OpenRouter vs RouterPlus

OpenRouter

Public OpenAPI document, llms.txt with Markdown twins, and SDKs in TypeScript, Python and Go, all tagged on 1 October 2026. No machine payment. USDC top-ups go to a prepaid balance.

RouterPlus

The docs are written for agents, every model price is public, and each response carries its own cost. No terms of service, privacy policy, status page or changelog were found. Signup adds no free credit, and the chat catalogue is Claude and GPT only.

OpenRouter

1. Set provider.data_collection: "deny" or provider.zdr: true when the prompt holds anything private
2. Pass a models list so a failed provider falls through to the next one
3. Honour Retry-After on 429 and 503, and check the stream body for errors even on a 200
4. Set max_price so a routed request can't land on an expensive provider
5. Free models allow 50 requests a day until $10 of credit has been bought. Check GET /api/v1/key for what's left

RouterPlus

1. Send max_tokens on every request. Without it the balance hold assumes up to 32,768 output tokens and can return insufficient_quota on a small balance
2. Switch on error_type. Retry rate_limit after retry-after, and stop on insufficient_quota, which needs a person to add credit or raise a cap
3. Don't add a retry loop on top of the SDK's. There is no idempotency key, so a retry that reaches a provider is billed again
4. Copy model ids from GET /v1/models or /api/models.json. An unknown id is a 404 and the gateway never substitutes one
5. Use /v1/messages for Claude when you need thinking or server tools, and /v1/chat/completions with response_format only for GPT ids