# Emissary vs Zuplo

**Leader by Vioscale score:** Zuplo

| Attribute | Emissary | Zuplo |
|---|---|---|
| **Vioscale score** | 50.2 (54% (medium)) | 67.9 (73% (medium)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 31 | - |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 4 | - |
| adoption.github_stars | 4,519 | - |
| deployment.options | `{"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true}` |
| description.long | An open-source, CNCF incubation project providing a Kubernetes-native API gateway with Layer 7 load balancing and ingress capabilities for microservices, built on Envoy Proxy. | Zuplo is a unified gateway for APIs and AI with a programmable policy engine for models and agents. Provides authentication, rate limiting, spend caps, and audit capabilities across API, LLM, and MCP calls. |
| features.capabilities | `{"mtls":true,"hosting":"self","k8s_native":true,"grpc_support":true,"observability":true,"rate_limiting":true}` | `{"mtls":true,"hosting":"cloud","oauth_oidc":true,"monetization":true,"observability":true,"rate_limiting":true,"graphql_gateway":true,"developer_portal":true,"plugin_ecosystem":"limited","request_transformation":true}` |
| integrations.count | 7 | 7 |
| integrations.list | `[{"name":"Consul"},{"name":"Linkerd"},{"name":"Istio"},{"name":"Knative"},{"name":"Grafana"},{"name":"Prometheus"},{"name":"Datadog"}]` | `[{"name":"Claude Code"},{"name":"Cursor"},{"name":"GitHub Copilot"},{"name":"Codex"},{"name":"Windsurf"},{"name":"ChatGPT"},{"name":"Stripe"}]` |
| language.primary | Python | - |
| license.spdx | Apache-2.0 | - |
| market.availability | `{"primaryMarkets":[],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` | - |
| platform.support | - | `{"cli":true,"web":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"open_source","sourceUrl":"https://emissary-ingress.dev/","retrievedAt":"2026-08-14T08:33:38.485Z"}` | `{"type":"hybrid","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Starter","summary":"Free forever for ≤100K requests/month, no credit card required","features":["100K requests/month","1 day of analytics, live logs & traces","Up to 2 developer seats","GitOps with GitHub","MCP Gateway","AI Gateway","Developer Portal"],"minSeats":1,"commitment":"monthly","components":[{"kind":"fixed","amount":0,"period":"month","currency":"USD"}],"description":"Individuals evaluating Zuplo or shipping a side project","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"requests":"100K/month","analytics_retention":"1 day"}},{"free":false,"name":"Builder","summary":"$25/month + $100 per 100K requests over included amount","features":["Custom domains","10 custom environments","1000 API consumers & keys","7 days analytics retention","1 day log & trace history","2 developer seats included","MCP Gateway","AI Gateway","Developer Portal","GitHub integration"],"minSeats":1,"commitment":"monthly","components":[{"kind":"fixed","amount":25,"period":"month","currency":"USD"},{"per":{"qty":100000,"unit":"requests"},"kind":"metered","amount":100,"currency":"USD"}],"description":"Solo entrepreneurs & hobbyists going live","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"environments":"10","custom_domains":"2","consumers_and_api_keys":"1000"}},{"free":false,"name":"Enterprise","summary":"From $1,000/month annual contract with SLA guarantee and full enterprise features","features":["Custom volume discounts available","SSO + RBAC","Audit logs","99.5% SLA baseline (up to 99.999%)","Unlimited custom domains","Unlimited developer seats","GitOps with GitHub, BitBucket, GitLab, Azure DevOps","30 day analytics retention (custom available)","Unlimited log & trace history","MCP Gateway (unlimited MCP users/servers)","AI Gateway (custom teams)","Developer Portal"],"commitment":"annual","components":[{"kind":"fixed","amount":1000,"period":"month","currency":"USD"}],"description":"Teams, scaling APIs & mission-critical workloads","contactSales":true,"includedLimits":{"environments":"None","custom_domains":"None"}}],"summary":"Free tier for ≤100K requests/month. Builder at $25/month with metered usage. Enterprise from $1,000/month with custom pricing available.","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://zuplo.com","retrievedAt":"2026-08-03T12:06:13.330Z","startingPrice":{"amount":25,"period":"month","currency":"USD"},"billingPeriods":["month"]}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | open_source | freemium |
| pricing.price_level | free | low |
| pricing.transparent | yes | no |
| release.cadence_days | 18 | - |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.1.0","date":"2026-05-19T21:35:22Z","type":"stable","version":"v4.1.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.1.0-rc.0","date":"2026-05-01T19:56:39Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v4.1.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.0.1","date":"2026-03-26T22:54:46Z","type":"stable","version":"v4.0.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.0.1-rc.0","date":"2026-04-30T20:43:30Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v4.0.1-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.0.0-rc.2","date":"2026-03-06T16:28:04Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v4.0.0-rc.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v4.0.0-rc.1","date":"2025-12-02T19:04:29Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v4.0.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.10.0","date":"2025-07-29T17:20:40Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.10.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.9.1","date":"2023-11-20T16:00:55Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.9.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.9.1","date":"2023-11-20T15:59:12Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.9.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.9.0","date":"2023-11-13T12:42:42Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.9.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.9.0","date":"2023-11-13T12:40:29Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.9.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.8.2","date":"2023-10-11T14:11:25Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.8.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.8.2","date":"2023-10-11T14:09:30Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.8.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.8.1","date":"2023-09-18T14:54:43Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.8.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.8.1","date":"2023-09-18T14:53:18Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.8.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.8.0","date":"2023-08-29T12:30:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.8.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.8.0","date":"2023-08-29T12:28:24Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.8.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.7.2","date":"2023-07-25T17:22:42Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.7.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/chart/v8.7.2","date":"2023-07-25T17:20:17Z","type":"stable","version":"chart/v8.7.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/emissary-ingress/emissary/releases/tag/v3.7.1","date":"2023-07-13T17:36:17Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.7.1"}]` | - |
| reliability.sla_pct | - | 99.99 |
| reliability.status_page | - | yes |
| security.scorecard | 5.9 | - |
| security.soc2 | - | yes |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":0,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Femissary-ingress%2Femissary%2Fv3&per_page=100","last_12m":0,"max_severity":null}` | - |

## Capabilities (API Gateways)

| Capability | Emissary | Zuplo |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Hosting | Self-hosted only | Cloud only |
| Kubernetes-native | ✓ | - |
| **Traffic** |  |  |
| Rate limiting | ✓ | ✓ |
| Request/response transformation | - | ✓ |
| **Security** |  |  |
| OAuth2 / OIDC / JWT | - | ✓ |
| Mutual TLS | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Protocols** |  |  |
| GraphQL gateway | - | ✓ |
| gRPC support | ✓ | - |
| **Delivery** |  |  |
| Developer portal | - | ✓ |
| Monetization | - | ✓ |
| **Ecosystem** |  |  |
| Plugin ecosystem | - | Limited |
| **Insight** |  |  |
| Observability | ✓ | ✓ |

*Source: Vioscale. Generated 2026-09-01T16:33:27.557Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*