Clerk Pricing 2026
Plans, hidden costs, and alternatives compared
Cite this data: Toolradar, Clerk pricing verified Oct 2026, toolradar.com/tools/clerk/pricing
Clerk starts at $1.67/month on the Pro plan.
Verified Oct 2026 from the official pricing page.
Is Clerk worth the price?
Clerk offers the most developer-friendly auth with 50K free users, enough for most startups to reach revenue before paying.
Pro at $20/mo is reasonable, but SMS and enterprise SSO add-ons can surprise you.
Pricing Plans
Hobby (Free)
Free
No credit card required
- 50,000 monthly retained users
- Unlimited applications
- Pre-built UI components
- Social login
- Email/password auth
- Bot protection
- Community support
Pro
$20/month (annual)
$25/month if billed monthly
- 50,000 MRU included
- Overage: $0.02/MRU (50K-100K)
- Remove Clerk branding
- MFA (SMS + TOTP)
- Passkeys
- Enterprise SSO (SAML/OIDC)
- 24/7 email support
Business
$250/month (annual)
$300/month if billed monthly
- Same MRU pricing as Pro
- 10 dashboard seats included
- B2B authentication add-on available
- Administration features
- Priority support
Enterprise
Custom
Annual billing only
- 99.99% uptime SLA
- Committed use discounts
- HIPAA compliance
- Dedicated support
- Custom contracts
Hidden Costs & Gotchas
SMS authentication costs $0.01 per message (US/CA), adds up for MFA-heavy apps
Enterprise SSO connections cost $75/month each on Pro
B2B authentication add-on is $85/month extra
Satellite domains (custom auth domains) cost $10/month each
MRU counts retained users, not active, deleted users still count until month resets
Our Recommendation
startup
Hobby plan handles 50K users free. Upgrade to Pro ($20/mo annual) when you need branding removal or SSO. Budget for SMS if using phone verification.
enterprise
Business at $250/mo for dashboard seats and admin features. Enterprise for SLA guarantees and HIPAA.
freelancer
Hobby is perfect for client projects. 50K users covers virtually any freelance project without cost.
How Clerk compares
5 of 6 direct competitors offer a free plan.
Clerk Pricing FAQ
How much does Clerk cost?
Clerk starts at $1.67/month on the Pro plan. It offers 2 paid tiers ranging from $1.67/month to $20.83/month. A free plan is also available.
Does Clerk have a free plan?
Yes. Clerk offers a free plan called "Hobby (Free)". It includes: 50,000 monthly retained users, Unlimited applications, Pre-built UI components.
What is the cheapest Clerk paid plan?
The cheapest paid plan for Clerk is "Pro" at $1.67/month. Key features include: 50,000 MRU included, Overage: $0.02/MRU (50K-100K), Remove Clerk branding.
What are alternatives to Clerk?
Alternatives to Clerk include Auth0, Firebase Authentication, Okta, Stytch. Keycloak is fully free. Auth0 starts at $35/month, billing unit not specified; Okta starts at $6/user/month; Stytch starts at $0.05/month, billing unit not specified.
Clerk alternatives
Direct competitors. Starting prices match the table above.
Sources
- Official Clerk pricing: clerk.com/pricing (verified Oct 2026)
- Cite this data: Toolradar, Clerk pricing verified Oct 2026, toolradar.com/tools/clerk/pricing
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