Turso vs Clerk
Edge SQLite — libSQL at the speed of light
vs. User management and authentication as a service
Pricing tiers
Turso
Free
100 DBs, 5 GB storage, 500M row reads/mo, 10M row writes/mo. No credit card.
Free
Developer
Unlimited DBs, 9 GB storage, 2.5B reads, 25M writes.
$5/mo
Scaler
24 GB storage, 100B reads, 100M writes. Teams + DPA support. Price is annual-billed.
$25/mo
Pro
50 GB storage, 250B reads, 250M writes. Teams, DPA, SSO, BYOK, HIPAA, SOC2, priority support. Annual billed.
$417/mo
Enterprise
White-glove support + unlimited usage + dedicated infra.
Custom
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
Free-tier quotas head-to-head
Comparing free on Turso vs hobby on Clerk.
| Metric | Turso | Clerk |
|---|---|---|
| databases | 100 DBs | — |
| mao | — | 100 orgs/month |
| mau | — | 50000 users/month |
| row reads month | 500000000 reads/month | — |
| row writes month | 10000000 writes/month | — |
| sso connections | — | 0 connections |
| storage gb | 5 GB | — |
Features
Turso · 11 features
- Branching — Create DB branches from a primary for staging/test envs.
- BYOK Encryption — Bring your own encryption key (Pro+).
- Edge Routing — Requests route automatically to the nearest replica group.
- Embedded Replicas — Client-side local SQLite file that syncs from the primary — reads are <1ms local…
- libSQL — Turso's open-source SQLite fork with HTTP, WebSocket, and multi-writer support.
- libSQL Server (sqld) — Self-hostable server component. Runs libSQL as a service.
- Multi-Database — Create thousands of DBs cheaply — perfect for per-tenant / per-customer isolatio…
- Point-in-Time Restore — Rollback DB to any moment within backup window.
- Scheduled Backups — Automated point-in-time backups.
- SQLite Compatibility — Drop-in SQLite — same SQL dialect, same file format.
- Teams & RBAC — Org-level access control for Scaler+ tiers.
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…
Developer interfaces
| Kind | Turso | Clerk |
|---|---|---|
| CLI | Turso CLI | — |
| SDK | go-libsql, @libsql/client, libsql-experimental (Python), libsql-rs, libsql-swift | @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 |
| REST | libSQL HTTP, Platform API | Backend REST API, Frontend API |
| MCP | Turso MCP | Clerk MCP |
| OTHER | libSQL WebSocket, SQLite wire protocol | Webhooks (Svix) |
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