---
title: "Pricing"
description:
  "Free, Builder, and Enterprise plans, with MCP Gateway, AI Gateway, and the
  developer portal included on every one. Compare tiers and estimate your
  monthly cost."
canonicalUrl: "https://zuplo.com/pricing"
sourceUrl: "https://zuplo.com/pricing"
pageType: "pricing"
generatedAt: "2026-09-02"
---

# Plans & Pricing

> Don't pay for a long list of features you'll never use. MCP Gateway, AI
> Gateway, and the developer portal are included in every plan.

## Get your pricing

Slide to your real volume, get your custom pricing. The estimator on
zuplo.com/pricing recommends a plan from your monthly request volume plus a few
feature picks (MCP Gateway, AI Gateway, Developer Portal, and Monetization are
included on every plan; SSO + RBAC, Audit logs, and an SLA guarantee require
Enterprise). The underlying rates:

- **Free** — $0/mo. Free forever for ≤ 100K requests/mo. No credit card.
  Analytics, logs & traces included.
- **Builder** — $25/mo flat for ≤ 100K requests/mo, then $100 per additional
  100K requests, up to a 1M requests/mo ceiling. Solo entrepreneurs & hobbyists
  only — not a team plan.
- **Enterprise** — From $1,000/mo on an annual contract. Custom volume, SLA, and
  add-ons priced individually.

Developer seats: 2 included on Free and Builder (more needs Enterprise). Custom
domains: none on Free, up to 2 on Builder (more needs Enterprise).

## Switching from Kong, Apigee, or AWS API Gateway?

Most teams cut gateway spend by 40–70% in the first quarter.

### Zuplo vs Kong

**Typical pain:** Self-managed control plane · Plugins in Lua, hard to share
across teams · Manual scaling and cluster ops

**What Zuplo does:** Fully managed — 60s to deploy · TypeScript-native policies
in your repo · Auto-scaled across 300+ edge locations

[See the full Kong comparison →](/api-gateways/kong-alternative-zuplo)

### Zuplo vs Apigee

**Typical pain:** XML & JSON-string policy config · Long onboarding & GCP
lock-in · Per-seat developer pricing

**What Zuplo does:** Code-first config in your IDE · Free tier, deploy from
GitHub in minutes · Pay per request, not per seat

[See the full Apigee comparison →](/api-gateways/apigee-alternative-zuplo)

### Zuplo vs AWS API Gateway

**Typical pain:** Region-bound and AWS-only · Plumbing required for auth, rate
limit, portal · Cost grows fast with custom integrations

**What Zuplo does:** Edge-native, multi-cloud and on-prem · Batteries included —
auth, keys, portal, monetization · Transparent usage pricing — no surprise
egress

[See the full AWS API Gateway comparison →](/api-gateways/aws-api-gateway-alternative-zuplo)

## Real teams. Real numbers.

Rated 4.8 out of 5 on [G2](https://www.g2.com/products/zuplo/reviews).

> The move to Zuplo from our existing API Management vendor was easy — just over
> 2 months to switch mission critical systems, and we're saving over 70% on
> costs.
>
> — Ryan Waites, Senior Director @ [Blockdaemon](/customers/blockdaemon)

> We didn't touch a line of code, it's just plug and play. In just a couple of
> hours we had a great result and a fully working MCP server.
>
> — Miguel Madeira, CTO & Co-Founder @ [Finsolutia](/customers/finsolutia)

> With rate limiting, API key management, and documentation hosting, it saved us
> weeks of engineering time and let us focus on solving problems unique to our
> mission.
>
> — Tom Carden, Head of Engineering @
> [Rewiring America](/customers/rewiring-america)

> Zuplo gives us the flexibility to scale efficiently, ensure security and
> compliance, and reduce operational complexity so we can focus on building new
> capabilities.
>
> — Daryl Benzel, Staff Software Engineer @ [Yext](/customers/yext)

> Built-in policies, route editing, custom code, and Github version control make
> surfacing our backend APIs to the world a breeze.
>
> — Reece Preston, Managing Director @ [iTicket](/customers/iticket)

> Setting up an API in Kong was a lot of work. In Zuplo, it is very fast — you
> can do it in 10 seconds.
>
> — Gary Sommerhalder, CEO @ [Copilot Travel](/customers/copilot-travel)

## Compare every feature

One platform, one bill. Here's exactly what's included at each tier (API
Management product).

|                  | Free                                                    | Builder                                                   | Enterprise                                       |
| ---------------- | ------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------ |
| **Price**        | $0/mo — No credit card                                  | $25/mo — Solo & hobby projects                            | From $1,000/mo — Annual contract                 |
| **CTA**          | Start free                                              | Start building                                            | Get in touch                                     |
| **Who it's for** | Individuals evaluating Zuplo or shipping a side project | Solo entrepreneurs & hobbyists going live — not for teams | Teams, scaling APIs & mission-critical workloads |

**Usage & Limits**

| Feature                 | Free | Builder                       | Enterprise                         |
| ----------------------- | ---- | ----------------------------- | ---------------------------------- |
| Monthly requests        | 100K | 100K Included ($100 per 100K) | Custom, volume discounts available |
| Custom domains          | ✗    | $25/mo for 2 domains (max)    | Custom                             |
| Environments            | 5    | 10                            | Custom                             |
| Consumers & API Keys    | 100  | 1000                          | Custom                             |
| Projects & Services     | 2    | 2                             | Custom                             |
| Data centers            | 300  | 300                           | Custom                             |
| Self-hosted / Dedicated | ✗    | ✗                             | Available                          |
| Developer seats         | 2    | 2                             | Custom                             |

**MCP Gateway**

| Feature                  | Free        | Builder | Enterprise      |
| ------------------------ | ----------- | ------- | --------------- |
| MCP Users                | Development | 5       | Up to Unlimited |
| Upstream MCP servers     | Development | 3       | Up to Unlimited |
| Virtual MCP servers      | Development | 3       | Up to Unlimited |
| Tool invocations / month | 1K          | 10K     | Up to Unlimited |

**AI Gateway**

| Feature                                     | Free        | Builder | Enterprise |
| ------------------------------------------- | ----------- | ------- | ---------- |
| AI Gateway Users                            | Development | 5       | Custom     |
| AI Gateway Teams                            | 1           | 1       | Custom     |
| Route to OpenAI, Anthropic, Google & more   | ✓           | ✓       | ✓          |
| Real-time token usage & cost tracking       | ✓           | ✓       | ✓          |
| Universal AI API                            | ✓           | ✓       | ✓          |
| Fallbacks, load balancing, retries, routing | ✓           | ✓       | ✓          |
| Semantic Caching                            | ✓           | ✓       | ✓          |

**Platform**

| Feature                                                  | Free              | Builder     | Enterprise                              |
| -------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------- | ----------- | --------------------------------------- |
| Developer Portal                                         | ✓                 | ✓           | ✓                                       |
| [MCP Servers](/mcp-servers)                              | 1                 | 1           | Custom                                  |
| GitOps integration                                       | GitHub            | GitHub      | GitHub, BitBucket, GitLab, Azure DevOps |
| Analytics                                                | 1 day             | 7 days      | 30 days (custom available)              |
| Log & trace history retention                            | Live (15 minutes) | 1 day       | 3 days (up to unlimited)                |
| Audit logs                                               | ✗                 | ✗           | Add-on                                  |
| API Usage Audit logs                                     | ✗                 | ✗           | Add-on                                  |
| [Monetization](/features/api-monetization)               | 100K events       | 100K events | Add-on                                  |
| Observability                                            | ✗                 | ✗           | 1 plugin included, optionally add more  |
| [Federated Gateways](/docs/dedicated/federated-gateways) | ✗                 | ✗           | Add-on                                  |
| Secure tunnels, mTLS, VPC Peering                        | ✗                 | ✗           | Add-on                                  |
| [DDoS Protection](/docs/articles/waf-ddos)               | Basic             | Basic       | Add-on                                  |

**Service & Support**

| Feature                                  | Free | Builder | Enterprise            |
| ---------------------------------------- | ---- | ------- | --------------------- |
| Service Level Agreement (SLA)            | ✗    | ✗       | 99.5% (up to 99.999%) |
| Single Sign-On (SSO) & Role-Based Access | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| Community Support & Chat                 | ✓    | ✓       | ✓                     |
| Email & Ticketed Support                 | ✗    | ✗       | ✓                     |
| Premium Support (24x7x365)               | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| Support SLA                              | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| SOC 2 Type 2 Compliance                  | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| Business Associate Agreement (BAA)       | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| Custom Contracts & Redlines              | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |
| Consulting & Onboarding Services         | ✗    | ✗       | Add-on                |

**Builder** is designed for solo entrepreneurs and hobbyists as a way to go live
— it is not a team plan. It caps at 2 custom domains, 2 developer seats and 1M
requests/mo. Teams, or anyone who needs SSO, an SLA or more headroom, need an
Enterprise agreement.

**Enterprise** pricing starts at $1,000 per month on an annual contract. The
base level Enterprise package includes an entry-level SLA of 99.5%, 1 million
requests, and 1 Observability integration. Volume discounts available on more
than 1M requests per month.

## Pricing FAQ

The questions buyers ask before signing up.

**Who is the Builder plan for?** Builder is designed for solo entrepreneurs and
hobbyists — it's the $25/mo way for one person to take an API live, not a team
plan. It caps at 2 custom domains, 2 developer seats and 1 million requests per
month, and it doesn't include SSO, RBAC, audit logs or an SLA. If you're a team,
or you need more headroom than those ceilings, you need an Enterprise agreement.

**How much does Enterprise cost?** Enterprise pricing starts at $1,000 per month
on an annual contract. The base package includes an entry-level 99.5% SLA, 1
million requests per month, and 1 observability integration. Volume discounts
apply above 1 million requests per month, and add-ons such as SSO + RBAC, audit
logs, premium support, monetization and secure tunnels are priced individually —
so the final number depends on your usage and which add-ons you need.

**What happens if I exceed my request limit?** On the Free tier, requests beyond
your limit will be rate-limited until the next billing cycle. On the Builder
tier, you can purchase additional request capacity as needed - there's no hard
cutoff - if you go over we'll reach out to help you right size your plan. On
Enterprise plans, usage limits are customized to your needs with flexible
overage options. Your API will never suddenly stop working due to limits.

**How quickly can I get started?** You can deploy your first API in minutes.
Sign up, connect your GitHub repo, and Zuplo automatically deploys to 300+ edge
locations. No credit card is required for the free tier, and you get 100K
requests per month to build and test your API.

**Can I try enterprise features before committing?** Yes! Most enterprise
features are available to try out without commitment - if we see a lot of usage
we'll reach out to help right size your plan. Some features like SSO, analytics,
and secure tunnels can be enabled in trial mode for development and testing.
This lets you validate that Zuplo meets your requirements before signing an
enterprise agreement. Contact us to enable a trial.

**What deployment options are available?** Zuplo offers three deployment
options: Managed Edge (default) runs across 300+ data centers worldwide and
scales to handle any traffic volume. Managed Dedicated runs on isolated
infrastructure on your choice of cloud provider (AWS, GCP, Azure, Akamai, and
more) with custom networking like VPC peering and PrivateLink. Self-Hosted lets
you run Zuplo on your own Kubernetes cluster for complete control. All options
provide the same features and developer experience.

**How is AI Gateway different from API Management?** AI Gateway is optimized for
LLM API traffic with features like semantic caching, token-based rate limiting,
and model fallback. API Management is our general-purpose solution for REST APIs
with features like key management, analytics, and developer portals. Many
customers use both together.

**What support options are available?** All plans include community support via
Discord. Enterprise plans offer email and ticketed support, customizable support
SLAs with response times as fast as 30 minutes, and 24/7/365 availability for
critical issues.

## Next steps

- Start for free: <https://portal.zuplo.com/signup> — free tier includes 100K
  requests/month, no credit card, no sales call
- Talk to an Architect: [/schedule-call](/schedule-call)
- Read the Kong, Apigee, or AWS API Gateway migration comparisons:
  [/api-gateways/kong-alternative-zuplo](/api-gateways/kong-alternative-zuplo),
  [/api-gateways/apigee-alternative-zuplo](/api-gateways/apigee-alternative-zuplo),
  [/api-gateways/aws-api-gateway-alternative-zuplo](/api-gateways/aws-api-gateway-alternative-zuplo)
- See Zuplo reviews on [G2](https://www.g2.com/products/zuplo/reviews)
