Head to head · Extraction · October 2026 research run

Microlink vs Qovia

Microlink scores 65.9 (B) on agent readiness against Qovia's 61.2 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Qovia leads on security & auth and payments & pricing. Both do extraction.

Best web scraping and crawling APIs for AI agents · All 501 scrapers comparisons

Which one, for what

Microlink B

Best for Agents that need link previews, screenshots, PDFs, metadata or a page as Markdown from one GET.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 52 against 40
  • Agent ergonomics, 82 against 77
  • Maintenance & community, 86 against 77
  • Transparency & trust, 75 against 30

Also in its favour

  • Runs on your own machine
  • Free to start without a card

Watch for

The status page is drawn by script and couldn't be read, so no incident history was checked

Qovia C

Best for Agents that need structured public data from Chinese platforms (Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Weibo, Bilibili, Kuaishou, Zhihu, WeChat official accounts, Taobao and JD reviews) or the Xingtu and Pugongying creator marketplaces, with TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, X and Reddit beside them, paid per successful call from a prepaid balance.

Ahead on

  • Security & auth, 60 against 44
  • Payments & pricing, 55 against 47

Watch for

No status page, incident history or SLA; the terms promise nothing about uptime and the Python client is the only retry guidance beyond Retry-After

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.

Transparency & trust Microlink +45

Microlink 75

The API is closed under terms naming Microlink Labs, S.L. with its registry details, and the SDK, MCP server and the libraries behind it are MIT (20 of 30). The DPA, updated 30 October 2026, gives cache retention of 24 hours by default up to 31 days, logs 15 days and deletion within 15 days, but the privacy policy is undated, names no controller and gives no periods (20 of 30). The terms promise advance notice before a paid feature is materially reduced, and the changelog records changes by month, with no notice period (10 of 20). Subprocessors list updated 16 October 2026, with services, data types and locations (18 of 20). 20 + 20 + 10 + 18 = 68.

Qovia 30

Closed service. The Terms of Service is one paragraph that names no legal entity, address or liability terms, says Delaware law governs and that the page is a summary with the signed agreement governing; the repository's client is MIT. Between the closed and unclear bands (7 of 30). The privacy policy is one paragraph. Account information is used to deliver and bill, personal information is not sold, requests and results are not resold, deletion requests go to the support mailbox, and the agreement governs where it differs. No retention periods, no subprocessors, no DPA, and no statement about the cache the prov.source flag implies; the SECURITY.md repeats the same points (8 of 30). A 410 endpoint_disabled code exists for retired endpoints and the changelog is dated, but there is no deprecation policy or notice period and nothing is marked deprecated (5 of 20). Stripe is named on the pricing page as the card and Alipay processor; no other provider, data location or transfer basis is stated (3 of 20). 7+8+5+3 = 23.

Security & auth Qovia +16

Microlink 44

One API key per account in the x-api-key header, with no scopes, rotation or expiry documented. auth.md says to keep it out of URLs and no query option is documented (20 of 30). Tools are reads apart from microlink_function, which runs caller-supplied code against the page in Microlink's browser, and the checkout tools never return a key (10 of 20). Pages come back as Markdown and text, and no prompt-injection guidance was found in the docs, auth.md or the MCP README (0). A request id on every response, with no per-call log for the customer documented (4 of 15). security.txt is valid to 28 July 2027 and links a responsible-disclosure policy and acknowledgements. No bug bounty or certification found (10 of 20). 20 + 10 + 0 + 4 + 10 = 44.

Qovia 60

API keys with scopes chosen at creation (every endpoint, search, every raw endpoint or one of 24 platform groups), an optional expiry, revocation in the console and hashed storage; the docs say the key is read from the Authorization or x-api-key header only, never the URL or a cookie, and 30 failed authentications from one IP in a minute are throttled. No OAuth and no rotation feature beyond creating another key (24 of 30). The whole surface is read-only retrieval, scopes restrict a key to platforms, the two MCP catalogue tools need no key, and the docs and SECURITY.md tell users to give AI tools a separate scoped key (17 of 20). Every response is third-party platform text, and the only related statement is that error messages never contain the data source's own text; nothing on treating returned content as untrusted (3 of 15). request_id is the usage record ID on every answer, the console lists every charge in a usage log, X-Qovia-Charged and X-Qovia-Balance headers report each call, and GET /v1/account returns the key's scopes and balance at no charge; no exportable audit log or per-call endpoint was found (11 of 15). No security.txt on qovia.ai or api.qovia.ai (404), no bug bounty, SOC 2 or ISO 27001; the repository's SECURITY.md names a Telegram handle and a mailbox for reports covering both hosts (5 of 20). 24+17+3+11+5 = 60.

Reliability Microlink +12

Microlink 52

Graded on the hosted lines. microlink.io/status exists but is drawn by script, showing only 'Please wait' to our reader, and status.microlink.io failed through our proxy, so components and history are unchecked and scored absent (0). No readable history (5). Free and keyed quotas are published, 5 and 25 requests a day and 2 at a time, with paid quotas from 46,000 a month and x-rate-limit headers on every response (15). 429 with ECONCURRENCY says to wait a second and retry, a quota 429 gives the reset time, and every call only reads, but there is no Retry-After header documented (12 of 15). The terms commit to 99.9% uptime on paid plans, with service credits only under an Enterprise agreement (10). Generally available (10). 0 + 5 + 15 + 12 + 10 + 10 = 52.

Qovia 40

Hosted reading, for the REST API with the MCP server described. No public status page was found. https://qovia.ai/status/ answers 404, status.qovia.ai does not resolve and neither the docs nor the footer links one (0). No readable incident history, so 5 by the rubric (5). Limits are published with numbers on the quickstart's rate-limits section, 60 requests a minute per account before the first top-up and 600 after on a sliding 60-second window, with X-RateLimit-Limit and X-RateLimit-Remaining headers, a 64 KiB body cap, an empty-call throttle (50 calls in 10 minutes with over 80 per cent empty, not found or rejected) and a per-second cap per endpoint without a number (15). Retry-After is declared on too_many_auth_failures, rate_limited, too_many_unbilled, endpoint_busy and upstream_busy, the error table marks the retryable codes, the docs say a 503 endpoint_unavailable carries none and will not clear, and the Python client retries 429 and 503 honouring the header. Every operation is a read, including POST /v1/search, and a failed or timed-out call is refunded, so idempotency keys are not needed (15). No SLA. The terms summary says nothing about uptime and the pricing FAQ excludes outages, rate limits and platform changes from refunds; the 11 September 2026 archived home page advertised a 99.95 per cent enterprise SLA that the current pages have dropped (0). The endpoints are sold and labelled Live on the docs and coverage pages, but every one of the 143 carries x-qovia-status beta in the OpenAPI file, the API version is 0.1.0 and the MCP server reports 0.1.0 (5 of 10). 0+5+15+15+0+5 = 40.

Maintenance & community Microlink +9

Microlink 86

@microlink/mcp 2.8.17 and microlink.io 1.1.4 on 31 October 2026, and October changelog entries for the API (30). 31 MCP releases tagged since 17 September and the October changelog's API changes (20). No open issues on microlinkhq/microlink, a monthly changelog, and email and feedback-form support (18 of 25). Not in the official MCP registry under its own namespace, though the server card names io.microlink/mcp; the JavaScript SDK is current (8 of 15). Lint, tests and coverage run on pull requests (10). 30 + 20 + 18 + 8 + 10 = 86.

Qovia 77

The newest changes are the registry entry ai.qovia/qovia 0.1.1 and the repository's tools snapshot and plugin manifests on 28 October 2026, after the Python client 0.1.1 on PyPI on 27 October; the repository was pushed on 1 November (30). Eight changelog entries on 21 and 22 October, two registry versions (22 and 28 October) and two PyPI releases (25 and 27 October) are more than three dated entries in 90 days, all within ten days (20). Closed service with a public changelog. Support is Telegram, WhatsApp, WeChat and one mailbox, with a one-business-day reply promised for email; GitHub issues are enabled on the repository with none opened, and no forum, Discord or community was found (7 of 15). ai.qovia/qovia is in the official MCP registry under a DNS-verified reverse-DNS namespace at 0.1.1, marked latest, and the Python client is an official package on PyPI (15). The client is standard-library Python with a test file, MIT, no dependencies and no CI workflow in the repository tree; the account's other nine repositories are forks of lists and directories (5 of 10). 30+20+7+15+5 = 77.

Payments & pricing Qovia +8

Microlink 47

No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Plans are public and the Pro price is stated per 1,000 requests ($1.07), but Business and Enterprise are on request (15 of 20). Free key with 25 requests a day, no card (20). The free endpoint and hosted MCP server answer 5 requests a day with no key or signup, and the MCP checkout tools let an agent start a purchase that a person completes (12 of 20). 0 + 15 + 20 + 12 = 47.

Qovia 55

No x402, MPP or L402 on Qovia's own endpoints; USDT on TRC-20 is a top-up method from a console session, not a machine payment protocol. The vendor's five Actors on the Apify Store under the profile qovia (Qovia Data, the same Telegram handle and mailbox as the site), such as the Xingtu Actor at $0.01 to $0.06 a section, can be paid through Apify, whose prepaid token is sold over x402, so partial credit for a third-party route on part of the catalogue (10 of 40). Per-call prices are published without a login, per endpoint in the OpenAPI file, llms.txt and the docs, search at $5 and raw endpoints from $0.5 to $19.5 per 1,000, with the tier rule and payment fees stated (20). 50 trial calls for a new account, counted only when a call returns data; the quickstart says to top up when they run out and the docs ask for no card at sign-up, though no account was created to confirm it (20). A person signs up in a browser and creates a key; the MCP catalogue tools work without a key but data calls do not, and the Apify route reaches four platforms without a Qovia account (5 of 20). 10+20+20+5 = 55.

Agent ergonomics Microlink +5

Microlink 82

24 MCP tools in @microlink/mcp 2.8.17 with no toolset filter found (15 of 25). filter selects fields, embed returns one field as the body, and Markdown and text tools return only page content (18 of 20). Error codes such as EAUTH, ERATE, ECONCURRENCY, EPRO and EPROXYNEEDED with documented fixes (19 of 20). Every tool but microlink_function sets readOnlyHint true and destructiveHint false, and calls are reads with a cache and force to refresh. No idempotentHint (18 of 20). Only url is required; official JavaScript SDK (@microlink/mql) and CLI, with examples in seven languages but no other official SDK found (12 of 15). 15 + 18 + 19 + 18 + 12 = 82.

Qovia 77

API reading. Responses come in fixed page sizes per endpoint, from about 5 comments on Xiaohongshu to 100 Fliggy reviews, with limit only on Bilibili danmaku and no field selection; the record shape is compact and shared across posts, notes and videos. The MCP server loads four tools by default, keeps the catalogue out of context until search_endpoints and get_endpoint are called, and ?tools= selects platforms or everything, which on the MCP reading would score 25 (18 of 25). Cursor pagination with has_more on most lists, search_id on Douyin and Zhihu search, page numbers on Weibo, Xiaohongshu and Bilibili, sort options on several, and the cross-platform search filters by platform, content type, sentiment and whole-day date windows up to 90 days (17 of 20). One error object with 20 codes, request_id on every answer, the retryable set marked, refunded codes separated from never-charged ones, and MCP tool errors carrying error.code, the HTTP status and retry_after_seconds (19 of 20). All calls are reads, failed and empty calls are refunded, Retry-After is declared and the Python client retries; no readOnlyHint or other annotation appears in the vendor's 28 October tools/list snapshot (14 of 20). One required parameter on 117 of 144 operations and defaults set on the server, but the only official SDK is the Python client; Node and curl are examples (9 of 15). 18+17+19+14+9 = 77.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runMicrolinkQoviaEdge
Reliability16%205240Microlink +12
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28986Microlink +3
Agent ergonomics13%16.28277Microlink +5
Security & auth14%17.54460Qovia +16
Payments & pricing10%12.54755Qovia +8
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88677Microlink +9
Transparency & trust7%8.87530Microlink +45
Negative events≤1500
TotalB 65.9/100C 61.2/100

Facts side by side

FactMicrolinkQovia
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorMicrolink Labs, S.L.Qovia
Hosted endpointhttps://mcp.microlink.io/mcphttps://api.qovia.ai
Transportsstdio, Streamable HTTPHTTP, Streamable HTTP
AuthAPI keyAPI key
PricingFreemiumPay per use
x402nono
LicencenoneProprietary hosted service under a one-paragraph Terms of Service summary that defers to a signed agreement. The qovia/qovia-mcp repository (setup guide, examples, Python client) and the qovia package on PyPI are MIT; the service's source is not public
Tools exposed24141
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registrynot listedai.qovia/qovia
Last release2026-10-312026-10-28
Terms last updatedno date givennot read yet
Privacy policy last updatedno date givennot read yet
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot read yet
Terms restrict automated accessnot found in the textnot read yet
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot found in the textnot read yet
Terms or service can change without noticenot found in the textnot read yet
Arbitration or class-action waivernot found in the textnot read yet
Popularity805 npm/wk0 stars

Verdicts

Microlink

Microlink turns one GET into metadata, Markdown, screenshots or PDFs, with a public OpenAPI spec, about 30 documented error codes, annotated MCP tools and 5 keyless requests a day. Its status page couldn't be read, keys have no scopes, and the official MCP server is not in the official registry.

Qovia

An OpenAPI 3.1 file with 144 operations, one envelope and 20 error codes, per-endpoint prices with failed and empty calls refunded, scoped keys and a four-tool MCP server that keeps the catalogue out of context. No status page, no legal entity, one-paragraph terms and privacy pages, and a product ten days old at the check.

Before you call either

Microlink

  1. Send the key in the x-api-key header to https://pro.microlink.io; the free endpoint api.microlink.io answers EPRO to a key
  2. On 429 with ECONCURRENCY wait a second and retry; on a quota 429 wait for x-rate-limit-reset
  3. Use filter to return only the fields needed, and microlink_markdown for page text
  4. Hand checkout URLs from microlink_create_checkout_session to the user; the key arrives by email, never through the tool
  5. Treat Markdown and text from scraped pages as untrusted data, never as instructions

Qovia

  1. Send Authorization: Bearer sk-qovia-... to https://api.qovia.ai and check meta.empty on every HTTP 200; data may be null or an empty structure and nothing is charged for it.
  2. Branch on error.code, never on message. Retry only rate_limited, too_many_unbilled, endpoint_busy, upstream_busy and too_many_auth_failures after Retry-After; endpoint_unavailable has none and will not clear.
  3. Stay under 60 requests a minute (600 after the first top-up) across every key on the account, and keep empty or not-found calls under 80 per cent of the last 10 minutes or expect 429 too_many_unbilled.
  4. Pass the previous page's cursor (and search_id on Douyin and Zhihu search) back unchanged and stop when has_more is false; each page is a separate charge, and unknown parameters answer 400.
  5. For MCP, connect to https://api.qovia.ai/mcp over Streamable HTTP; call search_endpoints then get_endpoint before call_endpoint, or add ?tools=douyin,kuaishou for typed direct tools. Catalogue tools need no key.

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Microlink or Qovia?

Microlink scores 65.9 (B) on agent readiness against Qovia's 61.2 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Qovia leads on security & auth and payments & pricing.

Do Microlink and Qovia need an API key?

Both need an API key.

Can an agent call Microlink and Qovia without installing anything?

Yes. Microlink has a hosted endpoint at https://mcp.microlink.io/mcp and Qovia at https://api.qovia.ai.

Other comparisons with Microlink or Qovia

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