Clerk vs Kinde
User management and authentication as a service
vs. Flexible authentication, user management, and feature flags
Pricing tiers
Clerk
Free
50k MAU included. No SSO/SAML. Perfect for side projects and early prototypes.
Free
Pro
$25/mo (or $20/mo annual). 50k MAU, $0.02 each after. 1 enterprise SSO connection per app. Webhooks, JWT templates, custom session duration.
$25/mo
Business
$300/mo (or $250/mo annual). Advanced organizations, enhanced support, additional enterprise features.
$300/mo
Enterprise
Custom. Volume MAU discounts, SLA, workspace-wide SAML SSO, dedicated support.
Custom
Kinde
Free
10,500 MAU included. MFA, B2B orgs, custom domain, 2 custom roles, 1 webhook, 2 environments.
Free
Pro
Unlimited webhooks, roles, feature flags, API keys. Remove Kinde branding. SOC 2 attestation.
$25/mo
Plus
Unlimited enterprise SSO, API scopes, org-owned M2M apps, 6 environments.
$75/mo
Scale
11 environments, custom domain per org, SCIM, MFA triggers, 30-day audit logs.
$250/mo
Enterprise
Custom. Dedicated infra option, volume discounts, custom SLAs.
Custom
Free-tier quotas head-to-head
Comparing hobby on Clerk vs free on Kinde.
| Metric | Clerk | Kinde |
|---|---|---|
| custom roles | — | 2 roles |
| environments | — | 2 envs |
| feature flags | — | 10 flags |
| mao | 100 orgs/month | — |
| mau | 50000 users/month | — |
| mau included | — | 10500 users/month |
| sso connections | 0 connections | — |
| webhooks | — | 1 webhooks |
Features
Clerk · 15 features
- Account Portal — Hosted sign-in/user profile pages at accounts.yourapp.com — zero UI code, fully …
- Bot Protection — Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA integrated into sign-up.
- Clerk Billing — Built-in Stripe-powered billing: subscriptions, plans, proration — ties directly…
- Enterprise SSO (SAML/OIDC) — SAML and OIDC for enterprise customers. Per-domain connection. Pro+ (1 included)…
- Impersonation — Act as a user from dashboard to debug. Logged.
- JWT Templates — Custom JWT issuance for third-party backends (Supabase, Hasura, Firebase, Convex…
- Machine Tokens (M2M) — API keys and machine tokens for service-to-service auth in addition to user sess…
- Multi-Factor Auth — TOTP (authenticator apps), SMS OTP, backup codes. Forced or optional per user.
- Organizations (B2B) — Multi-tenant orgs with roles, permissions, invitations, domain allowlist, and pe…
- Passkeys (WebAuthn) — Passwordless passkey sign-in with per-device biometrics.
- Prebuilt Components — Drop-in React components: <SignIn/>, <SignUp/>, <UserButton/>, <OrganizationSwit…
- Sessions — Server-side session tokens. Sliding expiration by default; configurable absolute…
- User Management — Full user CRUD, metadata (public/private/unsafe), email/phone verification, ban/…
- Waitlist Mode — Collect sign-ups before opening the app. Approve waitlist entries to activate ac…
- Webhooks — Events: user.created/updated/deleted, session.created, organization.* — delivere…
Kinde · 14 features
- API Scopes — OAuth scopes for your APIs, enforced server-side (Plus+).
- B2B Organizations — Multi-tenant orgs with user roles, invitations, feature flags per org.
- Custom Domain — Host auth at auth.yourbrand.com. Free tier includes this.
- Enterprise SSO — SAML 2.0 + OIDC enterprise connections (Plus unlimited).
- Feature Flags — Built-in feature flags with per-user/org overrides. No separate service needed.
- Kinde AI — AI-assisted query and insights over your Kinde data.
- Kinde Billing (preview) — Built-in subscription billing linked to users/orgs. Stripe under the hood.
- Machine-to-Machine — Client credentials grant for service-to-service auth.
- Multi-Factor Auth — TOTP authenticator apps, SMS, email, passkey.
- Passwordless — Email code + passkey (WebAuthn).
- Roles & Permissions — RBAC with roles → permissions. Assigned per user or per organization.
- SCIM Provisioning — Directory provisioning from IdPs (Scale tier).
- Sign-in Widget — Hosted pages + themeable widget for login/signup. Customizable with CSS.
- Webhooks — Event webhooks: user.created/updated, organization events, MFA, etc.
Developer interfaces
| Kind | Clerk | Kinde |
|---|---|---|
| SDK | @clerk/astro, @clerk/backend / @clerk/clerk-sdk-node, @clerk/chrome-extension, @clerk/clerk-expo, @clerk/clerk-js (vanilla), @clerk/clerk-react, @clerk/clerk-react-native, @clerk/nextjs, @clerk/nuxt, @clerk/remix, clerk-sdk-go, clerk-sdk-python, clerk-sdk-ruby, @clerk/tanstack-start, @clerk/vue | Kinde Android / Kotlin, Kinde Flutter SDK, Kinde Go SDK, Kinde iOS / Swift, @kinde-oss/kinde-auth-nextjs, @kinde-oss/kinde-auth-react, @kinde-oss/kinde-nodejs-sdk, Kinde Python SDK |
| REST | Backend REST API, Frontend API | Kinde Management API |
| MCP | Clerk MCP | Kinde MCP |
| OTHER | Webhooks (Svix) | — |
Staxly is an independent catalog of developer platforms. Outbound links to Clerk and Kinde are plain references to their official websites. Pricing is verified against vendor pages at publication time — reconfirm before buying.
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