MaxAPI vs Replicate
Both Replicate and MaxAPI let developers call hosted image and video models through HTTP APIs. They take different angles: Replicate is a general-purpose model marketplace covering many model families through its own predictions/run API; MaxAPI focuses on production image and video generation behind an OpenAI-compatible interface with multiple price tiers per model.
API surface
Replicate exposes its own predictions API (replicate.run / predictions.create) and an SDK per language.
MaxAPI exposes the OpenAI image/video endpoints (POST /v1/images/generations, /v1/images/edits, /v1/videos/generations). Existing OpenAI SDK code switches by changing the base URL and key.
MaxAPI exposes image and video generation models through the OpenAI-compatible endpoints existing OpenAI SDK code already targets. Each public model also offers multiple route modes (official / official-cheap / mix) so the same request can be billed at different price tiers, and image generation works either through OpenAI's /v1/images/* family or, for Gemini models, through Google's native /v1beta/models/{model}:generateContent path with the same MaxAPI bearer key.
Model coverage on MaxAPI today
- Image: GPT Image 2, Gemini 2.5 Flash Image, Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite Image, Nanobanana Pro, Gemini 3.1 Flash Image Preview, Gemini 3 Pro Image Preview Beta, Gemini 3.1 Flash Image Preview Beta, GPT Image 2 Beta
- Video: Seedance 2.0 Fast Beta, Seedance 2.0 Beta, Seedance 2.0 Fast Beta Face, Seedance 2.0 Beta Face, Seedance 2.0 Fast, Seedance 2.0, Veo 3.1 Lite, Veo 3.1 Fast, Veo 3.1 Quality, Omni Flash, Omni Flash Components, Omni Flash Edit, Grok Video, Grok Imagine 1.5
- OpenAI-compatible /v1/* endpoints are the canonical surface.
- Gemini image models additionally accept Google's native /v1beta/models/{model}:generateContent format.
Pricing model
MaxAPI bills in credits where 1 credit = 1 USD. Failed requests are not charged. Each public model exposes one or more route_mode tiers (official, official-cheap, mix) — pass route_mode in the request body to pick. Refer to https://www.maxapi.dev/pricing for the full per-route table.
Replicate's billing is model-specific and per-prediction; check Replicate's own pricing page for current rates.
Migration sketch
From Replicate's Python or JS SDK, swap the SDK for the OpenAI SDK pointed at https://api.maxapi.dev. Image generation becomes openai.images.generate(model="...", prompt="..."); video generation becomes a POST to /v1/videos/generations followed by polling the returned poll_url. Authentication is a MaxAPI bearer key (sk-...) in the Authorization header.
When MaxAPI is the better fit
- You already have OpenAI SDK code and want to keep the same call shape.
- You want a single image/video API with explicit cost-tier choices (route_mode).
- You want Gemini image models reachable through Google's official SDK shape without a Google Cloud project.
When Replicate is the better fit
- You need access to community-published or research models that aren't in MaxAPI's catalogue.
- You're building infra that runs custom open-source models (cog-packaged or otherwise).
Try MaxAPI by creating a key on the homepage, or read the API documentation linked from any model page.