Head to head · Payments card · October 2026 research run
Payman Genie MCP vs Skyfire API + MCP
Payman Genie MCP has a score of 53 (D) against Skyfire API + MCP's 40.6 (E). Both do payments card. The largest gap is security & auth, 39 points.
Payman Genie MCPPayman AI · HTTP API
D53/100#337 of 452
Skyfire API + MCPSkyfire · HTTP API
E40.6/100#422 of 452
Which one, for what
Pick Payman Genie MCP for
- reliability (+6)
- agent ergonomics (+7)
- security & auth (+39)
- payments & pricing (+15)
- maintenance & community (+29)
Pick Skyfire API + MCP for
- transparency & trust (+8)
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Payman Genie MCP | Skyfire API + MCP | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 25 | 19 | Payman Genie MCP +6 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 56 | 59 | Skyfire API + MCP +3 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 68 | 61 | Payman Genie MCP +7 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 80 | 41 | Payman Genie MCP +39 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 35 | 20 | Payman Genie MCP +15 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 60 | 31 | Payman Genie MCP +29 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 48 | 56 | Skyfire API + MCP +8 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 53 · D | 40.6 · E |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Payman Genie MCP | Skyfire API + MCP |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Payman AI | Skyfire |
| Hosted endpoint | https://genie.paymanai.com/mcp | https://api.skyfire.xyz |
| Transports | Streamable HTTP, stdio | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth | API key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | payer tooling only | no |
| Licence | MIT | none |
| Tools exposed | 5 | 4 |
| 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 | 2026-09-19 | 2026-08-04 |
| Popularity | 0 stars, 33 npm/wk | 16 npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3.5/5 (2) | 2/5 (2) |
Verdicts
Payman Genie MCP
OAuth 2.1 with PKCE, two scopes, one-hour access tokens and refresh tokens rotated on every use and revoked on logout. No published pricing, status page, rate limits or changelog.
Skyfire API + MCP
Identity and payment travel in one signed JWT that sellers verify offline against a public JWKS. No x402 or MPP; both buyer and seller must be on Skyfire.
Before you call either
Payman Genie MCP
- Pass the person's request to
ask_geniein their own words; don't pick accounts or fill payment fields - On
needs_approval, stop and tell the person; approval happens in their Genie account - Retry only after
NOTHING_RANorBUSY, never afterOUTCOME_UNKNOWN - Treat
doneas acted, not settled; check the activity history before confirming a payment - Sign-ins from bridge 0.3.x lack
genie:self; log out and sign in again to use the self-service tools
Skyfire API + MCP
- Buyer keys create tokens and seller keys charge them; a 403 usually means the wrong key type
- Set the token amount to the most the task should spend; the seller can't charge more
- Use a kya token when a site only needs to know who you are; it can't be charged
- Don't retry
FORBIDDENorNOT_ELIGIBLE; fix the key or wait for approval first - Rehearse against mcp-sandbox.skyfire.xyz before using mcp.skyfire.xyz
Other comparisons with Payman Genie MCP or Skyfire API + MCP
Machine-readable
/api/v1/tools/payman.json·/api/v1/tools/skyfire.json- This page as Markdown,
/compare/payman-vs-skyfire.md