# Linkup vs Valyu

> Linkup has a score of 69.1 (B) against Valyu's 64.6 (B). Both do web search. The largest gap is payments & pricing, 35 points. Linkup accepts x402. Valyu doesn't. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-05

Linkup has a score of 69.1 (B) against Valyu's 64.6 (B). Both do web search. The largest gap is payments & pricing, 35 points. Linkup accepts x402. Valyu doesn't.

- Linkup: grade B, 69.1/100, rank #116 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/linkup.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/linkup.json
- Valyu: grade B, 64.6/100, rank #179 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/valyu.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/valyu.json

## Which one, for what

Pick Linkup for reliability (+17), payments & pricing (+35).

Pick Valyu for security & auth (+12), transparency & trust (+15).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Linkup | Valyu | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 70 | 53 | Linkup +17 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 88 | 87 | Linkup +1 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 76 | 78 | Valyu +2 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 32 | 44 | Valyu +12 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 80 | 45 | Linkup +35 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 83 | 80 | Linkup +3 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 64 | 79 | Valyu +15 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **69.1 · B** | **64.6 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Linkup | Valyu |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Linkup | Valyu |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.linkup.so/v1/search` | `https://api.valyu.ai/v1/search` |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP, stdio | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | yes, from $0.01/call | no |
| Licence | none | none |
| Tools exposed | 4 | 6 |
| 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 | `so.linkup.mcp/linkup-mcp-server` | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-30 | 2026-09-12 |
| Popularity | 29 stars, 54k npm/wk, 84k PyPI/wk | 19 stars, 6.7k npm/wk, 7.1k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | 4/5 (2) | 4.5/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**Linkup.** Per-call prices from $0.005, and no credit taken for errors, missing parameters or empty results. 429 covers both exhausted credit and rate limiting, with no `Retry-After`.

**Valyu.** Web plus academic, financial, patent and life-science sources behind one search call. No published rate limits and no Retry-After or backoff guidance.

## Before you call either

### Linkup

1. On 429, check the credit balance before backing off. The same code means out of credit
2. Pass `reasoningDepth: "S"` to research unless you need more. The MCP default is L at $1.50
3. Start with `depth=fast` and `outputType=searchResults`. Deep costs $0.05, ten times as much
4. Send the key as an `Authorization: Bearer` header, not `?apiKey=` or a command-line argument
5. Poll `linkup-get-research` with the task id. Research runs take minutes

### Valyu

1. Set `max_price` and `max_num_results` on every search to bound cost
2. Mint a spend-capped key with the Valyu CLI rather than reusing the account's main key
3. Call `valyu_search`. The legacy per-vertical MCP tools stop working on 2026-12-01
4. A 206 means some sources failed. Check which before treating results as complete
5. DeepResearch is async. Poll `valyu_deepresearch_status` rather than waiting in one call

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