CarVector vs ProblemsByVin

CarVector decodes VINs and license plates into specs, images, recall notices, and OBD-II DTC codes for vehicles spanning model years 1925 to 2029. A live unauthenticated GET against its real API host, api.carvector.io/v1/vehicles/{id}, returned a 401 "missing_api_key" JSON error over HTTPS — reconfirming auth "API Key" and https true — with no Access-Control-Allow-Origin header on either that request or a follow-up OPTIONS preflight, resolving the stored "yes" cors to "no". Its pricing page lists a $0 Free tier alongside paid $39/mo and $79/mo plans plus a custom Enterprise tier — freemium.

ProblemsByVin's Data Center publishes derived, CC BY 4.0-licensed datasets built from NHTSA's owner-complaint and recall record — a reliability scorecard, failure-mileage quartiles, and post-warranty failure patterns — as weekly-refreshed CSV and JSON downloads plus a machine-readable /data/catalog.json manifest. A live GET against both the docs page and the catalog endpoint returned access-control-allow-origin: *, reconfirming cors "yes"; no key was required, reconfirming auth "None" over HTTPS. The datasets are free to use, republish, and remix with attribution — free.