# External Secrets Operator vs Infisical

**Leader by vioscaleAI score:** Infisical

| Attribute | External Secrets Operator | Infisical |
|---|---|---|
| **vioscaleAI score** | 54.8 (42% (low)) | 68.9 (67% (medium)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 58 | 100 |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 5 | 0 |
| adoption.github_stars | 6,903 | 29,735 |
| content.faq | `[{"answer":"External Secrets Operator integrates Kubernetes with third-party secret management services like AWS Secrets Manager, HashiCorp Vault, and others, automatically fetching and injecting secret values into native Kubernetes Secrets. It is indexed under Secrets Management Tools.","source":"https://external-secrets.io/","question":"What is External Secrets Operator?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"External Secrets Operator is open source, so it can be self-hosted and used at no licence cost. It is released under the Apache-2.0 licence. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://external-secrets.io/","question":"Is External Secrets Operator free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"External Secrets Operator supports a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://external-secrets.io/","question":"What platforms does External Secrets Operator support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. External Secrets Operator can be deployed cloud / SaaS, on-premise and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://external-secrets.io/","question":"Can External Secrets Operator be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 8 integrations for External Secrets Operator, including AWS Secrets Manager, HashiCorp Vault, Google Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, IBM Cloud Secrets Manager, Akeyless, CyberArk Secrets Manager and Pulumi ESC. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://external-secrets.io/","question":"What does External Secrets Operator integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. External Secrets Operator is published under the Apache-2.0 licence, a permissive licence that generally allows commercial use and modification. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets","question":"Is External Secrets Operator open source?","confidence":0.95}]` | `[{"answer":"A secrets management solution that provides a single, encrypted repository for storing and controlling access to application credentials, certificates, and privileged access. It enables teams to automatically sync, rotate, and audit secrets across cloud, on-premises, and AI infrastructure while enforcing fine-grained access controls and approval workflows. It is indexed under Secrets Management Tools.","source":"https://infisical.com/blog/hashicorp-vault-pricing","question":"What is Infisical?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Infisical offers a free tier, so you can start without paying. Paid plans start at $20 per identity per month. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://infisical.com/","question":"Is Infisical free?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Infisical supports the web and a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://infisical.com/blog/hashicorp-vault-pricing","question":"What platforms does Infisical support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. Infisical can be deployed cloud / SaaS, on-premise and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://infisical.com/blog/hashicorp-vault-pricing","question":"Can Infisical be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 6 integrations for Infisical, including Checkly, Vercel, AWS, GitHub, Datadog and Anthropic. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://infisical.com/blog/hashicorp-vault-pricing","question":"What does Infisical integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed SOC 2, HIPAA and GDPR for Infisical. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as Infisical not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://infisical.com/","question":"What security certifications does Infisical have?","confidence":0.48},{"answer":"Infisical is available worldwide. Its primary market is the United States.","source":"https://infisical.com/","question":"Where is Infisical available?","confidence":0.5}]` |
| deployment.options | `{"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true,"on_prem":true,"self_hosted":true}` |
| description.long | External Secrets Operator integrates Kubernetes with third-party secret management services like AWS Secrets Manager, HashiCorp Vault, and others, automatically fetching and injecting secret values into native Kubernetes Secrets. | Open-source platform for centralizing and securing application secrets, certificate lifecycle, and privileged access management. Includes automatic secret rotation, dynamic secret generation, and integration with deployment tools and infrastructure platforms. |
| features.capabilities | `{"hosting":"both","tool_type":"sync_inject","secret_rotation":true,"open_source_core":true,"kubernetes_native":true,"fine_grained_policy":true}` | `{"pki_ca":true,"hosting":"both","tool_type":"store","audit_logging":true,"fips_validated":true,"dynamic_secrets":true,"secret_rotation":true,"open_source_core":true,"kubernetes_native":true,"fine_grained_policy":true,"encryption_as_a_service":true}` |
| integrations.count | 18 | 60 |
| integrations.list | `[{"name":"AWS Secrets Manager"},{"name":"HashiCorp Vault"},{"name":"Google Secrets Manager"},{"name":"Azure Key Vault"},{"name":"IBM Cloud Secrets Manager"},{"name":"Akeyless"},{"name":"CyberArk Secrets Manager"},{"name":"Pulumi ESC"},{"name":"1Password"},{"name":"GitHub"},{"name":"Google Secret Manager"},{"name":"Yandex Lockbox"},{"name":"Conjur"},{"name":"SecretServer"},{"name":"BeyondTrust"},{"name":"OpenBao"},{"name":"ngrok"},{"name":"Infisical"},{"name":"VolcEngine"},{"name":"AWS Certificate Manager"},{"name":"OpenStack Barbican"},{"name":"Azure AD"},{"name":"Pulumi"},{"name":"Webhook"},{"name":"DVLS"}]` | `[{"name":"Checkly"},{"name":"Vercel"},{"name":"AWS"},{"name":"GitHub"},{"name":"Datadog"},{"name":"Anthropic"},{"name":"Slack","native":true,"category":"chat"},{"name":"Docker","native":true,"category":"container"},{"name":"Kubernetes","native":true,"category":"container-orchestration"},{"name":"Terraform","native":true,"category":"infrastructure"},{"name":"GitLab","native":true,"category":"source-control"},{"name":"GitHub Actions","native":true,"category":"ci-cd"},{"name":"Okta","native":true,"category":"identity"},{"name":"Active Directory","native":true,"category":"identity"},{"name":"Jira","native":true,"category":"project-management"},{"name":"GCP Certificate Manager","native":true,"category":"certificate-management"},{"name":"LDAP","native":true,"category":"identity"},{"name":"MCP","native":true,"category":"api"},{"name":"Heroku"},{"name":"Cloudflare"},{"name":"Google Cloud"},{"name":"Stripe","category":"payments"},{"name":"Keeper"},{"name":"Let's Encrypt"},{"name":"DigiCert"},{"name":"Microsoft AD CS"}]` |
| language.primary | Go | TypeScript |
| license.spdx | Apache-2.0 | - |
| market.availability | - | `{"primaryMarkets":["US"],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` |
| platform.support | `{"cli":true}` | `{"cli":true,"web":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"open_source","summary":"Free, open source","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://external-secrets.io/","retrievedAt":"2026-10-15T20:25:43.513Z"}` | `{"type":"subscription","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Community Edition","summary":"Free, self-hosted","features":["KV secrets storage","dynamic secrets","transit encryption","HTTP API","CLI"],"description":"Self-hosted open-source version with core secrets management features","contactSales":false},{"free":false,"name":"Paid Tier","summary":"$18/month per identity with up to 50 integrations","features":["fine-grained RBAC","secret rotation","dynamic secrets","PKI and certificate management","audit logging","SAML SSO"],"components":[{"kind":"per_unit","unit":"identity","amount":18,"period":"month","currency":"USD"}],"description":"Cloud-hosted managed platform with enterprise features","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"integrations":"50"}}],"summary":"Free self-hosted tier. Paid starting at $18/month per identity.","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://infisical.com/blog/hashicorp-vault-pricing","retrievedAt":"2026-09-10T21:12:23.352Z","startingPrice":{"unit":"identity","amount":18,"period":"month","currency":"USD"},"billingPeriods":["month"]}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | open_source | freemium |
| pricing.price_level | free | low |
| pricing.starting_price | - | `{"amount":18,"currency":"USD"}` |
| pricing.transparent | yes | yes |
| release.cadence_days | 2 | 1 |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.12.0","date":"2026-10-06T08:44:36Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.12.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.12.0","date":"2026-10-06T11:40:43Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.12.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.11.0","date":"2026-09-21T12:12:54Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.11.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.11.0","date":"2026-09-18T14:38:00Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.11.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.10.0","date":"2026-08-28T11:49:18Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.10.0","date":"2026-08-28T13:09:40Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.10.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.9.0","date":"2026-08-08T12:43:21Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.9.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.9.0","date":"2026-08-07T16:37:22Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.9.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.8.0","date":"2026-07-18T16:52:08Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.8.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.8.0","date":"2026-07-18T05:36:33Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.8.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.7.0","date":"2026-06-26T12:05:27Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.7.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.7.0","date":"2026-06-26T13:35:17Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.7.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.6.0","date":"2026-06-07T06:20:46Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.6.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.6.0","date":"2026-06-05T17:56:12Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.6.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.5.0","date":"2026-05-15T12:27:05Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.5.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.5.0","date":"2026-05-15T13:06:51Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.5.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.4.1","date":"2026-04-28T10:26:32Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.4.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.4.1","date":"2026-04-28T11:07:11Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.4.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.4.0","date":"2026-04-24T15:15:37Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.4.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/helm-chart-2.4.0","date":"2026-04-24T18:43:56Z","type":"stable","version":"helm-chart-2.4.0"}]` | `[{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.5","date":"2026-10-12T20:28:28Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.4","date":"2026-10-12T13:14:33Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.3","date":"2026-10-08T21:26:59Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.2","date":"2026-10-07T04:13:34Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.1","date":"2026-10-06T21:55:03Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.166.0","date":"2026-10-06T16:51:00Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.166.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.17","date":"2026-10-05T20:53:18Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.17"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.16","date":"2026-09-23T15:44:50Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.16"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.15","date":"2026-09-22T14:12:05Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.15"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.14","date":"2026-09-21T12:54:30Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.14"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.13","date":"2026-09-18T21:07:08Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.13"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.12","date":"2026-09-16T18:58:37Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.12"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.11","date":"2026-09-15T23:44:38Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.11"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.10","date":"2026-09-11T14:21:48Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.10"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.9","date":"2026-09-10T00:33:12Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.9"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.8","date":"2026-09-08T13:47:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.8"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.7","date":"2026-09-07T19:27:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.7"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.6","date":"2026-09-04T23:20:32Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.6"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.5","date":"2026-09-04T19:59:29Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/Infisical/infisical/releases/tag/v0.165.4","date":"2026-09-04T17:46:21Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.165.4"}]` |
| reliability.sla_pct | - | 99.99 |
| reliability.status_page | - | yes |
| security.certifications | - | `[{"name":"SOC 2","status":"active"},{"name":"HIPAA","status":"active"},{"name":"FIPS 140-3","status":"active"}]` |
| security.disclosure_policy | - | yes |
| security.gdpr | - | yes |
| security.hipaa | - | yes |
| security.scorecard | 8.2 | - |
| security.soc2 | - | yes |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":6,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Fexternal-secrets%2Fexternal-secrets&per_page=100","last_12m":4,"max_severity":"CRITICAL"}` | `{"count":0,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Finfisical%2Finfisical&per_page=100","last_12m":0,"max_severity":null}` |

## Capabilities (Secrets Management Tools)

| Capability | External Secrets Operator | Infisical |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Core** |  |  |
| Tool type | Sync / injection | Secret store / engine |
| Dynamic (short-lived) secrets | - | ✓ |
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Hosting | Cloud + self-hosted | Cloud + self-hosted |
| **Lifecycle** |  |  |
| Automatic secret rotation | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Crypto** |  |  |
| Encryption as a service (transit) | - | ✓ |
| **Compliance** |  |  |
| FIPS 140-2/3 validated crypto | - | ✓ |
| HSM support | - | - |
| **Access** |  |  |
| Fine-grained / identity-based policy | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Governance** |  |  |
| Audit logging | - | ✓ |
| **Integration** |  |  |
| Kubernetes native (CRD / CSI / K8s auth) | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Scope** |  |  |
| PKI / certificate authority | - | ✓ |
| **Licensing** |  |  |
| Open-source core | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Ecosystem** |  |  |
| CNCF maturity | - | - |

*Source: vioscaleAI. Generated 2026-10-16T21:42:15.207Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*