# Localazy vs Smartcat

> Localazy scores 54.4 (C) to Smartcat's 51.6 (D) for translation. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-smartcat
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-smartcat.md (~5,700 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Localazy scores 54.4 (C) on agent readiness against Smartcat's 51.6 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Smartcat leads on transparency & trust. Both do translation.

- Localazy: grade C, 54.4/100, rank #915 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/localazy.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/localazy.json
- Smartcat: grade D, 51.6/100, rank #1021 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/smartcat.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/smartcat.json
- Best machine translation APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/translation/index.md
- All 105 translation comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/translation/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Localazy (C)

Good 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 62
- Schema & documentation, 51 against 45
- Agent ergonomics, 62 against 57
- Payments & pricing, 35 against 25
- Maintenance & community, 75 against 69

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

### Smartcat (D)

Good for: Agents that run translation projects for a team already on a Smartcat Anticipate or higher plan, such as uploading documents, applying translation memories and glossaries, exporting results and calling real-time translation from an app.

Ahead on:
- Transparency & trust, 74 against 57

Also in its favour:
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install

Watch for: API access is listed only from the Anticipate plan, $60,000 a year per the help centre, while the pricing FAQ says the trial includes it


## Why the edge

### Transparency & trust: Smartcat +17

- 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.
- Smartcat (74): Closed service with published Terms of Use (18 September 2026) and Customer Agreement (22 September 2026). The PHP client is GPL-3.0-or-later and the CLI is a closed binary (15). The DPA (17 September 2025) returns or deletes data within 30 days of a written request and lists subprocessors. The privacy policy (23 June 2026) keeps personal data as long as required or advisable. A help article says Smartcat doesn't share user information with third parties, beside a DPA list of eleven AI, OCR and dubbing providers. The claim that customer content never trains public models appears on the pricing page and llms.txt, not in the agreements we read. Data centres are the EU, the US and China in the DPA and Asia in the help centre (14 of 30). The changelog has a pending-changes section and a 2022 deprecation of `GET /v1/project/list` with a September 2022 date. Experimental segmentation may change without notice, and the terms and DPA can be changed by notice. Dated notices with no stated notice period (15 of 20). Subprocessors named with location and purpose, region chosen at signup, data residency choice on Autonomous only, and 24 hours' notice of subprocessor changes under the SCC clause (17 of 20). Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform. 15 + 14 + 15 + 17 = 61.

### Payments & pricing: Localazy +10

- 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.
- Smartcat (25): No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Plan prices are public. The help centre (20 October 2026) gives Adapt $1,200, Accelerate $24,000 and Anticipate $60,000 a year with 100,000, 1,000,000 and 2,000,000 Smartwords, while the pricing page (26 October 2026) shows Adapt from $1,200 and the rest as custom. No top-up price per Smartword was found, so plan-only credit (10). A 15-day trial with 15,000 Smartwords and no card. The pricing FAQ says the trial includes API access, while the plan table and the help centre list API access only from Anticipate, and the trial article doesn't mention the API, so 5 points are withheld for the conflict (15 of 20). A person signs up in a browser and an administrator creates the key (0). Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform.

### Reliability: Localazy +6

- 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.
- Smartcat (62): Hosted reading, for the REST API and its real-time translation endpoint. status.smartcat.ai is a Statuspage site with three components, the European, American and Asian regions, and no separate API component (20). Its history lists 11 incidents between 1 August and 29 October 2026. Among them are a 4-hour slowdown on 2 September that could stop changes being saved, an access outage in the Americas from 15:28 to 17:27 UTC on 21 September, and access outages marked critical of 38 minutes on 22 September and about 10 minutes on 10 October. The 2 September slowdown with failed saves was in Europe and the 21 September outage in the Americas, so each hit one region and reads as partial (minor). The 22 September and 10 October access outages are marked critical with no region recorded, so they're read as two majors by that label (5 of 30). Limits are published per method group, 35 requests a second for all integration methods down to 30 a minute for translation memory methods (15). A 429 carries Retry-After in whole seconds, other responses carry `x-rate-limit-remaining` and `x-rate-limit-reset`, and the guide says to wait and retry. Writes take no idempotency key, and the glossary guide warns that a repeated create request makes duplicates, which is safe-retry guidance without keys (12 of 15). The pricing page names Standard, Priority and Enterprise SLAs, but no SLA document or uptime figure was found, and the Customer Agreement disclaims all warranties and sells the services as is (0). The API is generally available. Only custom document segmentation is labelled experimental (10). The window from 6 August still holds these incidents, and 1 to 4 November is unread, with no credit for it. Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform. 20 + 5 + 15 + 12 + 0 + 10 = 62.

### Schema & documentation: Localazy +6

- 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.
- Smartcat (45): An OpenAPI 3.0.1 file sits at smartcat.com/api/methods/v1/swagger.json, loaded by the Swagger UI at smartcat.com/api/methods/. The developer site doesn't link it and no page was found offering it as a download, so it reads as a file fetched by page script and earns nothing as a published contract. The counts the 29 October check took from it are no longer used (0 of 25). developers.smartcat.com has no llms.txt or Markdown copies. www.smartcat.com has an llms.txt and Markdown twins of its marketing pages, which don't cover the API (3 of 10). The API reference on developers.smartcat.com gives most operations a one-line summary only, and the guides explain when to use permanent or temporary projects and the real-time endpoint, with little on when not to call a method (10 of 20). Parameters carry enums and required markers, but bodies come in several JSON content types, multipart uploads put their JSON in an unnamed form part, and some request bodies are marked optional on calls that need them (9 of 15). The guides carry curl examples and a status code table, and the reference's examples are placeholders (10 of 15). These three partials drew partly on the same file as well as the reference and guides, so they're kept under the in-between rule and flagged. Paths are versioned at v1 and v2, and the changelog is dated with a pending-changes section, though it had no entry between 18 March 2024 and 2 October 2026 (13 of 15). Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform. 0 + 3 + 10 + 9 + 10 + 13 = 45.

### Maintenance & community: Localazy +6

- 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.
- Smartcat (69): The latest API change is the charges method of 16 October 2026 (30). Three dated changelog entries in 90 days, on 2, 14 and 16 October 2026 (20). Closed service with a public changelog, a support address on it and a help centre that says replies come within one business day. On GitHub, the PHP client's issues from 2021 to 2024 and a February 2026 report about the CLI install steps have no reply, while the PHP 8.4 issue was closed on 14 October 2026 (8 of 15). One official client, `smartcat/smartcat-api` 3.0.1 for PHP of 14 October 2026, and CLI binaries with no version number on the download page (8 of 15). The PHP client has no CI workflow in the repository, and Dependabot bumps for guzzle and psr7 from July and August 2026 are still open (3 of 10). The PHP client's tags were re-read from a clone on 4 November (v3.0.1 on 2026-10-14 is still the latest; no commit since). Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform.

### Agent ergonomics: Localazy +5

- Localazy (62): API reading. List endpoints return whole projects, files and keys with few output controls (13). Filtering by file, language and tags, and batch imports of up to 1,000 keys and 50 files a request (14). Error responses are documented per endpoint, with HTTP codes and messages (12). No idempotency keys, and the docs warn against parallel imports into the same new file (8). Official TypeScript API client, a CLI and Android and iOS libraries, with few required fields (15). 13+14+12+8+15 = 62.
- Smartcat (57): API reading of the checklist. `limit`, `skip` and `offset` cap list sizes, the v1 project list has `include` flags for documents, quotes, custom fields and clients, and one translate call takes several texts and target languages. No field selection was found (15 of 25). `offset` and `limit` on the v2 project list, a cursor with `afterConceptId` and `hasMore` on glossary concepts, `pageSize` up to 5,000 on audit logs, and filters by name, creator, assignee, client and `externalTag` (16 of 20). Errors return a JSON `ErrorResponse` with type, code, message and `requestId`, translate marks each failed text with `error`, and a 429 body is plain text (14 of 20). No idempotency keys. Callbacks are retried 8 times over about 2 hours with a `lastErrors` endpoint, and translate charges can be looked up later by `requestUid` (5 of 20). Translate needs a profile ID made in the web app, project creation needs `assignToVendor`, and the only official client is a PHP library besides the CLI binaries and a Postman collection (7 of 15). Smartcat's pages, status page included, are per the 29 October check, not re-read on 4 November, because the Terms of Use (18 September 2026) bar any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means from accessing any portion of the Platform, defined as Smartcat's website and technology platform.

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Localazy | Smartcat | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 68 | 62 | Localazy +6 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 51 | 45 | Localazy +6 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 62 | 57 | Localazy +5 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 37 | 40 | Smartcat +3 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 35 | 25 | Localazy +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 69 | Localazy +6 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 57 | 74 | Smartcat +17 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **54.4 · C** | **51.6 · D** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Localazy | Smartcat |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Localazy s.r.o. | Smartcat Platform Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | `https://smartcat.ai/api/integration` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | Token | API key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Proprietary service under Smartcat's Terms of Use and Customer Agreement. The PHP client on GitHub is GPL-3.0-or-later, and the CLI ships as closed binaries |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-26 | 2026-10-16 |
| Terms last updated | no date given | 2026-09-18 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | 2026-06-23 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | yes |
| Popularity | 61k npm/wk | 6 stars |

## How the scores have moved

### Localazy

No score change since it was listed.

### Smartcat

- -2.6 on 4 November 2026 (C to D): correction
- -0.1 on 30 October 2026: checklist

## Verdicts

**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.

**Smartcat.** Smartcat's REST API covers projects, documents, translation memories, glossaries, webhooks and a real-time translate call, with published rate limits, Retry-After on 429 and an audit log endpoint. Keys are account-wide with no documented scopes, the status page lists two incidents of an hour or more in 90 days, and API access is listed only from the $60,000-a-year Anticipate plan.

## Before you call either

### 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

### Smartcat

1. Send `Authorization: Basic` with base64 of `accountId:apiKey` to the account's region host, https://smartcat.ai, https://us.smartcat.ai or https://ea.smartcat.ai.
2. On 429, wait the seconds in Retry-After before retrying. The 429 itself carries no `x-rate-limit-*` headers.
3. Create a smart translation profile in the web app first and pass its ID as `profile` to `smartTranslation/translate`.
4. Store each `requestUid` and look charges up later with `smartTranslation/charges`, since the translate response doesn't include the cost.
5. Treat callbacks as hints and poll project, document or export status as a fallback, because failed deliveries are dropped after the last retry.

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Localazy or Smartcat?

Localazy scores 54.4 (C) on agent readiness against Smartcat's 51.6 (D), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Smartcat leads on transparency & trust.

### Do Localazy and Smartcat need an API key?

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

### Can an agent call Localazy and Smartcat without installing anything?

No hosted endpoint is listed for Localazy. Smartcat has a hosted endpoint at https://smartcat.ai/api/integration.


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Localazy or Smartcat

- [Amazon Translate vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-translate-vs-localazy.md)
- [Amazon Translate vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-translate-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Azure Translator vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/azure-translator-vs-localazy.md)
- [Azure Translator vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/azure-translator-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Crowdin vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/crowdin-vs-localazy.md)
- [Crowdin vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/crowdin-vs-smartcat.md)
- [DeepL API vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepl-api-vs-localazy.md)
- [DeepL API vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepl-api-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Google Cloud Translation vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-cloud-translation-vs-localazy.md)
- [Google Cloud Translation vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-cloud-translation-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Lara Translate API vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lara-translate-vs-localazy.md)
- [Lara Translate API vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lara-translate-vs-smartcat.md)
- [LibreTranslate vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/libretranslate-vs-localazy.md)
- [LibreTranslate vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/libretranslate-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Lingo.dev vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lingo-dev-vs-localazy.md)
- [Lingo.dev vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lingo-dev-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Lingvanex Translation API vs Localazy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lingvanex-vs-localazy.md)
- [Lingvanex Translation API vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lingvanex-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Localazy vs Lokalise](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-lokalise.md)
- [Localazy vs Phrase](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-phrase.md)
- [Localazy vs SYSTRAN Translate API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-systran.md)
- [Localazy vs TranslatePlus](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/localazy-vs-translateplus.md)
- [Lokalise vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lokalise-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Phrase vs Smartcat](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/phrase-vs-smartcat.md)
- [Smartcat vs SYSTRAN Translate API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/smartcat-vs-systran.md)
- [Smartcat vs TranslatePlus](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/smartcat-vs-translateplus.md)

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