OpenRouter vs Portkey: pricing, quotas & features (2026)
Unified API for 300+ LLMs across 60+ providers — 1 key, any model
vs. Enterprise AI gateway + observability + guardrails + prompt mgmt
Data sourced from vendor documentation · Last updated June 2026
Summary
OpenRouter and Portkey are both ai-gateway platforms, addressing the same core use case with different implementation philosophies and trade-offs. Both offer a free tier, making it easy to prototype without a credit card. Portkey offers paid plans from $49/month; OpenRouter does not publish standard pricing. Portkey has a broader documented feature set (18 vs 15 features). The right choice depends on your existing stack, team experience, and feature requirements. All pricing and quota data below is sourced from OpenRouter and Portkey's official documentation — not generated by AI or estimated.
OpenRouter vs Portkey: Comparativa de precios, cuotas y características (2026)
En esta comparativa analizamos OpenRouter y Portkey lado a lado — incluyendo precios mensuales, límites del tier gratuito, características técnicas, cuotas de uso (almacenamiento, transferencia, usuarios activos mensuales) y los interfaces de desarrollo disponibles. Todos los datos proceden de la documentación oficial de cada proveedor, no de respuestas generadas por IA.
OpenRouter es una plataforma de la categoría ai-gateway — Unified API for 300+ LLMs across 60+ providers — 1 key, any model. Ofrece 3 tiers de precio: Free gratuito, Pay-as-you-go gratuito, Enterprise (personalizado). Su catálogo en Staxly documenta 15 características y 4 interfazes para desarrolladores.
Portkey pertenece a la categoría ai-gateway — Enterprise AI gateway + observability + guardrails + prompt mgmt. Ofrece 4 tiers de precio: Developer (Free) gratuito, Gateway (OSS) gratuito, Production desde $49/mes, Enterprise (personalizado). Su catálogo documenta 18 características y 6 interfazes para desarrolladores.
A continuación encontrarás los tiers de precio completos de ambas plataformas, una matriz de cuotas del tier gratuito (transferencia, almacenamiento, MAU, llamadas a la API y otros límites), el listado completo de características y los interfaces (CLI, SDKs, REST, GraphQL, MCP) disponibles para integrar cada servicio.
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Pricing tiers
OpenRouter
Portkey
Free-tier quotas head-to-head
Comparing free on OpenRouter vs free on Portkey.
| Metric | OpenRouter | Portkey |
|---|---|---|
| No overlapping quota metrics for these tiers. | ||
Features
OpenRouter · 15 features
- 300+ Models — Claude, GPT, Gemini, Llama, Mistral, Qwen, DeepSeek, Cohere, Grok + open-source.
- 60+ Providers — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Together, Fireworks, Groq, DeepInfra, Replicate, etc.
- Auto Fallback — Automatic retry to backup provider on failure.
- Bring Your Own Key — Use your own provider keys → pay providers directly + no platform fee.
- Credit System — Prepay credits via card, crypto, or bank.
- Data Retention Controls — Opt-out of training/retention per provider.
- Free Models Tier — 25+ models available at $0 (limited rate).
- Prompt Caching — Automatic cache for identical prefixes (provider-dependent).
- Provider Preferences — Pin preferred providers per request or default.
- Rankings & Stats — Public leaderboard of most-used models.
- Regional Routing — Route requests to specific geographic regions.
- Streaming — SSE + partial completions.
- Structured Outputs — JSON-mode + JSON schema across supporting models.
- Tool Use / Function Calling — Unified tool calling across providers.
- Unified OpenAI-Compat API — Same endpoint for every model + provider.
Portkey · 18 features
- AI Gateway — Unified OpenAI-compatible API to 250+ LLMs.
- Alerts — Thresholds on latency, error rate, cost, usage.
- Budget Controls — Per-key + per-team spending limits.
- Evaluations — Built-in evaluator templates + custom.
- Fallbacks — Config-driven provider fallback chains.
- Guardrails — Pre/post processors for safety + compliance.
- Load Balancing — Round-robin, weighted, least-latency across providers.
- MCP Support — Use MCP servers as tools through gateway.
- OSS Gateway — Open-source gateway (portkey-ai/gateway).
- Observability — Logs, traces, feedback, alerts, cost tracking.
- Prompt Library — Shared prompt library + public marketplace.
- Prompt Templates — Version + test + collaborate on prompts.
- Retries — Configurable retry policies per route.
- Role-Based Access Control — Team permissions on prompts + keys.
- Semantic Caching — Vector-based cache on query meaning.
- Simple Caching — Exact-match cache.
- VPC Deployment (Ent) — Deploy in your own VPC for compliance.
- Virtual Keys — Per-app keys with budget + rate limits + permissions.
Developer interfaces
| Kind | OpenRouter | Portkey |
|---|---|---|
| CLI | — | Portkey CLI |
| SDK | Any OpenAI SDK | portkey-ai (Node), portkey-ai (Python) |
| REST | OpenRouter API (OpenAI-compat) | Portkey API (OpenAI-compat) |
| MCP | OpenRouter MCP | Portkey MCP |
| OTHER | OpenRouter Dashboard | Portkey Dashboard |
Key takeaways
- Both OpenRouter and Portkey offer a free tier — OpenRouter ("Free") and Portkey ("Developer (Free)") — with no credit card required to start.
- Portkey's entry paid tier (Production) costs $49/month; OpenRouter does not list public pricing.
- Portkey has a broader documented feature set (18 features) vs. OpenRouter (15 features) in Staxly's catalog.
- Developer integrations differ: only Portkey offers CLI.
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