# StepFun API vs Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) (slim)

> Vertex AI scores 88.7 (AA) to StepFun's 44.3 (E) for llm inference. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/stepfun-api-vs-vertex-ai.md (~7,350 tokens) · this version ~3,630 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/stepfun-api-vs-vertex-ai.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/stepfun-api-vs-vertex-ai
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-07
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) scores 88.7 (AA) on agent readiness against StepFun API's 44.3 (E), and leads in every scored category. Both do llm inference.

- StepFun API: E 44.3, rank #1223 of 1510 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/stepfun-api.min.md
- Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform): AA 88.7, rank #2 of 1510 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/vertex-ai.min.md
- StepFun API, good for Long-context agent and coding work over text, screenshots and video at a low per-token price, where a preview model is acceptable.
- Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform), good for Google Cloud customers who need Gemini with residency, VPC-SC, provisioned throughput and an SLA, or Claude under a Google bill. Ahead on Reliability, 99 against 28; Schema & documentation, 94 against 53; Agent ergonomics, 97 against 68; Security & auth, 97 against 41; Payments & pricing, 40 against 20; Maintenance & community, 91 against 50; Transparency & trust, 90 against 57. Also Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better; Free to start without a card.

| Category | StepFun API | Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 28 | 99 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 53 | 94 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 68 | 97 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 41 | 97 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 20 | 40 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 50 | 91 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 57 | 90 |

| Fact (where they differ) | StepFun API | Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | StepFun | Google Cloud |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.stepfun.ai/v1` | `https://aiplatform.googleapis.com/v1` |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Licence | Closed service under the StepFun Open Platform Terms of Service (STEPFUN TECHNOLOGY (HK) LIMITED, Hong Kong law). | Proprietary service under the Google Cloud Platform terms. Partner models carry their providers' terms. The Google Gen AI SDKs are Apache-2.0 |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | none | 2026-11-05 |
| Terms last updated | couldn't be read | 2026-09-02 |
| Privacy policy last updated | couldn't be read | 2026-10-01 |
| Customer content may train models | couldn't be read | yes |
| Terms restrict automated access | couldn't be read | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | couldn't be read | not found in the text |
| 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 | not found in the text |
| Popularity | none | 20.9M PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3.3/5 (4) | none |

Why the edge:
- Reliability, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +71: StepFun API 28 (No status page read. status.stepfun.ai refused our reader by robots.txt and the shell couldn't connect, so we couldn't establish whether it is a status page or read any history. Scored absent for both lines, with 5 for unreadable history, and named in the open questions (0 + 5). Rate limits published with numbers per tier, from 5 concurrent, 100 RPM and 500,000 TPM to 130, 2,600 and 13,000,000 (15). The error and exception guides say to retry 429, 500, 503 and 504 after a short delay, with no Retry-After header, backoff schedule or idempotency guidance (8 of 15). No SLA found in the terms or pricing (0). Step 5 Preview is labelled a preview (0).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 99 (Google Cloud status dashboard with per-product history (20). Its incident feed, read on 6 November, has no incident naming Vertex Gemini API, Gemini or the Agent Platform in the 90 days. The regional incidents of 20 August, 1 September and 20 October (europe-west2) and the Cloud Storage incident of 8 and 9 October didn't list it among affected products (30). Standard PayGo publishes usage tiers by 30-day spend with baseline throughput, 2,000,000 to 50,000,000 tokens a minute for Flash models and 500,000 to 10,000,000 for Pro, plus quota tables for other methods (15). A 429 page says to use the global endpoint and truncated exponential backoff, and a retry-strategy page (15). SLA of 99.5 per cent a month on generateContent and streamGenerateContent, 95 per cent for short-term availability models, and a latency SLO on Provisioned Throughput. The 429 page says pay-as-you-go 429s don't count toward the SLA error rate (10). Gemini 4 Argon reached GA on 13 October and Gemini 3.8 Flash moved to the 12-month tier, and the v1 API, 3.5 Flash-Lite and Claude Opus 5.5 are GA, but express mode was Preview at the 6 October check (9 of 10, up from 8). Up from 98 on 6 October.)
- Security & auth, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +56: StepFun API 41 (Model reading. Bearer API keys, revocable by deletion. Organisations can create one key per project, billed to a project's credit with a per-member cap. No scopes or read-only keys found (20 of 30). Training on API data is not off by default in plain words. The privacy policy (effective 7 August 2026) says StepFun may use and retain data to improve its models, including training and fine-tuning where law and program terms permit, and the terms name early-access programmes as one such case. No opt-out found (5 of 20). No retention period for prompts and outputs and no zero-retention option. IP addresses are kept three years (3 of 15). The console's usage details list each billed call by key, model and date, with export (8 of 15). No security.txt, bug bounty or certification found. A DPA with breach notification exists (5 of 20).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 97 (Model reading. OAuth 2.0 with IAM roles and service accounts, which the docs recommend for production, with API keys for testing. No key in a query string found in the docs we read (30). The training restriction in the Service Specific Terms says Google won't use customer data to train or fine-tune any model without permission, GA and pre-GA alike (20). Default in-memory caching for 24 hours that can be disabled, flagged prompts logged up to 90 days unless an abuse-monitoring exception is granted or the customer has a Cloud Master Agreement, the Interactions API storing by default, and Claude Fable 5 and Mythos 5 requiring 30-day retention shared with Anthropic (12 of 15, a judgement call matching the Fable exception on the Anthropic and Bedrock listings). Cloud Audit Logs, with Data Access logs off until enabled, and optional request-response logging to BigQuery (15). google.com security.txt valid to 2030-04-01, the Google VRP, and Generative AI on the platform in ISO 27001, 27017 and 27018 and SOC 1, 2 and 3 scope per the 1 October services-in-scope check for vertex-ai-tuning, not re-read on 6 October (20).)
- Schema & documentation, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +41: StepFun API 53 (No OpenAPI or similar machine-readable contract found. The API reference is Markdown pages (0). llms.txt at platform.stepfun.ai/docs/llms.txt, and every page has a Markdown copy (10). The Chat Completions reference describes each parameter with its default, and the model page lists what Step 5 Preview supports, but little on when not to use an option (12 of 20). Tool definitions take JSON Schema parameters, structured output takes a JSON Schema with `strict: true`, and `reasoning_effort` is an enum of low, medium and high. No `tool_choice` parameter is documented (11 of 15). Worked requests and responses on each page, and an error table of eight codes with causes and fixes, but no error bodies (12 of 15). No API changelog. A model lifecycle page with dated retirements and announcement pages (8 of 15).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 94 (Model reading. Keyless discovery document for the Agent Platform API v1, revision 20260930, with 1,128 methods and 1,493 schemas (25). No llms.txt, but every docs page answers as Markdown at `.md.txt`, counted as for vertex-ai-tuning (10). Model cards give limits, capabilities and retirement dates, and the 3.8 Flash card says when to use 3.7 Flash instead, but the docs mix the Vertex AI and Agent Platform names, and the OpenAI page tells new users to call the Gemini Developer API instead (16 of 20). Structured output with `response_schema` and `response_mime_type: application/json` always follows the schema per the docs, and complex schemas fail with a 400 (15). Examples on every page and a 429 guide, but we found no full error code list for generateContent (13 of 15). Versioned v1 and v1beta1 APIs and release notes with entries on most working days, newest 5 November 2026 (15).)
- Maintenance & community, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +41: StepFun API 50 (Model reading. The image models `step-2x-large` and `step-image-edit-2` were retired on 10 October 2026, and a Step 5 Preview price change is announced for 14 October (30). No stated notice period. The 10 October image retirement had a dated notice page and the July retirements a migration table, but we couldn't date when either notice went up (4 of 12). One retirement date in the last 90 days, 10 October, with nine models retired on 8 July just outside that window (6 of 8). Dated announcements, a Discord server and platform@stepfun.com for support. We didn't test whether either answers (10 of 15). No official SDK (0 of 15, 0 of 10).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 91 (Model reading. Gemini Omni 1.2 Flash GA on 5 November, Grok 4.7 GA on 27 October, Gemini 4 Argon GA on 13 October and Claude Haiku 5.5 on 7 October 2026 (30). Stable models stay at least 12 months, and since 6 October Gemini 4 Argon and Gemini 3.8 Flash are in that tier, while 3.7 and 3.6 Flash remain short-term with at least 45 days' notice once a date is set (10 of 12, up from 8). Gemini 2.5 Pro, Flash and Flash-Lite were due to retire on 20 October, three models on one date after more than 12 months, with replacements named. We didn't check partner model retirements (6 of 8, down from 8). Dated release notes on most working days, newest 5 November, and Cloud Customer Care (15). python-genai replies not sampled this run (5 of 10). Current SDKs, google-genai 3.0.0 on 6 November and `@google/genai` 3.0.0, and google-cloud-aiplatform 2.7.0 on 28 October 2026 (15). Supported runtimes stated, Python 3.10 or later and Node 20 or later, per the 6 October check (10). Unchanged at 91.)
- Transparency & trust, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +33: StepFun API 57 (Closed service with clear terms under Hong Kong law, with HKIAC arbitration and liability capped at six months of fees. Some earlier Step models have open weights, which doesn't change the hosted service (15). The privacy policy, terms and DPA agree that data may be used for training under program terms, but the terms' licence to Content is broad and perpetual, no retention period is given for prompts and outputs, and no subprocessor list was found (12 of 30). A model lifecycle page with dated retirements and replacements (14 of 20). Servers are disclosed as in the United States. The DPA gives general authorisation for subprocessors without a published list (10 of 20).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 90 (Closed service under the Google Cloud terms, with the Gen AI SDKs under Apache-2.0 and a public discovery document (18, as for Bedrock's open service models). The zero data retention and abuse monitoring pages agree with the Cloud terms and give periods for each case, 24 hours in memory, up to 90 days for flagged prompts, 30 days for Advanced AI models, 3 days for Search grounding logs and 30 days for Maps grounding, and say which can't be switched off (27 of 30). A dated model versions table with release and retirement dates and a stated 12-month or 45-day policy, but on 6 November it still listed Gemini 2.5 Pro, Flash and Flash-Lite as available with a 20 October 2026 retirement date and left them out of the retired table (18 of 20, down from 20). The Cloud subprocessor list with locations, per the 1 October vertex-ai-tuning check, regional and multi-region endpoints, and per-model ML processing locations on the partner model cards (20).)
- Agent ergonomics, Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) +29: StepFun API 68 (Model reading of the checklist (tool use, structured output, caching, context, batch, SDKs, errors). Tool calls through Chat Completions, Responses and Messages, with no documented way to force or forbid a call (15 of 20). Strict JSON Schema output on Step 5 Preview (13 of 15). Prompt caching with a published cache-hit price at a tenth of the miss price (15). 1M-token context and 64k output (15). No batch endpoint found (0). No official SDK. The docs use the OpenAI and Anthropic clients against compatible endpoints (0). Eight error codes with a fix each, plus `finish_reason` handling for length, content filter and tool calls (10 of 15).); Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) 97 (Model reading of the checklist (tool use, structured output, caching, context, batch, SDKs, errors). Function calling with `FunctionCallingConfig` mode ANY and `allowedFunctionNames` to force a named tool (20). Schema-guaranteed JSON output (15). Implicit and explicit context caching, cached input at 0.1x, $0.075 per million on 3.8 Flash through 31 December (15). 1,048,576-token context on 3.8 Flash, a unified 1,048,576-token input and output limit on Gemini 4 Argon, and 1,000,000 on Claude Opus 5.5 (15). Flex/Batch at half price on Gemini (10). Gen AI SDKs for Python and JavaScript among others, and the OpenAI libraries work with Google Cloud auth (10). 429 handling documented per quota framework, with standard Google status codes elsewhere (12 of 15).)

| Task | StepFun API | Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Research a product and write a sourced report | $1.38 | $22.03 |
| Build a small four-page website | $0.44 | $5.09 |
| Find and fix a bug in a large codebase | $0.11 | $1.09 |