Where Hookdeck Event Gateway's free tier stops
Hookdeck Event Gateway Hookdeck's free Developer plan stops at 10,000 events per month, 100,000 discarded requests per month, 3-day event data retention, 1 included user, and 5 events per second of throughput per project. That is enough for a small integration or a narrow test environment, but it leaves little room for higher-volume event ingestion, longer debugging windows, or shared access. Once you need more history, more people, or steadier throughput, you are past the free tier's ceiling and into paid usage.
Switch table
| Hookdeck Event Gateway | Hook0 | Posthook | Hook Relay | Svix | Kong Konnect | Knock | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| monthly events or messages | 10,000 events per month | 100 events per day | 1,000 hooks per month | 100 deliveries per day | Included messages not stated in free tier items | 10M API requests per month stored | Up to 10,000 messages per month |
| discarded requests | 100,000 discarded requests per month | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated |
| retention | 3-day event data retention | 7 days of data retention | 7-day log retention | 14-day retention | 30-day payload retention | 30 days analytics retained | Not stated |
| users or team members | 1 user | 1 developer | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | Unlimited team members |
| throughput per second | 5 events per second per project | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated | 50 messages per second | No Gateway limits during the 30-day trial | Not stated |
| projects or endpoints | Not stated | 1 application, 10 subscriptions, 10 event types | 3 projects | 3 hook endpoints | Not stated | Up to 5 Serverless Gateways, up to 2 Hybrid Gateways, up to 2 Dedicated Cloud Gateways | Unlimited notification workflows, unlimited broadcasts, unlimited delivery channels |
| Card required | - | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| First paid tier | - | Startup, €59 /mo excl. VAT | Launch, $39 /month | Basic, $30/month | Professional, from $490 / month | Plus, charged per Gateway per month | Starter, $250/ month |
The alternatives
Hook0
FTV 68 / 100Hook0's free cloud tier gives you a fully managed webhook service with no infrastructure to own, plus 1 developer, 1 application, 10 event types, 10 subscriptions, up to 100 events per day, 7 days of data retention, community support, and no credit card required. The free plan is narrower than Hookdeck on daily volume, but it gives you more retention and a more complete webhook delivery workflow, including delivery attempts, retries, signatures, replay defense, and dashboard replay. It is a better fit if you want a hosted webhook service with a small but real ongoing free allowance. Switch if your priority is a simple managed webhook stack and you can live within the smaller daily cap.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: 7 days of data retention
- Falls short: Up to 100 events per day
- Who should switch: Switch to Hook0 if you want a hosted webhook service with slightly longer free retention and can stay well under 100 events a day.
Posthook
FTV 47 / 100Posthook's free plan includes 1,000 hooks per month, 3 projects, 7-day log retention, 15-minute alerts, and email alerts. That makes it a lighter-weight option than Hookdeck, but it is useful if your main job is scheduling HTTP callbacks rather than ingesting live inbound events. It also adds alerting and per-hook activity views, which can be enough for reminders, follow-ups, expirations, and recurring sequences. It falls short on raw volume and on the kind of real-time webhook gateway behavior Hookdeck provides. Choose it if your workload is scheduled callbacks and you do not need an event gateway with higher throughput or discard handling.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: Scheduled callback workflows with alerting
- Falls short: 10,000 events per month
- Who should switch: Switch to Posthook if your use case is webhook scheduling, reminders, or recurring callback delivery rather than inbound event ingestion.
Hook Relay
FTV 49 / 100Hook Relay's free forever tier includes 100 deliveries per day, 14-day retention, and 3 hook endpoints. It is a small plan, but it is a practical fit for developers who want webhook infrastructure without building and running their own delivery backend. Compared with Hookdeck, the free tier gives you a longer retention window and a clear endpoint-based model, while staying simple to set up. Where it falls short is scale: the daily delivery cap is much lower than Hookdeck's monthly event allowance, and it is not aimed at higher-throughput ingestion pipelines. Use it when you want a basic hosted relay for a few endpoints and modest traffic.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: 14-day retention
- Falls short: 5 events per second throughput per project
- Who should switch: Switch to Hook Relay if you only need a few webhook endpoints and want a longer free retention window for troubleshooting.
Svix
FTV 78 / 100Svix's free tier includes Dispatch, Stream, and Ingest, plus no credit card required, 99.9% uptime SLA, 50 messages per second, 30-day payload retention, an embeddable webhooks UI, and connectors and transformations. It is the strongest free option here for teams that care about observability, delivery tooling, and longer retention. It beats Hookdeck on retention and throughput headroom, and it includes a broader webhook product surface. It falls short on simplicity if all you want is a focused event gateway, because Svix spans sending, receiving, testing, and UI embedding. Switch if you want the most free capacity and the deepest webhook feature set.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: 30-day payload retention
- Falls short: More focused event-gateway simplicity
- Who should switch: Switch to Svix if you want the most free retention and throughput headroom for webhook infrastructure work.
Kong Konnect
FTV 25 / 100Kong Konnect's free trial gives you enterprise functionality for 30 days, no Gateway limits during that trial, analytics retained for 30 days, up to 5 Serverless Gateways, up to 2 Hybrid Gateways, up to 2 Dedicated Cloud Gateways, support for REST, HTTP APIs, LLMs, Kafka, WebSockets, gRPC, and GraphQL, and broad API governance features. It is far wider in scope than Hookdeck, especially if your work spans APIs, gateways, and event streams in one platform. The catch is that it is a 30-day trial, not a perpetual free tier, so it is best for evaluation or a short project. Choose it if you need broad platform coverage more than an ongoing free plan.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: 30-day analytics retention with no gateway limits during the trial
- Falls short: Perpetual free availability
- Who should switch: Switch to Kong Konnect if you need a short-term enterprise-grade evaluation environment across APIs and event streams.
Knock
FTV 70 / 100Knock's free Developer plan includes up to 10,000 messages per month, up to 500 guide active users, 500 AI agent credits, unlimited notification workflows, unlimited broadcasts, unlimited delivery channels, unlimited team members, batch and delay notifications, built-in multi-tenancy, and Google SSO access. It is a better fit for customer messaging and engagement automation than for webhook ingestion. The free tier is generous on workflow breadth and team size, but it is not built around inbound event gateway behavior. It falls short on retention and throughput for event delivery pipelines. Use it if your real need is notification orchestration, not webhook routing.
- Beats Hookdeck Event Gateway: Unlimited team members
- Falls short: 5 events per second throughput per project
- Who should switch: Switch to Knock if your free plan needs are notification workflows and team collaboration rather than webhook ingestion.
Two quick picks
Svix
Svix is the closest drop-in because it is also webhook infrastructure with ingest, dispatch, retention, observability, and no credit card required. Its model is broader than Hookdeck's, but it stays in the same operational category for teams that need webhook handling and monitoring.
Kong Konnect
Kong Konnect offers the most apparent free headroom because the trial removes Gateway limits for 30 days and includes broad platform coverage across APIs, gateways, and event traffic. It is the best fit when you need the widest short-term allowance, not a long-term free plan.
Frequently asked questions
Which alternative has the longest free retention?
Svix lists 30-day payload retention on its free tier, which is longer than Hookdeck's 3-day retention and longer than the other perpetual free options here.
Which option is closest to Hookdeck for webhook ingestion?
Svix is the closest fit for webhook infrastructure. Hook0 and Hook Relay are also in the same general category, but Svix is the most directly comparable on ingest, delivery, and observability.
Which alternatives require no credit card?
Hook0, Posthook, Hook Relay, Svix, Kong Konnect, and Knock all list no credit card required in their free or trial items.
Which free option gives the most room before paying?
Kong Konnect gives the broadest short-term allowance because its 30-day trial removes Gateway limits and includes a wide set of API and event features. Svix gives the best ongoing retention and throughput among the perpetual free options.
Bottom line
For most builders, Svix is the best alternative to try first. It keeps you in the same webhook infrastructure category, includes ingest, dispatch, and observability, and gives you longer 30-day retention with 50 messages per second on the free plan. If you only need a small, ongoing webhook setup, it is the closest mix of free capacity and product fit. If your needs are more about scheduled callbacks or messaging workflows, one of the other options may fit better.
Read the full listing for Hookdeck Event Gateway. Scores use the FTV methodology at /ftv. Browse more alternatives on /alternatives, or head-to-head comparisons on /compare.