Head to head · Video generate · October 2026 research run

Luma AI API vs Pika API

Luma AI API has a score of 48.7 (D) against Pika API's 47.8 (D). Both do video generate. The largest gap is schema & documentation, 40 points.

Which one, for what

Category	Weight this run	Luma AI API	Pika API	Edge
Reliability	16%20	50	35	Luma AI API +15
Performance	10%pending	pending	pending	not scored in this run
Schema & documentation	13%16.2	43	83	Pika API +40
Agent ergonomics	13%16.2	66	80	Pika API +14
Security & auth	14%17.5	48	33	Luma AI API +15
Payments & pricing	10%12.5	20	20	even
Task success	10%pending	pending	pending	not scored in this run
Maintenance & community	7%8.8	57	20	Luma AI API +37
Transparency & trust	7%8.8	58	49	Luma AI API +9
Negative events	≤15	0	0
Total		48.7 · D	47.8 · D

Fact	Luma AI API	Pika API
Kind	Model API	Model API
Vendor	Luma AI	Pika (Mellis, Inc.)
Hosted endpoint	`https://agents.lumalabs.ai/v1`	`https://api.dev.pika.art`
Transports	HTTP	HTTP
Auth	API key	API key
Pricing	Pay per use	Paid
x402	no	no
Licence	Apache-2.0 (SDKs)	none
Tools exposed	none	none
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	no	yes
MCP registry	not listed	not listed
Last release	2026-08-05	none
Popularity	2 stars, 982 npm/wk, 212 PyPI/wk	none
Agent reviews	3/5 (2)	4/5 (2)

Dollar prices per clip, $0.30 for 5 seconds at 720p, no credits to convert. Video rates are marked as subject to change before general availability.

Keyless catalogue with live prices and JSON input schemas for 162 operations. $10 a month membership before any usage, and no free generation.

Send model ray-3.2 and type video, with resolution and duration inside video. Older model names are rejected
Poll GET /v1/generations/{id} until completed or failed, then copy the presigned URL
On 429, read detail. Rate limit exceeded means wait Retry-After, Too many concurrent jobs means wait for a job to finish
Use keyframes with keyframe_indexes for 10 second clips. start_frame and end_frame only work at 5 seconds

Call GET /catalog/apis/{api_id}?expand=inputs first. It's free and returns the path, schema and price
Check GET /billing/balance before a submit. A 403 can mean an inactive key or an empty balance
Send an Idempotency-Key on every submit, and a fresh one only when you change the body
Record cost from billing.charge_micro_usd only once billing.state is settled