Merge

Overview

If you have ever built a B2B SaaS application, you know the drill. You build a great core product, but the first thing every prospect asks is, "Does this sync with Salesforce/Workday/NetSuite?"

Suddenly, your roadmap is hijacked by building and maintaining distinct API connectors for dozens of third-party tools. This is the problem Merge solves. It is a Unified API platform that acts as a translation layer between your application and the chaotic world of external software.

Instead of writing separate code for HubSpot, Salesforce, and Pipedrive, you write code once to the Merge Unified API. Merge handles the heavy lifting of standardizing that data into a common schema. It supports critical business categories including HRIS, ATS, CRM, Accounting, Ticketing, and File Storage.

This tool is primarily for B2B SaaS engineering teams who want to offload the "maintenance tax" of integrations. It is also becoming a critical piece of infrastructure for AI developers building agents that need to securely read and write data across a user's disparate software stack without manual intervention.

Key Features

The "Integrate Once" Architecture

The core value here is the normalized schema. Merge has mapped out the data models for hundreds of platforms and unified them. If you need to pull an "Employee" object, you do it via one Merge endpoint. You do not need to know how BambooHR formats a name versus how Gusto does it. Merge standardizes the response so your code remains clean and agnostic to the underlying provider.

Merge Link

Authentication is usually the most annoying part of integration work (OAuth dances, token refreshing, weird redirect URIs). Merge Link is a pre-built, drop-in UI component that handles this for you. You embed it in your app, and it guides your end-users through the authorization flow for whatever tool they are connecting. It provides a polished, self-service experience that looks native to your application.

Merge Agent Handler

For those building AI applications, this feature is significant. Large Language Model (LLM) agents often struggle with the nuances of calling external APIs correctly. The Agent Handler provides a specialized interface for AI agents to securely interact with third-party tools. It allows agents to perform Create, Read, Update, and Delete (CRUD) actions across the supported software stack with high accuracy, essentially giving your AI "hands" to do work in external systems.

Observability Dashboard

Integrations break. Third-party APIs change, tokens expire, and customers enter bad data. Merge provides a central command center where your team can see exactly what is happening. It features automatic issue detection and detailed request logs. This is a big win for Customer Success teams, as they can often identify and resolve sync errors using the dashboard without having to escalate a ticket to engineering.

Pricing

Merge operates on a "Linked Account" model, meaning you pay based on the number of specific connections your customers make (e.g., one customer connecting their Salesforce instance counts as one Linked Account).

• Launch Plan (Free Tier):

  • Cost: $0.
  • Includes 3 production Linked Accounts.
  • Good for prototyping or very early-stage startups testing the waters.

• Professional Plan:

  • Starts around $650 per month, which covers your first 10 production Linked Accounts.
  • Additional accounts cost approximately $65 per Linked Account per month.
  • Adds capabilities like custom field mapping, higher sync frequencies, and direct support.

• Enterprise Plan:

  • Custom pricing based on volume.
  • Necessary for advanced security features like SAML SSO, dedicated account management, and SLAs.
  • Includes options for single-tenant environments.

Note: They typically offer free trials for the paid tiers so you can test features like sandboxes before signing a contract.

Pros & Cons

Pros

• Speed to Market: You can deploy integrations for 50+ tools in the time it would usually take to build one or two in-house.
• Maintenance Relief: This is the biggest selling point. When a third-party API changes or deprecates an endpoint, Merge handles the update. Your engineering team stays focused on your product, not patching broken pipes.
• Developer Experience: The documentation is consistently praised for being clear and accurate. The SDKs and "Merge Link" UI component make the initial implementation very smooth.
• Operational Visibility: The dashboard allows non-technical staff to monitor integration health, which reduces the support burden on developers.

Cons

• Cost at Scale: The unit economics can get tricky. At roughly $65 per connection on the Pro plan, the bill climbs standardized quickly if you have a high volume of low-value customers. It makes the most sense for high-ACV B2B products.
• Lowest Common Denominator: While the unified API covers the vast majority of use cases, you might lose access to very niche features specific to a single platform. You can often get around this with "remote data" features or passthrough requests, but it adds complexity.
• Data Latency: Real-time sync isn't always instant. Depending on your plan and the specific integration, there can be a lag between data changing in the source system and appearing in your app.

Verdict

Merge is an excellent piece of infrastructure for B2B SaaS companies and AI developers who need to offer broad integration coverage immediately. The value proposition is simple: you are buying engineering time.

If you are an early-stage startup, the speed at which Merge lets you say "Yes, we integrate with that" to enterprise prospects is invaluable. For larger organizations, the ability to offload the maintenance nightmare of constant API updates justifies the cost.

However, keep an eye on your margins. If your product is low-cost and high-volume, the per-account pricing model might become a friction point. But for most B2B applications, the ROI on saved engineering hours makes Merge a strong recommendation.