# SeaTable vs Smartsheet API + MCP

> Smartsheet API + MCP scores 67.6 (B) on agent readiness against SeaTable's 66.3 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. SeaTable leads on payments & pricing. Both do sheets records. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/seatable-vs-smartsheet
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/seatable-vs-smartsheet.md (~2,350 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/seatable-vs-smartsheet.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/seatable-vs-smartsheet.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: 2026-10-08

Smartsheet API + MCP scores 67.6 (B) on agent readiness against SeaTable's 66.3 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. SeaTable leads on payments & pricing. Both do sheets records.

- SeaTable: grade B, 66.3/100, rank #241 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/seatable.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/seatable.json
- Smartsheet API + MCP: grade B, 67.6/100, rank #205 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/smartsheet.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/smartsheet.json

## Which one, for what

### SeaTable (B)

Good for: Teams that want typed tables hosted in Germany or on their own server, with an agent reading and writing rows through a per-base token or the official MCP server.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 30 against 20

Also in its favour:
- Runs on your own machine

Watch for: Monthly API call quotas by plan, 3,000 for a whole Free team, 10,000 per user on Plus and 50,000 per user on Enterprise

### Smartsheet API + MCP (B)

Good for: An agent working inside a company that already runs projects in Smartsheet on a Business plan or above, especially row-level reads and batched writes, workflows and dashboards.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 88 against 81
- Security & auth, 66 against 59
- Transparency & trust, 82 against 75

Watch for: API and MCP access need a Business plan or higher, from $19 a member a month billed yearly with a three-member minimum


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | SeaTable | Smartsheet API + MCP | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 69 | 65 | SeaTable +4 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 81 | 88 | Smartsheet API + MCP +7 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 74 | 74 | even |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 59 | 66 | Smartsheet API + MCP +7 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 30 | 20 | SeaTable +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 76 | 80 | Smartsheet API + MCP +4 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 82 | Smartsheet API + MCP +7 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **66.3 · B** | **67.6 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | SeaTable | Smartsheet API + MCP |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | SeaTable GmbH | Smartsheet Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://cloud.seatable.io` | `https://api.smartsheet.com/2.0` |
| Transports | HTTP, stdio | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary cloud service under the Terms of Service for SeaTable Cloud. The MCP server is MIT. SeaTable Server Enterprise Edition is licensed under an EULA | Proprietary service under Smartsheet's User Agreement and Developer Agreement. The SDKs on GitHub are Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | 21 | 83 |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | yes |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | `io.github.seatable/seatable` | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-04 | 2026-10-06 |
| Terms last updated | no date given | 2021-07-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | 2026-05-20 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 103 npm/wk, 1.7k PyPI/wk | 82 stars, 47k npm/wk, 312k PyPI/wk |

## Verdicts

**SeaTable.** API tokens are limited to one base and to read-only or read-write, and the official MCP server marks every tool as read-only or destructive. The Free plan allows 3,000 API calls a month in total, and base calls are capped at 200 a minute. The status page showed the base API degraded for 0.77 per cent of 30 days.

**Smartsheet API + MCP.** The REST API has a public OpenAPI 3.0.3 spec with 187 operations, Markdown docs and llms.txt, and the hosted MCP server loads its 83 documented tools by toolset. API access needs a Business plan or higher, and the status page lists eight incidents marked major or critical between 15 July and 21 September 2026.

## Before you call either

### SeaTable

1. Create an API token for the one base with read-only permission unless writes are needed, then exchange it at `/api/v2.1/dtable/app-access-token/` for a Base-Token
2. Renew the Base-Token before it expires after 3 days, and send it as `Authorization: Bearer` to `/api-gateway/api/v2/dtables/{base_uuid}/`
3. Read `x-ratelimit-remaining` and `x-ratelimit-reset` on every base call. SeaTable Cloud allows 200 base calls a minute and answers 429 with no body
4. Batch writes to save the monthly quota. One call appends or updates up to 1,000 rows over REST and 100 over MCP
5. Over MCP, prefer `update_rows` and `delete_rows` to `query_sql`, which can run UPDATE and DELETE, and call `get_schema` before writing

### Smartsheet API + MCP

1. Send writes to one sheet one at a time. Parallel updates with the same token return error 4004
2. Batch row changes, up to 500 rows a call, and add `allowPartialSuccess=true` to get per-row failures instead of a failed batch
3. On error 4003 (HTTP 429) wait at least 60 seconds before retrying. The limit is 300 requests a minute per token, 30 for attachments and cell history
4. Through MCP, call `get_columns` before filtering or writing. Column names are case-sensitive and guesses fail validation
5. Use the regional host that matches the account (api.smartsheet.com, .eu or .au). Tokens don't work across regions

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, SeaTable or Smartsheet API + MCP?

Smartsheet API + MCP scores 67.6 (B) on agent readiness against SeaTable's 66.3 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. SeaTable leads on payments & pricing.

### Do SeaTable and Smartsheet API + MCP need an API key?

SeaTable needs an API key. Smartsheet API + MCP takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call SeaTable and Smartsheet API + MCP without installing anything?

Yes. SeaTable has a hosted endpoint at https://cloud.seatable.io and Smartsheet API + MCP at https://api.smartsheet.com/2.0.


## For agents

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

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