exa vs Alion: company, startup and market intelligence
exa is a plugin bundle for AI coding tools published by exa-labs. Marketplaces we read that list it: 5 (Claude Code: claude-plugins-official, Official MCP Registry, Docker MCP Catalog, Claude: knowledge-work-plugins, Community GitHub marketplaces). Alion: company, startup and market intelligence is an MCP server published by alion.io. Marketplaces we read that list it: 1 (Official MCP Registry). As of our marketplace pass on 2026-10-20. This pair was picked by a reader, not by our comparison rule, so search engines are asked not to index the page.
Where each is published
| Marketplace |  exa |  Alion: company, startup and market intelligence |
|---|---|---|
| Claude Code: claude-plugins-official | Listed Version: 3.4.1 Forks (GitHub): 422 Stars (GitHub): 5 149 Not marked · First seen |
Not listed |
| Official MCP Registry | Listed Version: 3.4.1 Forks (GitHub): 422 Stars (GitHub): 5 149 Not marked · First seen |
Listed Version: 1.2.0 No figure published Not marked · First seen |
| Docker MCP Catalog | Listed Version: sha256:d88edd571d98 Forks (GitHub): 422 Pulls (Docker Hub): 36 616 Stars (Docker Hub): 7 Stars (GitHub): 5 149 Not marked · First seen |
Not listed |
| Claude: knowledge-work-plugins | Listed Version: 3.4.1 Forks (GitHub): 422 Stars (GitHub): 5 149 Not marked · First seen |
Not listed |
Each figure is the marketplace's own and is never added up across marketplaces. A marketplace that publishes no figure shows none: no number is not zero.
The facts side by side
| Fact | exa | Alion: company, startup and market intelligence |
|---|---|---|
| Marketplaces that list it (differs) | 5 (better) | 1 (worse) |
| Stars (GitHub) (differs) | 5 149 | No figure on GitHub |
| Pulls (Docker Hub) (differs) | 36 616 | No figure on Docker Hub |
| Forks (GitHub) (differs) | 422 | No figure on GitHub |
| Last release (differs) | Not published | 2026-10-15 |
| Where it runs (differs) | Remote server or your machine | Remote server (alion.io/mcp) |
| Transport (differs) | Streamable HTTP, stdio | Streamable HTTP |
| Tools it declares (differs) | 2 | Not published |
| Environment variables it asks for (differs) | 1, secrets among them: 1 | Not published |
| Parts of the bundle (differs) | 3 | Not a bundle |
| Licence (differs) | MIT | Not stated |
| Repository (differs) | github.com/exa-labs/exa-mcp-server | Not stated |
| Changes in the last 7 days (differs) | 0 | 4 |
| First seen | 2026-10-11 | 2026-10-11 |
| Endpoint at the last check (differs) | Responded 4 days ago | Responded 33 h ago |
Lines where the two differ have a tinted background and bold values. Where the data itself says which value is better (more marketplaces, a larger figure of the same marketplace, a fresher release, a verified mark on a marketplace that lists both), the better one is also marked green with ▲ and the worse one red with ▼. Where it runs, the transport, the tools, the settings, hooks, the bundle's parts, the licence and the week's changes are marked only as different: more or fewer is not better in itself.
What each says it does
exa
Exa AI web search, deep research, and content extraction. Provides MCP tools and research skills for comprehensive web search, people discovery, company research, academic papers, and more.
Alion: company, startup and market intelligence
Live data on millions of companies: funding, tech stack, growth, lookalikes, jobs and pay stats.
How to run each
exa As a Claude Code plugin
/plugin install exa@claude-plugins-officialAlion: company, startup and market intelligence As a remote MCP server
claude mcp add --transport http alion https://alion.io/mcp --header "Authorization: Bearer <YOUR_TOKEN>"Requires: Authorization header
Commands built only from what the marketplaces declare; the full set for every client is on each card.
Both endpoints responded at the last daily check. How we check endpoints
Tools each declares
The marketplaces of Alion: company, startup and market intelligence publish no list of tools, so we do not compare tools.
Settings each asks for
The marketplaces of Alion: company, startup and market intelligence publish no settings it asks for, so we do not compare settings.
What it can do: exa · What it can do: Alion: company, startup and market intelligence · Compare two other plugins
Data comes from the public marketplace file https://github.com/anthropics/claude-plugins-official/blob/HEAD/.claude-plugin/marketplace.json. Data comes from the Official MCP Registry (registry.modelcontextprotocol.io), CC0 1.0. Data comes from the Docker MCP Catalog (desktop.docker.com/mcp/catalog) and Docker Hub. Data comes from the public marketplace file https://github.com/anthropics/knowledge-work-plugins/blob/HEAD/.claude-plugin/marketplace.json. Data comes from public marketplace files in GitHub repositories of their authors. Figures come from our own regular passes over the marketplaces, last read on . We publish no contact details for plugin publishers.