Clerk pricing
How Clerk charges, what to know before you commit, and what you'd pay at your usage — next to what the alternatives would cost for the same thing.
How it charges
Checked 2026-10-03 on clerk.com ↗ · USD, list pricesFree up to 50,000 monthly retained users per app; Pro is $25/month ($20 billed annually) with 50,000 included, then from $0.02 per retained user.
- Free plan
- Yes
- Cheapest paid plan
- $25/mo
- Side project
- $0/mo Hobby
- Growing
- $0/mo Hobby
- Scaling
- $3,725/mo Pro
What the model leaves out
Clerk bills monthly retained users (MRU — users who come back after the day they sign up), not raw MAU, so this model is an upper bound. 50,000 MRUs included per app; graduated overage $0.02 to 100k, $0.018 to 1M, $0.015 to 10M, $0.012 beyond. Hobby gives a one-month grace period above 50k before you must upgrade. Pro is $20/mo billed annually. Business ($300/mo, $250 annual) has the same allowance and rates plus more features.
- Past 50,000 retained users on Hobby you must upgrade to Pro, after a one-month grace period.
- A user counts as retained when they return 24+ hours after signing up, so one-day signups aren't billed.
- Extra SSO connections are $75/month each, and Directory Sync connections beyond the first will be $75/month from January 1, 2027.
- SMS authentication needs Pro and costs $0.01 per SMS in the US and Canada, market rate elsewhere.
| Plan | Monthly fee | Monthly active users |
|---|---|---|
| Hobby | Free | up to 50k MAU |
| Pro | $25/mo | 50k MAU includedthen $0.02 per MAU |
| ↳ next tier | 100k MAU includedthen $0.018 per MAU | |
| ↳ next tier | 1M MAU includedthen $0.015 per MAU | |
| ↳ next tier | 10M MAU includedthen $0.012 per MAU |
What you'd pay
HobbyWithin the free allowance$0/mo
Cost as you grow
All authentication pricing, compared →Which one fits your situation →