Best LLM Router / Comparisons / Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Vercel AI Gateway
Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Vercel AI Gateway
Two hosted gateways from platforms many teams already use. Cloudflare's is built around observability and control at its edge; Vercel's around one key and one bill for many providers inside a Vercel project.
In one line: Choose the gateway of the platform you already deploy on; both are hosted only.
Facts checked 11 Nov 2026 against each vendor’s public docs.
Cloudflare AI Gateway
Hosted gatewayHosted
A hosted gateway on Cloudflare's network for analytics, logging, caching, rate limiting, retries and model fallback in front of the providers you use.
- Pricing model
- Provider price plus a fee on credits
- ZDR on inference
- Not documented
- Web search in the call
- Not documented
Vercel AI Gateway
Hosted gatewayHosted
A hosted API for models from many providers with routing, fallbacks, prompt caching and usage monitoring, billed from prepaid credits at list price.
- Pricing model
- No markup on tokens
- ZDR on inference
- Not documented
- Web search in the call
- Not documented
Side by side
| Criterion | Cloudflare AI Gateway | Vercel AI Gateway |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Core features (analytics, caching, rate limiting) are free on all plans. Credits bought through Unified Billing carry a 5% fee; provider inference is passed through with no markup.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 | No markup and no platform fee on tokens, including with your own keys. You pay the provider's list price from prepaid credits; payment processing fees may apply. A free tier covers a subset of models.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 |
| Routing and fallbacks | Model aliases and fallbacks, conditional dynamic routes, request retries and rate limiting.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 | Routing, fallbacks, prompt caching and usage monitoring, with budgets per API key.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 |
| Privacy terms | Logs are stored in Workers Logs or Legacy Logs depending on when the account made its first gateway, and can be deleted. DLP scanning is free on all plans.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 | Not verified here. Check Vercel's AI Gateway docs for its retention terms and each provider's.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 |
| Model coverage | Workers AI, OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, Amazon Bedrock, Azure OpenAI and more, through a unified OpenAI-compatible endpoint or each provider's own endpoint.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 | Models from many providers. The live list, with prices and context windows, is on the models page and a public model list API.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 |
| Latency overhead | No overhead figure is published. Caching can serve repeated requests from Cloudflare's cache instead of the provider.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 | No overhead figure is published in the pages checked. Measure it against a direct provider call before you commit.Source, checked 11 Nov 2026 |
Pricing
Cloudflare's core features (analytics, caching, rate limiting) are free on all plans, and credits bought through Unified Billing carry a 5% fee. Vercel states no markup and no platform fee on tokens, with payment processing fees possible.
Caching and logs
Cloudflare can answer repeated requests from its cache and stores logs you can query, push out and delete. Vercel documents prompt caching and usage monitoring with budgets per key.
Which suits whom
Choose Cloudflare AI Gateway if
- You're on Cloudflare and want caching, logs and rate limits at no base cost
- Repeated prompts make an edge cache worth it
Choose Vercel AI Gateway if
- Your app runs on Vercel and you want gateway, billing and budgets in one place
- You want list-price tokens with no markup
Choose the gateway of the platform you already deploy on; both are hosted only.