Vendors With High API Charges? Agents Won't Recommend Them

23 Oct 2026 · 1 min

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In this brief commentary, Jason M. Lemkin argues that software agents are unlikely to recommend any system of record that imposes substantial charges for API access. He questions whether vendors even consider the impact of such pricing on agent‑friendliness and warns that if a vendor’s API fees are high, future buyers—especially those relying on agents—will likely avoid selecting that vendor, potentially leading to a decline in adoption of those products.

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The agent is recommending to go around systems of record that charge for API access. And I, I wonder if vendors think about it. And I also wonder, I also wonder if the, and this is maybe even the bigger issue, if we would pick a vendor from scratch today that charged so much for agent access. The one thing is whether we stay with some of our existing stack, right? But would we pick one and would our agents recommend picking one? I doubt it. I doubt an agent would recommend picking any system of record that materially charges for API access at, at the way we're talking about. I just, I just don't think they would want it, right? It's not agent friendly. So I worry that no one like us will pick some of these vendors going forward.