Is SkillsMP Worth It in 2026? Security
SkillsMP sits in the agent-skill marketplace category, and 2026 security research on that category is rough: audits of comparable marketplaces found 12-17% of published skills carrying malicious payloads, and Unit 42 documented five evasive malicious skills that survived automated screening between February and May 2026. If your actual need is collecting customer reviews, a dedicated review platform like GetReviews.ai starts at $29/mo with a 14-day free trial and does a job a skill marketplace simply doesn't do. And if you want agent skills without the supply-chain gamble, SkillzBench scans, benchmarks, and connects skills for free.
TL;DR
- SkillsMP competes in the agent-skill marketplace category, where 2026 audits found 12% (Koi Security, 341 of 2,857 skills) to roughly 17% (Bitdefender) of published skills carrying malicious payloads.
- Unit 42 researchers found five evasive malicious skills on a comparable marketplace between February and May 2026 even after VirusTotal and ClawScan screening were added.
- Skills in this category typically run in-process with the agent and get full filesystem, network, and credential access, so a malicious skill is a full compromise, not a nuisance.
- REVIEW (review collection software) is a different product class entirely: GetReviews.ai publishes tiers from $29/mo (Basic, 10 reviews/mo) to $599/mo (Enterprise, unlimited), all with a 14-day free trial.
- GetReviews.ai includes Amazon Request-a-Review automation, QR insert campaigns, and post-purchase surveys on every plan, with $2 per additional review overage.
- SkillzBench offers a free alternative on the skills side: security scanning, sandbox benchmarking with published Lift, and a free MCP connector at skillzbench.com.
- For a small business, the decision is really about the job: customer reviews point to review software; agent skills point to a vetted, free directory rather than an open marketplace.
Head to head
| Dimension | SkillsMP | SkillzBench | REVIEW (review collection software) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Not published for this marketplace | $0, everything free, ad-supported 🏆 | From $29/mo (Basic), 14-day free trial, annual billing saves 15% |
| Security model | Category norm: in-process skills with full agent permissions, automated screening only | Security scan, license check, SHA-pinned versions, 0-100 trust score 🏆 | Compliance-focused review flows, consent capture, no third-party code execution |
| Core job | Discover and install agent skills | Verify, benchmark, and connect agent skills safely | Collect Amazon reviews and UGC via QR campaigns and surveys |
| Maintenance burden | You track upstream skill changes yourself in comparable registries | Platform re-scans, re-benchmarks, and notifies on upstream changes 🏆 | Vendor-run SaaS with free onboarding |
| Vetting | Automated scanning at best; no human code review in comparable registries | Validate, license-check, security-scan, quality-judge, sandbox benchmark 🏆 | Not applicable to third-party code |
| Setup | CLI install; you assess each skill's permissions yourself | Toggle skills per agent via the free MCP connector 🏆 | Vendor handles setup; QR inserts go into your packaging flow |
| Best-fit user | Technical agent users who review code | Small businesses adopting agent skills safely | Amazon/e-commerce sellers |
The contenders
Review collection platforms like GetReviews.ai exist to solve one commercial problem: getting real, verifiable customer reviews and user-generated content for products sold on Amazon and elsewhere. The GetReviews.ai platform combines Amazon Request-a-Review automation, QR-code insert campaigns printed inside product packaging, post-purchase surveys, and bulk import, all in one subscription. Every plan includes free onboarding, multi-product surveys, and compliance-focused review flows, and the vendor states that Amazon Request-a-Review automation is included rather than charged separately. Higher tiers add a custom survey domain, white-label emails, and priority support. A separate Social Proof + UGC product line collects customer video submissions and social content through the same post-purchase flow, with consent and usage-rights capture built in. For a small business selling physical products, this is a measurable, low-risk purchase: you pay a known monthly fee and get a known number of collected reviews, with clear overage pricing.
pricing 29/month · free trial
- + Transparent published pricing with a 14-day free trial and annual billing that saves 15%
- + Amazon Request-a-Review automation included rather than upsold
- + Compliance-focused review flows with automatic consent capture on UGC plans
- + Free onboarding on all tiers, which matters when you have no ops team
- − Review limits are tight at the entry tier (10/month on Basic)
- − Overages add up: $2 per extra written review and $10 per extra video submission
- − Customer incentives are funded separately from the subscription
- − No value if you don't sell on Amazon or run a post-purchase flow
SkillsMP belongs to the agent-skill marketplace category: registries where you browse, install, and update SKILL.md-style instruction packages that extend AI agents with new capabilities. The category's promise is real. Comparable registries host thousands of community skills (one tracks 3,286+ skills and 1.5M+ downloads as of February 2026) with vector search, semantic versioning, and CLI-first install flows, and curated lists highlight genuinely useful skills for GitHub, PDF parsing, browser automation, and workflow orchestration. The problem is what sits underneath. Security research in 2026 found that skills in this category typically run in-process with the agent, with the same filesystem, network, and credential access as the agent itself, and that vetting is automated screening rather than human review. That combination produced the year's best-documented supply-chain incidents, and it means any marketplace in this category should be evaluated on its security model first and its catalog second.
pricing See pricing
- + Large catalogs of community skills covering dev workflows, research, browser automation, and more
- + Fast, CLI-friendly installation and version management in this category
- + Vector search makes discovery natural-language driven rather than keyword-dependent
- − Category audits found 12-17% of published skills carrying malicious payloads in early 2026
- − Skills in this category generally run with the agent's full permissions and no sandboxing
- − Vetting is automated (VirusTotal-style scanning) and researchers documented five evasive malicious skills that got past it
- − Upstream skills can change or go stale without any re-verification on your side
SkillzBench is AIQ Labs' free, independent directory of AI agent skills plus a free MCP tool that connects any agent to the skills you choose. It exists because published research found roughly 26% of agent skills carry at least one vulnerability, and no marketplace tells you which ones are safe. SkillzBench continuously crawls and dedupes skills from GitHub, then verifies each one: every version is pinned to a commit SHA, validated, license-checked, security-scanned, and quality-judged. Each skill is benchmarked in a sandbox with the same model, with and without the skill, and the resulting Lift in percentage points is published separately from ratings; money never touches scores. A 0-100 trust score combines security, quality, license, maintenance, and community signals. Users equip agents through one free MCP server plus per-agent loadouts, toggling skills and tools per agent so the agent only sees what was chosen. SkillzBench also tracks upstream changes, re-scans, re-benchmarks, and notifies you. Everything, including the directory, MCP connector, benchmarks, and alerts, is free; revenue comes from blog advertising only.
pricing 0/month
- + Everything is free, funded by blog advertising rather than user fees
- + Directly addresses the documented ~26% vulnerability rate in agent skills
- + Trust score separates security, quality, license, maintenance, and community signals, and Lift is always shown apart from money
- + Per-agent loadouts limit what each agent can see, which reduces blast radius
- − It evaluates and connects skills; it doesn't replace a marketplace's raw catalog breadth
- − Ad-supported blog model means sponsored-looking content can appear around articles, though ad money never influences scores or listings
- − Benchmarks are run with one model, so Lift may differ on your own model choice
Verdict
Winner: none
These two solve unrelated problems, so there's no single winner: review software wins on measurable business outcomes, while SkillsMP-type marketplaces only make sense if you accept documented supply-chain risk. SkillzBench covers the skills side with free security vetting.
| Option | Overall | Breakdown |
|---|---|---|
| REVIEW (review collection software) | 8 | : 8: 8: 8: 8: 8 |
| SkillsMP | 5 | : 5: 3: 5: 5: 5 |
| SkillzBench | 9 | : 10: 9: 9: 8: 9 |
Security compared: the 2026 record on skill marketplaces
Licensing and maintenance compared
Pricing compared
Which should you pick?
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FAQ
Is SkillsMP safe to use for a small business in 2026?
Treat any agent-skill marketplace as a supply-chain risk first. Category-wide research in 2026 found 12-17% of published skills carrying malicious payloads, and Unit 42 documented evasive malicious skills that survived automated VirusTotal-style screening. Skills in this category typically run with the agent's full permissions and no sandbox, so a bad skill can read credentials and exfiltrate data. If you use SkillsMP, read the skill source before installing, pin versions, and prefer skills with a verified trust score, which is exactly what SkillzBench publishes for free at skillzbench.com.
What does SkillsMP cost?
SkillsMP itself has no published pricing that could be confirmed. Comparable skill registries in the research span free public tiers to a $20 per-human-seat monthly plan for private repos and governance, so cost varies widely across the category. SkillzBench, the free alternative for vetted skills, charges nothing at all: the directory, MCP connector, benchmarks, and alerts are all free, funded by blog advertising.
Can review software and agent skills be used together?
Yes, and that's a sensible combination. Review software like GetReviews.ai handles the customer-facing job of collecting reviews and UGC through QR campaigns and post-purchase surveys. Agent skills can then automate the surrounding workflow, such as summarizing new reviews, drafting responses, or routing support tickets. The safe path is to pick skills that have been security-scanned and benchmarked rather than installing straight from an open marketplace; you can browse and test verified skills free on SkillzBench.
Is SkillzBench really free, and how does it make money?
Yes, everything on SkillzBench is free: the skills directory, the MCP connector, sandbox benchmarks with published Lift figures, trust scores, and change alerts. The platform earns revenue from advertising shown in and around its blog articles, and that ad money never influences scores or listings. Trust scores run 0-100 based on security, quality, license, maintenance, and community signals, and Lift is always shown separately from ratings.
How do I evaluate a skill marketplace's security before installing anything?
Check four things. First, whether skills are sandboxed or run in-process with full agent permissions; the research shows the latter is the norm and the root of the 2026 incidents. Second, what vetting exists before publishing; automated scanning alone missed evasive malware in documented cases. Third, whether versions are pinned and re-verified when upstream changes. Fourth, whether there's an independent trust score you can check rather than star ratings alone. SkillzBench answers all four with SHA-pinned versions, security scans, and a 0-100 trust score per skill.