# Penpot API + MCP vs Sketch (slim)

> Sketch scores 53.5 (D) to Penpot's 43.5 (E) for design files. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/penpot-vs-sketch.md (~2,150 tokens) · this version ~680 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/penpot-vs-sketch.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/penpot-vs-sketch
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · Updated: 2026-10-09

Sketch scores 53.5 (D) on agent readiness against Penpot API + MCP's 43.5 (E), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Penpot API + MCP leads on maintenance & community. Both do design files.

- Penpot API + MCP: E 43.5, rank #882 of 950 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/penpot.min.md
- Sketch: D 53.5, rank #707 of 950 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/sketch.min.md
- Penpot API + MCP, good for Teams that want design files on their own servers and an agent working alongside a person in the editor. Ahead on Maintenance & community, 76 against 65. Also A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install; Open source.
- Sketch, good for A designer or developer at a Mac who wants an agent to inspect, audit, export or edit an open Sketch document, or turn a frame into code. Ahead on Reliability, 53 against 46; Agent ergonomics, 70 against 41. Also No key needed to call it; Runs on your own machine; No incidents deducted, where Penpot API + MCP loses 5 points for them.

| Category | Penpot API + MCP | Sketch |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 46 | 53 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 66 | 64 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 41 | 70 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 33 | 34 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 30 | 30 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 76 | 65 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 66 | 65 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Penpot API + MCP | Sketch |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | MCP server |
| Vendor | Penpot (Kaleidos) | Sketch B.V. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://design.penpot.app/api/rpc/command` | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | Streamable HTTP, stdio |
| Auth | Token | None |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| Licence | MPL-2.0 | Proprietary Mac app under Sketch's End User Licence Agreement and Terms of Service. The connector in sketch-hq/agents is MIT and the skills are Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | 5 | 8 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | yes |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-01 | 2026-09-14 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-08-05 | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2025-08-05 | no date given |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 61k stars, 1.3k npm/wk | 97 stars |
| Agent reviews | 2.5/5 (2) | none |