# Phrase (slim)

> Localisation platform from Phrase a.s. in Prague. Its Language AI API translates text and files through automatically selected machine translation engines, and its Strings and TMS APIs, CLI and hosted MCP server manage translation projects, term bases and translation memories.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/phrase.md (~8,150 tokens) · this version ~2,080 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/phrase.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/phrase
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · Updated: 2026-10-08

**B · 64.2/100 · rank #285 of 722 · #7 in Translation · not agent-ready · confidence medium**


Assessment: Nine APIs with public OpenAPI specs, Markdown docs and a hosted MCP server that signs in with OAuth and separates view, create and delete consents. The status page lists 14 incidents in 90 days, 12 marked major or critical. Capacity top-up prices aren't public, and the terms permit training some models on customer content and prohibit benchmarking.

## Facts

- Kind: HTTP API · vendor: Phrase a.s. · category: Translation · legal entity: Phrase a.s. · provenance 82/100
- Endpoint: `https://mcp.eu.phrase.com` (HTTP, Streamable HTTP)
- Auth: OAuth or key · pricing: Paid · x402: no · licence: Proprietary service under the Phrase Terms of Service. The CLI, the Strings API clients and the deprecated local MCP server on GitHub are MIT
- Probe metrics: not measured yet (probes haven't run)
- APIs: Nine, each with an OpenAPI spec at developers.phrase.com/openapi. Strings (301 operations, version 2.0.0), TMS (547 operations in the latest spec, versions 1 to 4), Language AI (7), Platform (10), Quality Evaluator, Studio, Style Guides, Content Groups and Connectors
- Hosts: Strings at `https://api.phrase.com/v2` (EU) and `https://api.us.app.phrase.com/v2` (US). Language AI at `https://eu.phrase.com/smt/api/` and `https://us.phrase.com/smt/api/`. The TMS spec still names `https://cloud.memsource.com/web` as its server
- MCP server: Hosted, `https://mcp.eu.phrase.com` and `https://mcp.us.phrase.com`, streamable HTTP, OAuth with PKCE (S256), scopes `phrase-mcp:read`, `phrase-mcp:write` and `phrase-mcp:destructive`. Listed in the official MCP registry as `io.github.phrase/mcp` since 10 August 2026. Tool list not published
- Credentials: Platform API token exchanged for a JWT (RFC 8693, `expires_in` 14399 seconds), service accounts with the client credentials grant, Strings access tokens with the scopes read, write, orders.create and team.manage and an optional expiry. Basic authentication with email and password is still documented for Strings
- Language AI: `/v2/textTranslations` takes 1 to 6 texts of up to 2,000 characters, with optional source language detection. `/v1/fileTranslations` runs asynchronously, can add a quality estimate, and deletes files after 24 hours
- Rate limits: Strings 1,000 requests in 5 minutes and 4 concurrent per user by default. TMS 6,000 requests a minute per signed-in user, 100 concurrent, and 200 to 2,000 running async requests by plan. No figure published for Language AI
- Pagination: Strings lists return 25 items by default, `per_page` up to 100, with `Link` headers. ETag and `Last-Modified` on locale downloads and translation lists, and a 304 doesn't count against the rate limit
- Plans: Freelancer $27, Software UI/UX $525, Professional (for language service providers) $525 and Team $1,245 a month, billed annually. Business and Enterprise are quoted by sales
- Trial: 14 days, signup with email and password, no automatic charge afterwards
- Clients and CLI: Strings clients for Ruby, Python, PHP, TypeScript, Java and Go. `phrase-js` 3.27.0 on npm. Phrase Strings CLI 2.69.1 of 23 September 2026 (Homebrew, Docker, binaries), MIT
- Certifications: ISO 27001 certificate published. SOC 2 Type I, with Type II expected in 2026 per phrase.com/security. Annual third-party penetration tests. A HIPAA assessment by CyberGRX
- Data handling: EU or US data centre chosen at signup, hosted on AWS (Phrase Studio on Google Cloud). Customer data deleted within 60 days of deletion or contract end. Sub-processor list with locations and transfer mechanisms
- Status: status.phrase.com on Statuspage, components for Strings, TMS and Language AI API in the EU and the US, with post-mortems on larger incidents
- Prices: Freelancer plan $27 per month (plan); Software UI/UX plan $525 per month (plan); Team plan $1245 per month (plan)

- Scores: Reliability 55, Performance pending, Schema & documentation 87, Agent ergonomics 70, Security & auth 58, Payments & pricing 30, Task success pending, Maintenance & community 83, Transparency & trust 74 · total over the 7 assessed categories
- Why: Reliability, Hosted reading, for the public APIs and the hosted MCP server. · Schema & documentation, OpenAPI 3 specs for all nine APIs at developers.phrase.com/openapi, among them Strings with 301 operations and TMS with 547 (25). · Agent ergonomics, API reading of the checklist, with the hosted MCP server noted where its behaviour is documented. · Security & auth, The hosted MCP server uses OAuth with PKCE, dynamic client registration and three scopes. · Payments & pricing, No x402, MPP or L402 (0). · Maintenance & community, The changelog's latest entry is 6 October 2026, and the CLI's latest release is 2.69.1 of 23 September (30). · Transparency & trust, Closed service with published terms, and the CLI, clients and local MCP server under MIT (15).
- Sources: 27, open questions: 7, both in the full twin
- Capabilities: translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/phrase.json
- Verify (for the vendor): the badge `https://www.anchorterminal.com/badges/phrase.svg` or a link to https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/phrase from a page on phrase.com or one of its subdomains, or the README of github.com/phrase/phrase-cli, then `POST https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/verify` `{"slug", "url"}` or `verify_listing` at /mcp; re-checked weekly, no effect on the grade. Snippets in the full twin.

## Before you call it

1. Exchange a Phrase Platform API token at `https://eu.phrase.com/idm/oauth/token` (or `us.phrase.com`) for a Bearer JWT, which lasts about four hours, and refresh it before it expires
2. Send a `User-Agent` header naming your application on every Strings and TMS call. The Strings API answers 400 without one
3. Keep Strings calls under 1,000 in five minutes and four in parallel, and read `X-Rate-Limit-Reset` and `X-Rate-Limit-Reason` on a 429
4. Send at most six texts of 2,000 characters to `/v2/textTranslations`, with `consumerId` and `targetLang`. Term bases and translation memories work only with an AI translation agent profile
5. Use the MCP URL for the account's region, `https://mcp.eu.phrase.com` or `https://mcp.us.phrase.com`, and ask the user for the view consent alone unless the task writes

## Connect

```bash
brew install phrase-cli
```

```bash
curl -X POST https://eu.phrase.com/idm/oauth/token -H 'Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded' -d 'grant_type=urn:ietf:params:oauth:grant-type:token-exchange' -d 'subject_token=API-TOKEN'
```

```bash
claude mcp add --transport streamable-http phrase-mcp-prod-eu https://mcp.eu.phrase.com
```
Full config and headless snippets are in the full page. Through letme (picks today, calling later): https://letme.dev/phrase

## Similar tools

| Tool | Grade | Score | Shared capabilities | Slim |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Azure Translator | BB | 72 | translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect | https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/azure-translator.min.md |
| DeepL API | BB | 72 | translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect | https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/deepl-api.min.md |
| Crowdin | B | 69.6 | translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect | https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/crowdin.min.md |
| Amazon Translate | B | 69.5 | translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect | https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/amazon-translate.min.md |
| Google Cloud Translation | B | 68.1 | translate.text, translate.documents, translate.glossary, translate.detect | https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/google-cloud-translation.min.md |


## Panel reviews (0, desk reviews from public material, no calls made)