Unified social media API compared: coverage, pricing, MCP support

Why teams buy a unified API at all

Building direct integrations means a Meta app review, a LinkedIn partner application, a TikTok audit and an X API subscription before your first post goes out, then permanent maintenance as each API changes. A unified API vendor carries that burden once for everyone: you get one consistent REST surface, hosted OAuth against the vendor's approved platform apps, and (increasingly) an MCP server so AI agents can call the same capabilities as typed tools.

The comparison table

Facts below come from each vendor's public pricing and documentation pages. Where a vendor's own pages disagreed with each other, the table says so rather than picking a number.

Verified against public vendor pages on July 5, 2026. Confirm current numbers on each vendor's site before deciding.

Coverage: count the platforms you will actually use

Headline platform counts hide two things. First, breadth versus relevance: Ayrshare's coverage including niche channels like Snapchat and Telegram matters only if you post there; most B2B teams live on four networks. Second, depth per platform: posting is table stakes, but comment management, DM access and analytics vary widely. Modiva and Ayrshare expose engagement surfaces; several posting-focused APIs stop at publish and schedule.

The bigger structural difference is what sits beyond social. Zernio adds ad networks. Modiva adds ads plus CRM (HubSpot) and ecommerce (Shopify), which changes what an agent can do: correlate posts with store orders, or move a social lead into the CRM, without a second integration platform. Everyone else on the list is social-only.

Pricing models: per account, per post, per credit

Three models dominate, and the same workload prices wildly differently across them. Per-account pricing (Modiva, Zernio, Ayrshare) scales with how many profiles you connect and is predictable for steady posting. Per-post pricing (bundle.social, Outstand) favors many accounts with low volume: an agency connecting 200 client profiles that each post weekly does better per post, while a brand posting 50 times a day per account does better per account. Credit pricing (Blotato) bundles AI generation with distribution, which is fine until an always-on agent drains credits mid-month.

Free tiers differ in kind, not just size: Modiva and Zernio give free connected accounts with no post cap, bundle.social and SocialAPI.ai give small monthly post allowances, and Ayrshare, Postiz's cloud and Blotato offer trials rather than free tiers.

MCP support: hosted, local, or docs-only

Every vendor now says 'MCP' somewhere; the implementations differ enough to change your architecture. Hosted MCP servers (Modiva, Zernio, Outstand, SocialAPI.ai) are remote endpoints: point Claude or Cursor at a URL with a key and tools appear, with OAuth handled server-side. Local MCP integrations (bundle.social today, per its own docs) run on the developer's machine and call the vendor API from there. And docs-search MCPs (Ayrshare's official server) help you write code against the API rather than executing actions; Ayrshare's action-executing MCP is a community project. If the goal is an agent that acts unattended, a hosted, action-executing server is the requirement to verify.

Auth handling: who carries the OAuth burden

All of these vendors host OAuth in some form; the differences are in tenancy and credential custody. If you are building a SaaS where end users connect their own accounts, look for real multi-tenant design: SocialAPI.ai leads with OAuth 2.1, PKCE and dynamic client registration for exactly this case, and Modiva is multi-tenant with per-workspace connections and envelope-encrypted (AES-256-GCM) token storage. If you self-host (Postiz, Upload-Post's open-source client), the platform apps, scopes and token refresh become your operational problem, which is precisely what most teams are paying to avoid.

The honest bottom line

Social-only and price-sensitive with steady volume: Zernio and Outstand are strong, and Socialync-class tools are cheaper still if an app (not an API) is acceptable. Many accounts, low per-account volume: bundle.social's unlimited-accounts model fits. Multi-tenant SaaS where users connect their own profiles: shortlist SocialAPI.ai and Modiva. Broadest niche-channel coverage from a long-standing vendor: Ayrshare. Need ads, CRM or ecommerce behind the same key, or an agent that does more than post: that is the gap Modiva was built for. Whatever you pick, re-verify pricing on the vendor's site; several of these numbers moved in the last year.