# The Weather Company Data APIs vs Xweather Weather API

> Xweather Weather API scores 67.1 (B) on agent readiness against The Weather Company Data APIs's 52.6 (D), and leads in every scored category. Both do weather current. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/weather-company-vs-xweather
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/weather-company-vs-xweather.md (~2,800 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/weather-company-vs-xweather.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/weather-company-vs-xweather.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

Xweather Weather API scores 67.1 (B) on agent readiness against The Weather Company Data APIs's 52.6 (D), and leads in every scored category. Both do weather current.

- The Weather Company Data APIs: grade D, 52.6/100, rank #565 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/weather-company.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/weather-company.json
- Xweather Weather API: grade B, 67.1/100, rank #219 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/xweather.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/xweather.json

## Which one, for what

### The Weather Company Data APIs (D)

Good for: A business that wants one contract for global forecasts, 4 km current conditions, alerts, imagery, aviation and deep history, and that can go through sales.

Watch for: No self-serve signup. The trial is requested through a form, is limited to enterprise customers, and the Buy now button opens a contact form.

### Xweather Weather API (B)

Good for: Teams that need lightning, hail, road weather or tropical data beside ordinary conditions and forecasts, with an MCP server and an OpenAPI file ready for agents.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 83 against 67
- Agent ergonomics, 78 against 54
- Payments & pricing, 32 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 81 against 36
- Transparency & trust, 68 against 49

Watch for: The REST API documents `client_id` and `client_secret` only as query parameters, and the MCP server also accepts the key as `?api_key=`


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | The Weather Company Data APIs | Xweather Weather API | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 73 | 74 | Xweather Weather API +1 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 67 | 83 | Xweather Weather API +16 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 54 | 78 | Xweather Weather API +24 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 48 | 52 | Xweather Weather API +4 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 32 | Xweather Weather API +12 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 36 | 81 | Xweather Weather API +45 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 49 | 68 | Xweather Weather API +19 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **52.6 · D** | **67.1 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | The Weather Company Data APIs | Xweather Weather API |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | The Weather Company, LLC | Vaisala Oyj |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.weather.com` | `https://data.api.xweather.com` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service. Use is under a content licensing agreement with The Weather Company, which is not published | Proprietary service under the General Conditions of Subscription Services of Vaisala Group. The OpenAPI files and the agent skills on GitHub are MIT |
| Tools exposed | none | 19 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `com.xweather/weather` |
| Last release | 2026-09-14 | 2026-09-14 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | couldn't be read | 2020-06-01 |
| Customer content may train models |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict automated access |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | none | 0 stars, 1.4k npm/wk |

## Verdicts

**The Weather Company Data APIs.** A wide weather data API with 168 API references built from OpenAPI documents, global 4 km current conditions, hourly history from June 2015 and a status page with component history. Keys come only through a sales-reviewed trial or contract, travel only in the URL, and the terms that govern the API are not published.

**Xweather Weather API.** A public OpenAPI file with 236 operations, a hosted MCP server in the official registry and a free tier of 15,000 accesses a month suit agents. REST credentials travel only in the query string, per-minute limits are unpublished, and the group terms bar commercial use of free plans and passing data to third parties unless a service description allows it.

## Before you call either

### The Weather Company Data APIs

1. Send `units`, `language` and `format=json` with a location on every v3 call, plus `Accept-Encoding: gzip`, which the usage guide marks as required.
2. Keep the key out of logs and client-side code, because it travels in the query string as `apiKey`.
3. Treat a 401 as either a bad key, an endpoint outside the key's package or an exceeded limit, and treat a 204 as no data for the query.
4. Each forecast duration (`3day` to `15day`) is a separate entitlement. Request only durations the contract covers.
5. Use `/v3/aggcommon` to combine up to 10 products in one request. Each product and each location still counts as one call.

### Xweather Weather API

1. Check `success` and `error.code` on every response. Application errors such as `invalid_location` return HTTP 200 with `success` false
2. Send `fields`, `limit` and `plimit`. The docs put a 15-day hourly forecast at about 600 KB, and about 25 KB with three fields
3. Read `X-Cost-Tokens` after each call. Cost is the endpoint multiplier times the intervals requested, so narrow `from` and `to`
4. For MCP, send `Authorization: Bearer <client_id>_<client_secret>` and avoid the `api_key` query parameter, which puts the secret in the URL
5. Add `include_tags` or `include_tools` to the MCP URL to load only the tool groups the task needs
6. On 429 read `Retry-After` and the `X-RateLimit-Reset-*` headers. `maxhits_min` clears at the next minute, `maxhits` at the period reset

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, The Weather Company Data APIs or Xweather Weather API?

Xweather Weather API scores 67.1 (B) on agent readiness against The Weather Company Data APIs's 52.6 (D), and leads in every scored category.

### Do The Weather Company Data APIs and Xweather Weather API need an API key?

The Weather Company Data APIs needs an API key. Xweather Weather API takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call The Weather Company Data APIs and Xweather Weather API without installing anything?

Yes. The Weather Company Data APIs has a hosted endpoint at https://api.weather.com and Xweather Weather API at https://data.api.xweather.com.


## For agents

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

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