Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Helicone

Detailed side-by-side comparison to help you choose the right tool

Cloudflare AI Gateway

🔴Developer

App Deployment

Cloudflare AI Gateway accelerates AI applications with intelligent caching, automates cost optimization through rate limiting, and analyzes LLM usage across OpenAI, Anthropic, Google providers. Reduce AI costs 60%+ with response caching. Free tier available.

Was this helpful?

Starting Price

Free
Full ReviewVisit Site

Helicone

🔴Developer

LLM Observability

Open-source LLM observability and AI gateway — logs every prompt, response, cost, and latency across 20+ providers with a one-line proxy or async SDK, plus caching, retries, and prompt experiments.

Was this helpful?

Starting Price

Free
Full ReviewVisit Site

Feature Comparison

Scroll horizontally to compare details.

FeatureCloudflare AI GatewayHelicone
CategoryApp DeploymentLLM Observability
Pricing Plans6 tiers4 tiers
Starting PriceFreeFree
Key Features
  • • LLM Request Routing
  • • Response Caching
  • • Rate Limiting
  • • Proxy-Based Request Logging
  • • Cost Analytics & Budget Alerts
  • • Gateway-Level Caching

💡 Our Take

Choose Cloudflare AI Gateway if you want an edge-deployed proxy with native fallback, DLP, and tight integration into Workers AI / Vectorize — and especially if you are already on Cloudflare. Choose Helicone if you want a more product-focused observability dashboard with richer prompt-management UI, custom properties, and a workflow geared toward LLM developers rather than infrastructure teams.

Cloudflare AI Gateway - Pros & Cons

Pros

  • ✓Universal proxy supporting all major AI providers
  • ✓Powerful caching reduces costs and improves performance
  • ✓Comprehensive analytics and observability features
  • ✓Easy integration requiring only endpoint URL changes
  • ✓Free tier includes unlimited requests with basic features

Cons

  • ✗Introduces an additional infrastructure dependency
  • ✗Advanced features require paid plans for high-volume usage
  • ✗Configuration can become complex for sophisticated routing policies
  • ✗Limited to Cloudflare's global network infrastructure

Helicone - Pros & Cons

Pros

  • ✓5-minute proxy integration captures full traces, cost, and latency across 20+ providers
  • ✓Real AI gateway features (caching, retries, fallback, key vault) replace a custom proxy
  • ✓MIT-licensed and self-hostable on Postgres + ClickHouse — passes regulated procurement

Cons

  • ✗Proxy mode adds a network hop unless self-hosted in your own region
  • ✗Prompt experiment UX is less mature than dedicated eval platforms like Braintrust
  • ✗Self-hosting requires running ClickHouse, which is an extra ops surface

Not sure which to pick?

🎯 Take our quiz →

🔒 Security & Compliance Comparison

Scroll horizontally to compare details.

Security FeatureCloudflare AI GatewayHelicone
SOC2✅ Yes✅ Yes
GDPR✅ Yes✅ Yes
HIPAA❌ No❌ No
SSO✅ Yes✅ Yes
Self-Hosted—✅ Yes
On-Prem❌ No✅ Yes
RBAC✅ Yes✅ Yes
Audit Log✅ Yes✅ Yes
Open Source❌ No✅ Yes
API Key Auth✅ Yes✅ Yes
Encryption at Rest✅ Yes✅ Yes
Encryption in Transit✅ Yes✅ Yes
Data ResidencyGLOBALUS, EU
Data Retentionconfigurableconfigurable
🦞

New to AI tools?

Read practical guides for choosing and using AI tools

Read Guides →
🔔

Price Drop Alerts

Get notified when AI tools lower their prices

Tracking 2 tools

We only email when prices actually change. No spam, ever.

Get weekly AI agent tool insights

Comparisons, new tool launches, and expert recommendations delivered to your inbox.

No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.

Ready to Choose?

Read the full reviews to make an informed decision

Review Cloudflare AI GatewayReview Helicone