Frequently asked questions
What is Snipget?
Snipget is a hosted API that provides programmatic utilities for AI agents: data normalization, parsing, validation, and classification. It's agent-discoverable via OpenAPI and MCP.
Who is this for?
Anyone building with AI who needs data to be reliably clean before it gets anywhere critical. That includes experienced engineers building production agent pipelines, and newer developers or no-code builders who are discovering for the first time that LLMs can't be trusted with routine data tasks. The utilities span common data types (names, addresses, phones, IDs), industry verticals (healthcare), and a large catalog of tiny helpers.
How is this different from asking an LLM?
LLMs are confidently wrong about things code can compute exactly. Ask one to normalize a phone number, validate a routing number, or resolve a jurisdiction and you'll get an answer that looks right, but is quietly wrong. You won't always know which ones. Snipget utilities are programmatic: fast, consistent, cheap, and honest about their confidence score. No guessing.
Do you have a free tier?
Yes. The Free tier requires no card and includes 5,000 calls per month. Every utility is included. Upgrade when you need more calls or higher throughput.
What happens when I hit my monthly call limit?
On paid tiers, you can add a prepaid overage allowance — a balance that covers extra calls at your tier's per-call rate, so your agents keep running. You're never charged anything you didn't buy up front; when the allowance runs out, calls pause until you top up or your included calls reset. Purchased allowance expires 12 months after purchase and is forfeited if your subscription ends. On the Free tier, calls stop when the monthly quota is exhausted. Upgrade any time to increase your included quota.
What counts as a billable call?
Every successful API call counts against your monthly included calls and, once those are used on a paid tier, draws from your prepaid overage allowance. Error responses (4xx, 5xx) and rate-limit responses (429) are not counted. Batch endpoints count as one unit per item in the batch.
Do you validate addresses against external authorities like USPS or Smarty?
No. Snipget parses, formats, classifies, and confidence-scores. It does not certify against authoritative external services for addresses. If you need USPS-certified validation, use Snipget as a pre-processor alongside Smarty or USPS, not instead, and watch your error and not-found rates drop.
Is there a client SDK?
Yes, the SDKs are live. Use the Python package (pip install snipget-client) or the npm package (npm install snipget); source for both lives on GitHub. They're thin HTTP wrappers for convenience; the REST API and MCP server are the product.
Can I self-host?
Not at launch. The hosted API is the product. If you have a hard self-hosting requirement (e.g., HIPAA, regulated data residency), contact us, and we can discuss.
How does rate limiting work?
Rate limiting is based on a token bucket per customer. Higher tiers get more RPS, higher concurrency, and larger burst capacity. 429 responses include exact retry-after hints and tier upgrade links so agents can pace themselves.
My script gets an edge '403 error code: 1010' before reaching the API. Why?
Our edge (Cloudflare) applies a Browser Integrity Check that blocks requests with an empty User-Agent or Python's default 'Python-urllib' one — those requests never reach Snipget, so you see an opaque edge 403 instead of our error envelope. The fix is one line: send any custom User-Agent header (e.g. 'my-agent/1.0'). Requests from python-requests, httpx, curl, Node fetch, and Go's http client all pass by default; only the raw stdlib urllib default and empty user agents are affected.
What's the response format?
Every endpoint returns the same envelope: { status, confidence, result, meta }. Every error returns { status: 'error', error_code, message, meta }. See the API Reference for full examples.
Do you support MCP?
Yes, natively. Snipget exposes the same utilities through an MCP server so agents in Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, and other MCP-aware environments can discover and call them directly.
How do I add Snipget as a connector in ChatGPT?
In ChatGPT, go to Settings → Apps, turn on Advanced (Developer) Mode, then choose Create App. Name it Snipget and set the URL to https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp?load=starter (ChatGPT struggles when too many tools are advertised, so use a tool pack — ?load=starter is our curated pack, or build your own on the dashboard's MCP Tools page and use https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp?load=custom). Sign in with your Snipget account and approve access when prompted — ChatGPT registers itself automatically, so there's no client ID or secret to copy.
How do I add Snipget as a connector in Grok?
In Grok, open Skills & Connectors → Connectors, choose New Connector → Custom, name it Snipget, set the URL to https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp, and sign in to finish. For a quick one-off you can instead give Grok the same URL plus an API key as the auth token — a single-session connection that doesn't persist. The sign-in connector is the better fit for repeated use.
How many tools does my agent see? What are tool packs?
By default (https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp) your connector advertises the full Snipget catalog — modern agents like Claude load tools on demand and handle the whole catalog well, and we believe that's where all agent platforms are headed. Some clients fail or degrade when too many tools are advertised (ChatGPT is the notable one). For those, connect with a tool pack instead: https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp?load=starter serves our curated data-cleanup pack with no setup, and https://mcp.snipget.ai/mcp?load=custom serves the pack you build on the dashboard's MCP Tools page (pick whole subject buckets or individual utilities, up to 80 advertised tools). The catalog discovery tools are always included with any pack, and results tell your agent when something it found isn't in the connected pack and how to get it. Pack changes apply the next time the client connects — in ChatGPT, remove and re-add the connector.
My connector is missing some Snipget tools (e.g. chemistry or biotech). Why?
Snipget adds new tools over time — for example the chemistry and biotech utilities. MCP clients like ChatGPT, Codex, and Grok cache the tool list when you first connect and don't always re-fetch it after we add tools, so an older connection can show a stale, shorter list. The fix: remove the Snipget connector entirely and add it again. A plain "refresh" or app restart often isn't enough, because the client keeps its cached manifest; re-adding forces a fresh discovery of the full current catalog. To check before you re-add, ask your agent: "Use Snipget's catalog_list tool and tell me its live_tool_count and catalog_version, then tell me how many Snipget tools you can see. If they don't match, my connector is stale." The catalog tools always reflect Snipget's real-time tool set, even when your connector's own list is out of date. (Connected with a pack URL? Compare against advertised_tool_count instead — a pack is expected to be smaller than live_tool_count.)
Can I add teammates to my account?
Team support is available on the Growth and Scale tiers. Invite as many teammates as you need, with no per-seat charge. Free and Starter are solo accounts (one user per account). Owners and admins manage invites, roles, and API key ownership; members can use the API and create their own keys.
Can the same email be on more than one team?
Not at launch. Each email can belong to one Snipget account. If you need to be part of multiple teams, use a different email address per team for now. Multi-team membership is on the roadmap.
What happens to my team if I downgrade from Growth or Scale?
Existing teammates keep their access, nothing is removed. You won't be able to add new members or re-issue invites until you upgrade again, and any pending (un-accepted) invites are revoked at downgrade time. Each member's API keys keep working unchanged.
Who runs Snipget?
Snipget Inc. is a small team of developers and data engineers who spent decades building these same utilities into every project we touched, got tired of the detour, and built it properly once so nobody else has to.
Still have questions? Get in touch.