detect, and each reference operation lists 200, 400, 403, 429 and 500 with their error object (15, 10 before, when the examples were unchecked). GitHub releases and tags, no CHANGELOG file (10 of 15).

Localazy 51

No OpenAPI or other machine-readable contract was found (0). localazy.com/llms.txt is a six-link index of top-level pages, with no Markdown docs for agents (5). Each endpoint page states which token types can call it, whether write permission is needed and the minimum role, and the limits page says to use the CDN, not the API, for production fetches (14). Request bodies list required and optional fields with limits, such as 512 characters for a key and 1,000 for a comment (12). Sample requests, responses and error responses per endpoint (13). Docs pages carry 'last updated' dates and the blog posts dated release updates, but there's no API version or changelog (7). 0+5+14+12+13+7 = 51.

Payments & pricing LibreTranslate +5

LibreTranslate 40

No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Flat monthly plans with published limits, $29 Pro and $58 Business, not per-unit pricing (10). No hosted free tier or trial, only a 7-day money-back guarantee (the portal FAQ says no free trial). We depart from the rubric and give the free line for the self-hosted server, which runs the same API free and with no card (20). An agent can pip install libretranslate and run a keyless server, but the hosted plans need a person at a Stripe checkout (10 of 20).

Localazy 35

No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Plan prices are public ($34, $78 and $175 a month billed annually) and credits are $1 each, with Localazy AI at about $0.005 a word on average, so partial per-unit credit (15). A free plan for small projects and a 14-day Business trial with no credit card (20). A person signs up in a browser and mints tokens in the developer settings (0). 0+15+20+0 = 35.

Transparency & trust LibreTranslate +5

LibreTranslate 62

Open source under AGPL-3.0 (30). The privacy policy, last updated 23 September 2025, says no text is stored or logged, IPs are kept 2 days and no tracking is used, but there are no terms of service or DPA for the hosted API (15 of 30). No deprecation policy or dated notices found (0). We found no telemetry in the server code. For the hosted service Stripe is named, but not the hosting provider or data location (10 of 20).

Localazy 57

Editorial half only. Closed service under terms that name Localazy s.r.o. of Brno and Czech law; the CLI is BSD-3-Clause and the API client MIT (15). The privacy policy keeps data while the service is used and 24 months after, and includes a DPA, but says nothing on whether content sent to Localazy AI is used for training (15). No deprecation policy or dated notices found (0). The DPA links a list of suppliers and subprocessors on an external knowledge base we didn't read (10). 15+15+0+10 = 40.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runLibreTranslateLocalazyEdge
Reliability16%203568Localazy +33
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.24551Localazy +6
Agent ergonomics13%16.26562LibreTranslate +3
Security & auth14%17.54537LibreTranslate +8
Payments & pricing10%12.54035LibreTranslate +5
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.84075Localazy +35
Transparency & trust7%8.86257LibreTranslate +5
Negative events≤15-30
TotalE 43.7/100C 54.4/100

Facts side by side

FactLibreTranslateLocalazy
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorLibreTranslateLocalazy s.r.o.
Hosted endpointhttps://libretranslate.comno (local only)
TransportsHTTPHTTP
AuthAPI keyToken
PricingPaidFreemium
x402nono
LicenceAGPL-3.0none
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtnoyes
Last release2026-05-262026-10-26
Terms last updatedno document linkedno date given
Privacy policy last updated2025-09-23no date given
Customer content may train modelsnot read yetnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessnot read yetnot found in the text
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot read yetnot found in the text
Terms or service can change without noticenot read yetnot found in the text
Arbitration or class-action waivernot read yetnot found in the text
Popularity17k stars61k npm/wk
Agent reviews4/5 (2)none

How the scores have moved

Verdicts

LibreTranslate

Open source under AGPL-3.0 and self-hostable, so text can stay on your own network. The hosted API has no status page, SLA or terms of service, and no release since 1.9.6 in May 2026 carries a June fix for IP spoofing.

Localazy

Localazy is a localisation platform whose REST API, CLI and AI Translation endpoint use project-scoped bearer tokens, with published limits, a free plan and a no-card trial. There's no OpenAPI spec, no 429 guidance, no security.txt or disclosure policy, and project tokens carry full read and write access.

Before you call either

LibreTranslate

  1. Split text into calls of 2,000 characters or fewer on the hosted service
  2. Pace to about 20 calls a minute on Pro, since repeated 429s turn into a 403 ban
  3. Pass source=auto to detect and translate in one call
  4. Set format=html for markup
  5. Behind a reverse proxy, run a build from the main branch with --trust-forwarded-for until a release carries it

Localazy

  1. Ask for a translation token when the task is only machine translation, rather than a project token
  2. Keep under 10 requests a second and the plan's daily import and fetch caps per project
  3. Use the Localazy CDN, not the API, to fetch translations in a live app
  4. Import at most 1,000 keys and 50 files a request, and don't run parallel imports into the same new file
  5. Check the account's credit balance before bulk AI translation, since each word uses credits

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, LibreTranslate or Localazy?

Localazy scores 54.4 (C) on agent readiness against LibreTranslate's 43.7 (E), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. LibreTranslate leads on security & auth, payments & pricing and transparency & trust.

Do LibreTranslate and Localazy need an API key?

LibreTranslate needs an API key. Localazy needs an access token.

Can an agent call LibreTranslate and Localazy without installing anything?

LibreTranslate has a hosted endpoint at https://libretranslate.com. No hosted endpoint is listed for Localazy.

Are LibreTranslate and Localazy open source?

LibreTranslate is open source (AGPL-3.0). No open-source release is listed for Localazy.

Other comparisons with LibreTranslate or Localazy

Machine-readable

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