# ShipBob vs Shippo

> Shippo scores 61.9 (C) on agent readiness against ShipBob's 60.8 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. ShipBob leads on reliability and transparency & trust. Both do shipping rates. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/shipbob-vs-shippo
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/shipbob-vs-shippo.md (~2,100 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/shipbob-vs-shippo.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/shipbob-vs-shippo.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

Shippo scores 61.9 (C) on agent readiness against ShipBob's 60.8 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. ShipBob leads on reliability and transparency & trust. Both do shipping rates.

- ShipBob: grade C, 60.8/100, rank #387 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/shipbob.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/shipbob.json
- Shippo: grade C, 61.9/100, rank #355 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/shippo.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/shippo.json

## Which one, for what

### ShipBob (C)

Good for: An agent working for a merchant that already stores stock with ShipBob, to create and track orders, check inventory, book inbound stock and handle returns.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 77 against 59
- Transparency & trust, 77 against 61

Watch for: No public price. Receiving, storage and pick, pack and ship fees come only in a quote from sales

### Shippo (C)

Good for: An agent that quotes and buys parcel labels across USPS, UPS, FedEx and DHL Express for a small or mid-size shipper, with a free test mode and public unit prices.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 64 against 56
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 77 against 41

Watch for: No idempotency key on label purchase or other writes. Only the Reporting API accepts one


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | ShipBob | Shippo | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 77 | 59 | ShipBob +18 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 85 | 83 | ShipBob +2 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 56 | 64 | Shippo +8 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 55 | 52 | ShipBob +3 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 40 | Shippo +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 41 | 77 | Shippo +36 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 77 | 61 | ShipBob +16 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **60.8 · C** | **61.9 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | ShipBob | Shippo |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | ShipBob, Inc. | Shippo |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.shipbob.com` | `https://api.goshippo.com` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| Price for shipping rates | not published | $0.01 per call |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under ShipBob's Terms of Service. The MCP tutorials repository on GitHub has no licence file | Proprietary service under Shippo's terms of use. The SDKs and the goshippo/ai repository (skills and MCP bridge) are MIT |
| Tools exposed | 73 | 4 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `com.shippo/shippo-mcp` |
| Last release | 2026-07-31 | 2026-10-01 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-05-22 | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2024-03-29 | couldn't be read |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | none | 3 stars, 73k npm/wk, 20k PyPI/wk |

## Verdicts

**ShipBob.** OAuth with PKCE and read and write scopes per domain, a free sandbox, a public OpenAPI spec per version and a 24-month support window for each API version are documented. Fulfilment prices are by quote only, the status page has no API component, no official SDK was found, and Personal Access Tokens never expire and carry full account access.

**Shippo.** Per-label and per-call prices are public, test keys are self-serve, and the OpenAPI spec, llms.txt and Markdown docs are open to a fetch. Label purchase has no idempotency key, API keys carry no scopes, and the status page logged carrier-side incidents on most days between July and October 2026.

## Before you call either

### ShipBob

1. Call `GET /2026-07/channel` first and send the ID of the channel with `_write` scopes in the `shipbob_channel_id` header on every write
2. Build against `https://sandbox-api.shipbob.com` with a sandbox account. Sandbox and production accounts, tokens and data are separate
3. Set a stable `reference_id` on each order, product and return. A duplicate returns 422, which is the only guard against a double create
4. Stay under 150 requests a minute per user and application, and wait the seconds given in `x-retry-after` after a 429
5. Over MCP, writes work only on records in the channel created at consent. A 403 or 404 on a cancel usually means the record belongs to another channel

### Shippo

1. Build and test with a shippo_test_ key. Test and live object IDs are separate, and the hosted MCP server has no test mode
2. Send `Authorization: ShippoToken <key>`, not Bearer, and pin `Shippo-API-Version: 2018-02-08`
3. Before retrying a failed POST /transactions, list recent transactions. There is no idempotency key, and a second purchase is a second charge
4. Pass `async: false` on shipments and transactions, or poll the object until its status leaves QUEUED
5. Set `results` on list calls (under 200). Defaults vary by resource, and list calls are limited to 50 a minute on live keys

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, ShipBob or Shippo?

Shippo scores 61.9 (C) on agent readiness against ShipBob's 60.8 (C), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. ShipBob leads on reliability and transparency & trust.

### Do ShipBob and Shippo need an API key?

Both take an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call ShipBob and Shippo without installing anything?

Yes. ShipBob has a hosted endpoint at https://api.shipbob.com and Shippo at https://api.goshippo.com.


## For agents

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

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