MCP or API: which option to choose for connecting your agents

Unelia offers two ways to connect external software: an MCP server and a REST API. Both respect the same permissions and leave the same trail in the log. The difference lies in who decides what to call.

When to use MCP

With MCP, the model discovers the available tools and decides when to use them. It's the natural choice for conversational assistants: the person asks and the assistant chooses the action.

When to use the API

With the API, your code decides exactly what gets read or changed. It's the option for integrations with other systems, scheduled processes or your own agents with fixed logic.

# Workspace details for your key
curl "https://public.app.unelia.com/v1/workspace/info" \
  -H "x-api-key: prefix.secret"

MCP for conversations, API for automation. And both with the same permissions.

You can combine both

Many teams use Claude via MCP for day-to-day work and the API to sync data with their ERP or invoicing tool.