Pick Airbyte if
teams who will burn the 14-day Cloud trial (400 credits, ~100 GB) or stay on Core $0, then buy Standard at $20/month when they want hosted hourly syncs without standing up Docker.
Read the Airbyte pageAirbyte vs Estuary
Our take
Pick Airbyte if teams who will burn the 14-day Cloud trial (400 credits, ~100 GB) or stay on Core $0, then buy Standard at $20/month when they want hosted hourly syncs without standing up Docker. Pick Estuary if data teams who will stay on Developer Free at $0 (10 GB / month, 2 connector instances) while they open a first Captures list, then buy Cloud at $0.50 / GB + $100 / connector / month when they outgrow 10 GB
Best for
Airbyte Move data on a schedule you can self-host
Estuary CDC pipelines you start at $0
Free plan
Airbyte $0 · community Slack/GitHub support. You run the metal
Estuary $0 · free up to 10 GB / month. 2 concurrent connector instances. No card on the Free tile we fetched
Lowest paid
Airbyte Standard $20/mo
Estuary Cloud $0.50
Next step up
Airbyte Plus $189/mo
Estuary Worked example on the page $100
Runs where
Airbyte Local; you host it
Estuary Hosted
Watch out
Airbyte Standard is $20 plus leftover credits
Estuary Free is 10 GB and 2 connector instances
Last checked
Airbyte 2026-10-22 · airbyte.com/pricing
Estuary 2026-10-23 · estuary.dev/pricing
Which one, then?
Pick Estuary if
data teams who will stay on Developer Free at $0 (10 GB / month, 2 connector instances) while they open a first Captures list, then buy Cloud at $0.50 / GB + $100 / connector / month when they outgrow 10 GB or need a third instance.
Read the Estuary page