Alternatives hub · AI Gateway
LLM Gateway alternatives
If LLM Gateway does not fit your budget, workflow, or rights requirements, these catalog tools cover the same creator jobs. Every row is checked against the official page — no invented scores.
Alternatives at a glance
Same job, different trade-offs. Open any profile for full sources and limitations.
| Tool | Category | Best for | Pricing note |
|---|---|---|---|
| OpenRouter | AI Gateway | Developers and teams who want one API key for many models with hosted reliability, without running or maintaining any gateway infrastructure. | Pay-as-you-go with prepaid credits; model prices pass through at list price. Free: 25+ free models from 4 providers, 50 requests/day. Standard: 500+ models from 80+ providers, 5.5% platform fee, provider passthrough rate limits. Business: 8% platform fee, adds EU/US in-region routing and up to 1,000 workspaces. BYOK is fee-free up to $25,000/month of list-price inference, then 5%. Enterprise: custom, SSO/SAML and SLAs. · source-cited |
| Requesty | AI Gateway | Developers who want an OpenRouter-style hosted gateway with a flat 5% markup, bring-your-own-keys and EU data residency, without running infrastructure. | Free: $0, access to free models, 200 requests/day, routing, caching and EU data residency. Pay as you go: model cost plus a 5% markup (a $10 per 1M-token model costs $10.50), 600+ models, bring your own keys, spend limits, MCP gateway. Enterprise: custom (SSO, RBAC, audit logs, SLAs). No per-seat pricing or minimum spend. · source-cited |
| LiteLLM | AI Gateway | Developers and platform teams who want a self-hosted, free AI gateway with granular spend control, virtual keys, and fallbacks — without per-token platform fees. | Open source and self-hosted is free forever ($0): 100+ providers behind one OpenAI-compatible API with virtual keys, users and teams, spend tracking, budgets and rate limits, LLM fallbacks, request/response logging, and Prometheus metrics. Enterprise is priced annually by gateway request capacity (never per token) and adds SSO/SCIM, OIDC/JWT auth, audit logs, secret managers and key rotation, org and team admins, multi-region control plane, 24/7 support with SLAs, and air-gap deployment; a 30-day trial key is available without a credit card. from litellm.ai/pricing. · source-cited |
| Bifrost | AI Gateway | Engineering teams running high-traffic LLM apps that want a fast, self-hosted gateway with failover and caching, and an enterprise path for clustering and guardrails. | Open source under Apache 2.0 and free to self-host. Bifrost Enterprise (private deployments with adaptive load balancing, clustering, guardrails and an MCP gateway) has a 14-day free trial; its price is not published. · source-cited |
Choose the right alternative
OpenRouter
Developers and teams who want one API key for many models with hosted reliability, without running or maintaining any gateway infrastructure.
Pay-as-you-go with prepaid credits; model prices pass through at list price. Free: 25+ free models from 4 providers, 50 requests/day. Standard: 500+ models from 80+ providers, 5.5% platform fee, provider passthrough rate limits. Business: 8% platform fee, adds EU/US in-region routing and up to 1,000 workspaces. BYOK is fee-free up to $25,000/month of list-price inference, then 5%. Enterprise: custom, SSO/SAML and SLAs.
Requesty
Developers who want an OpenRouter-style hosted gateway with a flat 5% markup, bring-your-own-keys and EU data residency, without running infrastructure.
Free: $0, access to free models, 200 requests/day, routing, caching and EU data residency. Pay as you go: model cost plus a 5% markup (a $10 per 1M-token model costs $10.50), 600+ models, bring your own keys, spend limits, MCP gateway. Enterprise: custom (SSO, RBAC, audit logs, SLAs). No per-seat pricing or minimum spend.
LiteLLM
Developers and platform teams who want a self-hosted, free AI gateway with granular spend control, virtual keys, and fallbacks — without per-token platform fees.
Open source and self-hosted is free forever ($0): 100+ providers behind one OpenAI-compatible API with virtual keys, users and teams, spend tracking, budgets and rate limits, LLM fallbacks, request/response logging, and Prometheus metrics. Enterprise is priced annually by gateway request capacity (never per token) and adds SSO/SCIM, OIDC/JWT auth, audit logs, secret managers and key rotation, org and team admins, multi-region control plane, 24/7 support with SLAs, and air-gap deployment; a 30-day trial key is available without a credit card. from litellm.ai/pricing.
Bifrost
Engineering teams running high-traffic LLM apps that want a fast, self-hosted gateway with failover and caching, and an enterprise path for clustering and guardrails.
Open source under Apache 2.0 and free to self-host. Bifrost Enterprise (private deployments with adaptive load balancing, clustering, guardrails and an MCP gateway) has a 14-day free trial; its price is not published.
Direct comparisons
Side-by-side pages involving LLM Gateway.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the best alternative to LLM Gateway?
- The most direct alternative to LLM Gateway is OpenRouter. It is best suited for developers and teams who want one API key for many models with hosted reliability, without running or maintaining any gateway infrastructure. You can also evaluate Requesty, LiteLLM, Bifrost depending on your specific requirements. Use the decision table above to compare pricing and feature trade-offs.
- Are there free alternatives to LLM Gateway?
- Yes. Options such as OpenRouter, Requesty offer free plans or open-source tiers. Check the pricing notes above for details on credit limits and commercial rights.
Keep the decision honest
Pricing, credit systems, and commercial terms change often. Every profile is checked against the official site — Verify the current plan before subscribing. Estimate your gateway cost If an alternative here does not fit, the comparisons hub covers more pairs.