Pick Chroma if
app teams who will run chromadb locally or pay Cloud usage after the Starter credits, and already have an embedding model.
Read the Chroma pageChroma vs Zilliz
Our take
Pick Chroma if app teams who will run chromadb locally or pay Cloud usage after the Starter credits, and already have an embedding model. Pick Zilliz if search teams who will stay on Free at $0 (5 GB) while they create a first cluster, then buy Dedicated from $197 / month when they need the SLA.
Zilliz
Managed Milvus. Free
Best for
Chroma A retrieval index you own
Zilliz Vector collections you start at $0
Free plan
Chroma $0 · pip install chromadb
Zilliz $0 · 5 GB storage. “Start for Free.”
Lowest paid
Chroma Team (Cloud) $250/mo
Zilliz Not published by the vendor
Runs where
Chroma Local or hosted
Zilliz Hosted
Watch out
Chroma You bring the embedding bill
Zilliz Free is 5 GB
Last checked
Chroma 2026-10-22 · trychroma.com/pricing
Zilliz 2026-10-23 · zilliz.com/pricing
Which one, then?
Pick Zilliz if
search teams who will stay on Free at $0 (5 GB) while they create a first cluster, then buy Dedicated from $197 / month when they need the SLA.
Read the Zilliz page