Agentic Index
Arcade vs Toolhouse (2026)
These look similar in a search result and are not the same product. That verdict is the Agentic Index coverage score, graded from each vendor's own published materials.
Arcade is a layer: authenticated tool calling and an MCP runtime that hands your agent secure access to more than seven thousand integrations, and nothing above that. Toolhouse is a runtime that builds and runs whole agents from a prompt, with RAG and tools included and one link MCP connectivity, from free to 10 dollars a month. If you already have an agent, Arcade fills the auth gap; if you do not, Toolhouse gives you one.
This comparison is published by Agentic Index, an independent agentic AI vendor research platform. Arcade and Toolhouse are each graded against the same 14 capability Agentic Index taxonomy, from the vendor's own public materials under the Agentic Index verification standard, alongside 969 researched vendors. No vendor pays for placement and no vendor has reviewed this page. How this evidence is graded
Choose Arcade if
- You already have an agent and a framework, and secure tool access is the missing piece.
- Integration breadth is the requirement and seven thousand is the number that matters.
- You want the auth layer decoupled so it survives changing your agent framework later.
Choose Toolhouse if
- You want an agent running today without assembling a stack to get there.
- Built in RAG matters: Toolhouse documents full knowledge grounding where Arcade documents none.
- Ten dollars a month with a free tier is the entire budget conversation.
| At a glance | Arcade | Toolhouse |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Agent infrastructure | Agent infrastructure |
| Entry price | From $25/mo · free tier | Free (50 runs/mo) · Pro $10/mo (1,000 runs) · Enterprise custom |
| Free / trial | Free tier: 100 user challenges, 1,000 standard tool executions, 50 pro tool executions per month, unlimited tools | Free Sandbox tier: 50 agent runs/month, unlimited MCP calls, for public projects. |
| Pricing confidence | public exact | public exact |
| Feature | A Arcade |
T Toolhouse |
|---|---|---|
| Action & orchestration | ||
|
Integrations & Tool Calling Ability to connect agents to real systems through native integrations, OAuth-authenticated actions, custom tools, APIs, webhooks, or MCP-compatible tools. |
Full / Explicit | Full / Explicit |
|
Workflow Orchestration Ability to sequence, branch, retry, route, and combine deterministic workflow nodes with autonomous agent steps. |
Partial | Partial |
|
Triggers & Channel Coverage How agents wake up and where they work: schedules, webhooks, message events, CRM events, inbox events, chat, email, voice, and collaboration tools. |
Partial | Partial |
| Knowledge & context | ||
|
Knowledge Grounding & RAG Ability to ground agent behavior in company data through document ingestion, retrieval, external knowledge APIs, semantic search, or RAG layers. |
No / Not documented | Full / Explicit |
|
Memory & State Persistence Ability to persist context across a run, conversation, workflow, user, team, or longer-term memory layer. |
No / Not documented | Partial |
| Control & trust | ||
|
Human Oversight & Guardrails Approval steps, consent checkpoints, escalation rules, structured guardrails, policy constraints, and pause/resume controls. |
Partial | No / Not documented |
|
Security, Identity & Governance RBAC, SSO, auditability, encryption, least-privilege tool access, compliance posture, and data handling policy. |
Full / Explicit | Partial |
|
Observability & Auditability Traces, logs, execution histories, metrics, audit events, and debugging detail for production agent behavior. |
Partial | Partial |
|
Deployment & Data Residency Deployment modes and options, including SaaS, dedicated cloud, VPC, on-prem, hybrid, local runtime, and self-hosting. |
Full / Explicit | Partial |
| Solution readiness | ||
|
Prebuilt Agents, Templates & Packs Ready-made workflows, packaged employees, templates, blueprints, industry solutions, and role-specific agents that reduce time-to-value. |
Full / Explicit | Partial |
| Platform extensibility | ||
|
Model Flexibility & Routing Ability to work across multiple foundation models, route tasks to different models, or let buyers bring their own providers and keys. |
Partial | Partial |
|
APIs, SDKs & MCP Extensibility Composability layer: stable APIs, SDKs, MCP tool consumption/serving, custom tools, and integration into internal systems. |
Full / Explicit | Full / Explicit |
|
Testing, Debugging & Optimization Testing, debugging, scoring, retries, fallbacks, quality gates, and optimization loops for improving agent workflows before and after deployment. |
Partial | Partial |
| Specialist automation | ||
|
Browser & Computer Use Browser, desktop, or remote/local computer control for workflows that cannot be handled through stable APIs alone. |
No / Not documented | No / Not documented |
Pricing snapshot
Sourced from the Index pricing dataset · open each vendor's profile for full detail.
| Pricing | A Arcade |
T Toolhouse |
|---|---|---|
|
Entry price Lowest public entry point |
From $25/mo · free tier | Free (50 runs/mo) · Pro $10/mo (1,000 runs) · Enterprise custom |
|
Pricing confidence How public the numbers are |
Public, exact | Public, exact |
|
Billing Primary billing axis |
Platform fee plus usage (user challenges and tool executions) | Subscription tiers metered by agent runs per month (each run = 1 credit, includes default model LLM usage and unlimited MCP executions) |
|
Variable cost Workload / overage exposure |
Medium variable cost | Low variable cost |
|
Free tier / trial Try before you buy |
Free tier
|
Free tier
|
|
Buying motion Self-serve vs sales call |
Mixed | Self-serve |
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