Clerk vs Saleor
User management and authentication as a service
vs. Open-source, GraphQL-first commerce for composable brands
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
Saleor
OSS (self-host)
$0. BSD-3-Clause. Self-host Saleor Core + Dashboard.
$0 base (usage-based)
Cloud — Development
$0. Dev tier for sandbox projects. Shared infra. Community.
$0 base (usage-based)
Cloud — Staging
$179/mo. Staging tier with dedicated env.
$179/mo
Cloud — Production
$1,999/mo. Production tier with SLA + support.
$1999/mo
Enterprise
Custom. Multi-region, SAML, dedicated clusters, PCI.
Custom
Free-tier quotas head-to-head
Comparing hobby on Clerk vs oss on Saleor.
| Metric | Clerk | Saleor |
|---|---|---|
| mao | 100 orgs/month | — |
| mau | 50000 users/month | — |
| sso connections | 0 connections | — |
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…
Saleor · 17 features
- Channels — Per-channel pricing/shipping/currency.
- Checkout — Multi-step checkout mutation set.
- Customers + B2B — Customer records + B2B permissions.
- Dashboard — Next.js admin dashboard.
- Gift Cards — First-class gift-card flow.
- Orders — Full lifecycle.
- Permissions + Roles — Granular RBAC.
- Pricing + Promotions — Rule-based promos, catalog pricing.
- Products + Attributes — Full PIM features.
- Saleor Apps — External extensions.
- Shipping Zones + Methods — Multi-zone shipping rules.
- Tax Providers — Pluggable tax (Avalara, etc.).
- Translations — Multi-language product content.
- Variants + Configurable — Deep variant system.
- Vouchers — Discount codes + gift cards.
- Warehouses + Stock — Multi-warehouse inventory.
- Webhooks — Async subscription to events.
Developer interfaces
| Kind | Clerk | Saleor |
|---|---|---|
| CLI | — | saleor CLI |
| 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 | @saleor/app-sdk, @saleor/sdk |
| REST | Backend REST API, Frontend API | — |
| GRAPHQL | — | Saleor GraphQL API |
| MCP | Clerk MCP | — |
| OTHER | Webhooks (Svix) | Saleor App Store, Saleor Dashboard, Saleor Webhooks |
Staxly is an independent catalog of developer platforms. Outbound links to Clerk and Saleor are plain references to their official websites. Pricing is verified against vendor pages at publication time — reconfirm before buying.
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