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Portkey vs PromptLayer
Portkey and PromptLayer are tools for teams building on large language models, which sit between an app and model providers such as OpenAI and Anthropic and keep track of the requests. Our editors read both companies' own sites, then read what AI and platform engineers say about the two tools in public reviews, community boards and chat forums. The table below compares price, limits and features.
| What buyers compare | Portkey | PromptLayer |
|---|---|---|
| Price per monthSources 3, 4 | Developer free. Production $49. Enterprise: quote | Free. Pro $49. Team $500. Enterprise: quote |
| Free plan or trialSources 3, 4 | Developer plan free forever, for prototypes and proofs of concept | Free plan: 5 users, 2,500 requests per month |
| How usage is countedSources 3, 4 | Recorded logs per month: 10,000 free, 100,000 on Production then $9 per extra 100,000, 10 million+ on Enterprise. Requests past the limit still run | Requests per month: 2,500 Free and Pro, 100,000+ Team. Overage $0.003 per request on Pro, $0.002 on Team |
| Seats and usersSources 3, 4 | Not published | 5 users on Free and Pro, 25 on Team, unlimited on Enterprise |
| Integrations and featuresSources 3, 4 | AI gateway with one API, fallbacks, load balancing and retries. Logs, traces, prompt management and guardrails | Prompt registry, playground, evals and agent nodes. Webhooks from Team |
| Security and deploymentSources 3, 4 | Role-based access on Production. Enterprise: SSO, budgets, rate limits and multiple deployment options | Enterprise: self-hosted or single-tenant, SSO, role-based access, deployment approvals, HIPAA with a BAA |
| Best forSources 1, 2 | Platform teams that want a hosted gateway for routing, fallbacks, budgets and request logs across many LLM providers | Product teams that change prompts often and want a log and version history beside the app |
List prices in US dollars per month before tax, as published on each vendor's site on October 16, 2026, billed monthly unless the cell says otherwise. "Quote" means the vendor sets the price through its sales team. A green check marks a row where the published data shows a clear edge.
Which one fits
Both have a free plan and a $49 first paid tier, so the choice comes down to whether you need routing or prompt management first.
Choose Portkey if
- You want a hosted gateway with fallbacks, retries and load balancing across model providers.
- You want logs and traces next to the gateway. Production records 100,000 logs per month for $49.
- You need prompt templates and guardrails in the same place as routing.
Choose PromptLayer if
- Your product team edits prompts often and wants version history and logs beside the app.
- You want non-engineers to change prompts. PromptLayer keeps prompts in a registry with a playground.
- You want to start free. The free plan covers five users and 2,500 requests per month.
What buyers say
“Portkey is better as the managed gateway with governance dashboards. PromptLayer is better when prompt versioning and observability are the product, not routing.”
treefarmer · HN · · source
“PromptLayer for prompt history and evals around prompts. Portkey when the ops problem is multi-provider routing and spend control.”
tikkun · HN · · source
“Portkey's fallbacks and retries across providers fixed our first problem, which was routing. PromptLayer's registry is what we would reach for if non-engineers needed to edit prompts, and both start free.”
Backend engineer, Series A AI startup
Representative buyer view
Verdict
Both start free and charge $49 for the first paid tier. Portkey (7.9 out of 10, Recommend) is the better fit when your first problem is routing requests across model providers with fallbacks and retries. PromptLayer (6.9 out of 10, Conditional recommend) is the better fit when your first problem is managing prompts, so that non-engineers can edit them in a registry with version history.
Methodology
We read the Portkey and PromptLayer pricing pages and product sites on October 16, 2026 and recorded every published price, limit and plan feature. A cell reads "Not published" when the vendor does not state that detail on its site, and rows where neither vendor publishes anything were left out.
Scores, best-fit notes and buyer quotes come from the AIR reviews of each product, which weight practitioner reviews at 40%, hands-on product checks at 35%, pricing at 15% and docs at 10%. Paid reviews and pay-for-play sites are excluded. Quotes marked Representative buyer view are written by AIR to reflect buyer feedback and carry no source link.