---
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: "2026-09-04"
---

# 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.

## Slide to your real volume. Get your custom pricing.

An interactive calculator estimates your plan and monthly cost from a
monthly-request slider (10K–50M) plus a set of add-ons and counted allowances:

- **Add-ons** — MCP Gateway, AI Gateway, Developer Portal, and Monetization are
  included on every plan. SSO + RBAC, Audit logs, and an SLA guarantee (99.5%
  baseline, up to 99.999% on Enterprise) are Enterprise-only.
- **Developer seats** — your team, not your API's consumers; 2 are included on
  every plan, more requires Enterprise.
- **Custom domains** — none on Free, up to 2 on Builder, more requires
  Enterprise.

The underlying recommendation logic:

- **Free** — $0/mo. Free forever for ≤100K requests/mo. No credit card. Includes
  100K requests/month, 1 day of analytics/live logs/traces, up to 2 developer
  seats, and GitOps with GitHub.
- **Builder** — $25/mo base + $100 per additional 100K requests, up to a ceiling
  of 1M requests/mo. $25/mo flat covers ≤100K requests, up to 2 custom domains,
  and 2 developer seats. Designed for solo entrepreneurs and hobbyists, not
  teams.
- **Enterprise** — From $1,000/mo, a minimum spend on an annual contract. Custom
  contract; volume discounts, SLA, and selected add-ons are priced individually.

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

Most teams cut gateway spend by 40–70% in the first quarter. Here's what
changes.

### Zuplo vs Kong

Typical pain on Kong:

- 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 on Apigee:

- 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 on AWS API Gateway:

- 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 stars 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 — scroll the
rows, the plans stay pinned at the top.

Who it's for:

|                  | Free                                                    | Builder                                                   | Enterprise                                       |
| ---------------- | ------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------ |
| **Price**        | Free (no credit card)                                   | $25/mo (solo & hobby projects)                            | From $1,000/mo (annual contract)                 |
| **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          | No   | $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 | No   | No                            | 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   | Yes         | Yes     | Yes        |
| Real-time token usage & cost tracking       | Yes         | Yes     | Yes        |
| Universal AI API                            | Yes         | Yes     | Yes        |
| Fallbacks, load balancing, retries, routing | Yes         | Yes     | Yes        |
| Semantic Caching                            | Yes         | Yes     | Yes        |

### Platform

| Feature                                                  | Free              | Builder     | Enterprise                              |
| -------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------- | ----------- | --------------------------------------- |
| Developer Portal                                         | Yes               | Yes         | Yes                                     |
| [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                                               | No                | No          | Add-on                                  |
| API Usage Audit logs                                     | No                | No          | Add-on                                  |
| [Monetization](/features/api-monetization)               | 100K events       | 100K events | Add-on                                  |
| Observability                                            | No                | No          | 1 plugin included, optionally add more  |
| [Federated Gateways](/docs/dedicated/federated-gateways) | No                | No          | Add-on                                  |
| Secure tunnels, mTLS, VPC Peering                        | No                | No          | Add-on                                  |
| [DDoS Protection](/docs/articles/waf-ddos)               | Basic             | Basic       | Add-on (or bring your own solution)     |

### Service & Support

| Feature                                  | Free | Builder | Enterprise            |
| ---------------------------------------- | ---- | ------- | --------------------- |
| Service Level Agreement (SLA)            | No   | No      | 99.5% (up to 99.999%) |
| Single Sign-On (SSO) & Role-Based Access | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| Community Support & Chat                 | Yes  | Yes     | Yes                   |
| Email & Ticketed Support                 | No   | No      | Yes                   |
| Premium Support (24x7x365)               | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| Support SLA                              | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| SOC 2 Type 2 Compliance                  | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| Business Associate Agreement (BAA)       | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| Custom Contracts & Redlines              | No   | No      | Add-on                |
| Consulting & Onboarding Services         | No   | No      | 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 — deploy your first API in 5 minutes. Free tier includes 100K
  requests/month, no credit card, no sales call: https://portal.zuplo.com/signup
- Talk to an Architect: [/schedule-call](/schedule-call)
