# People Data Labs vs ZoomInfo API + MCP

> ZoomInfo API + MCP scores 72.2 (BB) on agent readiness against People Data Labs's 64.2 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. People Data Labs leads on agent ergonomics. Both do lead search. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo.md (~2,600 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-09

ZoomInfo API + MCP scores 72.2 (BB) on agent readiness against People Data Labs's 64.2 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. People Data Labs leads on agent ergonomics. Both do lead search.

- People Data Labs: grade B, 64.2/100, rank #326 of 842. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/people-data-labs.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/people-data-labs.json
- ZoomInfo API + MCP: grade BB, 72.2/100, rank #106 of 842. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/zoominfo.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/zoominfo.json

## Which one, for what

### People Data Labs (B)

Good for: Products and pipelines that enrich or search person and company records at volume and can write Elasticsearch or SQL queries.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 77 against 71

Watch for: No OpenAPI file was found. The machine-readable material is a Postman collection and Elasticsearch mappings

### ZoomInfo API + MCP (BB)

Good for: Sales and marketing agents that need company, contact, intent and business-event data from one vendor, with free search before paid enrichment.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 87 against 78
- Schema & documentation, 84 against 70
- Security & auth, 65 against 43
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 35
- Transparency & trust, 75 against 67

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better

Watch for: The Licence Terms and Conditions bar disclosing benchmark results and automated access outside ZoomInfo's own tools without written approval


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | People Data Labs | ZoomInfo API + MCP | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 78 | 87 | ZoomInfo API + MCP +9 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 70 | 84 | ZoomInfo API + MCP +14 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 77 | 71 | People Data Labs +6 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 43 | 65 | ZoomInfo API + MCP +22 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 35 | 40 | ZoomInfo API + MCP +5 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 79 | 76 | People Data Labs +3 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 67 | 75 | ZoomInfo API + MCP +8 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **64.2 · B** | **72.2 · BB** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | People Data Labs | ZoomInfo API + MCP |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | People Data Labs, Inc. | ZoomInfo Technologies LLC |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.peopledatalabs.com/v5` | `https://api.zoominfo.com/gtm` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under the Services Subscription Agreement. The Python and JavaScript SDKs are MIT | Proprietary service under ZoomInfo's Licence Terms and Conditions. The GTM CLI on GitHub is MIT |
| Tools exposed | none | 26 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-09-16 | 2026-10-02 |
| Terms last updated | couldn't be read | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | couldn't be read | 2025-10-13 |
| Customer content may train models | couldn't be read | yes, with an opt-out |
| Terms restrict automated access | couldn't be read | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | couldn't be read | yes |
| Terms or service can change without notice | couldn't be read | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | couldn't be read | yes |
| Popularity | 40 stars, 133k npm/wk, 30k PyPI/wk | 534 npm/wk |

## Verdicts

**People Data Labs.** Monthly dated release notes, a free sandbox with synthetic data, response headers that report credits and rate limits, and a free plan of 100 records a month make the API easy to start with. No OpenAPI file was found, keys carry no scopes and may travel in the URL, and the agreement allows changes without notice.

**ZoomInfo API + MCP.** Search, lookup and similar-record calls cost no credits, and a free account with 1,000 data and 1,000 AI credits needs no card. OAuth carries 20 scopes and limits are published per package. The Licence Terms and Conditions bar disclosing benchmark results, and the two documentation sites disagree on batch sizes and rate-limit headers.

## Before you call either

### People Data Labs

1. Send the key in the `X-Api-Key` header. The `api_key` query parameter puts the secret in URLs and logs
2. Build and test queries against `https://sandbox.api.peopledatalabs.com/v5/...` first. It costs no credits and allows five calls a minute
3. Set `size` deliberately on search. Every record returned costs one credit, and responses over 1 MB fail
4. Treat `404` on enrichment as no match, not an error, and `402` as credits exhausted. Neither is worth a retry
5. On `429`, wait until the `x-ratelimit-reset` time. Limits are fixed-window per key and per endpoint

### ZoomInfo API + MCP

1. Call Lookup first and pass the returned IDs to Search. Unknown industry, metro or topic strings are rejected with a 422
2. Search before Enrich. Search is free, and each newly enriched record costs one data credit
3. Request only the scopes the task needs in the `scope` parameter of the token call. Omitting it grants every scope configured on the app
4. On 429 read `X-RateLimit-Rejected-Bucket` and wait for `Retry-After`. An exhausted hourly window can mean a wait of several hundred seconds
5. Turn off model training in the AI client before connecting the MCP server. ZoomInfo prohibits MCP data being used for training

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, People Data Labs or ZoomInfo API + MCP?

ZoomInfo API + MCP scores 72.2 (BB) on agent readiness against People Data Labs's 64.2 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. People Data Labs leads on agent ergonomics.

### Do People Data Labs and ZoomInfo API + MCP need an API key?

People Data Labs needs an API key. ZoomInfo API + MCP uses an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call People Data Labs and ZoomInfo API + MCP without installing anything?

Yes. People Data Labs has a hosted endpoint at https://api.peopledatalabs.com/v5 and ZoomInfo API + MCP at https://api.zoominfo.com/gtm.


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/people-data-labs-vs-zoominfo.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "people-data-labs", "b": "zoominfo"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare people-data-labs zoominfo`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/people-data-labs.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/zoominfo.json

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