Forte vs. Vercel

Run your application, authentication, and payments together.

Vercel is a strong platform for frontends and Next.js. Forte runs any container and includes authentication, payments, and request debugging.

Or go straight to the cost comparison.

Feature by feature

A straightforward look at how Forte compares to Vercel.

Deploy model
VercelFrontend + serverless functions
Forte✓ Any container, always-on
Deployment pipeline
VercelPush to a branch. Tag or release deploys need your own Action.
Forte✓ Push to a branch, or deploy only on a published GitHub release
Payments
Vercel✗ Not included
Forte✓ Built in. Create subscriptions with one API call.
User authentication
Vercel✗ Bring your own (Auth.js)
Forte✓ Built-in user auth and management
Debugging
VercelPer-deployment logs
Forte✓ Trace any request by ID
Billing
VercelUsage-based; bandwidth billed separately
Forte✓ Predictable, flat-rate instances
Seat & platform fees
Vercel$20 per deploying seat / month (Pro)
Forte✓ No seat fees. Pay only for usage.
Network egress
VercelIncludes 1 TB of data transfer, then $0.15/GB. Includes 10 GB of origin transfer, then $0.06/GB.
Forte✓ No egress fees for APIs, web traffic, or content.
Lock-in
VercelTuned for Next.js
Forte✓ Runs any container

Total cost of ownership

Choose a workload to compare monthly costs. The full breakdown stays visible below.

One developer, light traffic

12,000 req/mo · 1 × 0.25 vCPU / 0.5 GB · 1 developer · 5 builds/mo

Estimated monthly cost

Includes Vercel and $50 in priced services.

Vercel Pro
From$70/mo

Estimated at the selected workload

Debugging & operating
3.9 hours/month
Forte
$10/mo

Estimated at the selected workload

Debugging & operating
1 hour/month
Cost & time at a glance

Hover a bar for its complete breakdown. Every scale starts at zero.

Monthly cost

USD / month
Vercel Pro
$70/mo
8 dimensions · 3 bills
Forte
$10/mo
5 dimensions · 1 platform bill

Debugging & operating

Hours / month
Vercel Pro
3.9 hours/month
Forte
1 hour/month

$60/mo less on Forte. That's about 86% cheaper for the same workload.

Estimated hours per month spent debugging and operating the platform — keeping it running, not building features. Not included in dollar totals.

Responsibility
VercelForte
Application & runtime operations
Capacity, runtime upgrades, service health and incident recovery
0.3 hrs0 hrs
Database operations
Backups, upgrades, capacity and query health
0.3 hrs0 hrs
Integrations & upgrades
Auth, payments, observability and cross-vendor compatibility
1.3 hrs0.2 hrs
Debugging & on-call
Tracing failures, incident response and production diagnosis
1.8 hrs0.7 hrs
CI/CD & networking
Deploy pipelines, routing, certificates and network configuration
0.2 hrs0.1 hrs
Services outside the vendor plan

Priced services are included in the headline total. Items without a public price still need a quote.

Per month
VercelForte
Managed PostgresSupabase Pro · Micro database-only estimate with 1 GB storage. Included on Forte.Included in total
$25Included
User authenticationClerk Pro · 60 estimated retained users (60% of active users) · 1 dashboard seat · sign-in, sessions, and MFA. Included on Forte.Included in total
$25Included
Subscriptions & paymentsBuild it yourself on Stripe · No license fee. You build and maintain the integration.
Not pricedBuilt in, Stripe-backed
Add-ons subtotal
$50$0
Complete stack total
$70$10
Cost breakdown

How each total is calculated

Credits and included usage are applied before the total. Published list rates; taxes are excluded.

Vercel Pro
Pro platform fee
1 deploying seat + $20 usage credit
$20.00
Active CPU
1 vCPU-hours · 35% estimated utilization while requests are in flight
$0.00
Provisioned memory
1 GB-hours while requests are in-flight
$0.00
Function invocations
first 1M included, then $0.60 per million
$0.00
Edge requests
first 10M included, then $2.00 per million
$0.00
Fast Data Transfer
1 GB · first 1 TB included, then $0.15/GB
$0.00
Fast Origin Transfer
1 GB · 25% dynamic-origin estimate · first 10 GB included, then $0.06/GB
$0.00
Image Optimization
6,000 cache reads · 5,000 transformations · no Pro allowance
$0.27
Builds
5 builds/mo · ~10 min each on a 4-vCPU machine at $0.0035/CPU-min · draws the shared $20 credit
$0.70
Monthly usage credit
$20 credit, applied to usage then expires
−$0.98
Managed Postgres
Supabase Pro · Micro database-only estimate with 1 GB storage. Included on Forte.
$25.00
User authentication
Clerk Pro · 60 estimated retained users (60% of active users) · 1 dashboard seat · sign-in, sessions, and MFA. Included on Forte.
$25.00
Total$69.99/mo
  • Viewer seats are free on Pro; only deploying seats are billed.
  • Regional rates shown are Washington D.C. (iad1), Vercel's cheapest US region.
Forte
Provisioned compute
1 × 0.25 vCPU / 0.5 GB always on
$5.11
Active compute
6 of 183 max vCPU-hours · 3% duty cycle across 0.25 vCPU
$1.07
Database storage
1 GB · backups and replication included
$0.50
Database compute
5 of 365 max vCPU-hours · 1% duty cycle across 0.5 vCPU
$0.86
Network egress
1 GB at ~80 KB/response
Included
Team seats
1 developer · no per-seat fee
Included
Build & Deploy
5 runs/mo · $2.00 first, then $0.01/build-minute (~10 min each)
$2.40
User authentication
Managed users, sessions, and MFA — no per-user fee
Included
Subscriptions & payments
Built in, Stripe-backed
Included
Total$9.94/mo

Rates as of July 2026, from Forte's and Vercel's published prices. Build frequency is estimated at about 5 runs a month at ~10 minutes each. Actual usage changes your bill. Treat this as an estimate, not a quote.

Want a quote instead? Share your bill.

What you operate

One product usually needs several services

Vercel covers part of the product. Other services provide the rest. Each one adds an account, a bill, and another system to maintain.

Multiple services

With Vercel

4 vendors
  • VercelFrontend & function hostingVercel
  • Supabase ProManaged PostgresSupabase Pro
  • Clerk ProUser authenticationClerk Pro
  • Build it yourself on StripeSubscriptions & paymentsBuild it yourself on Stripe

Integration code, credentials, dashboards, and failure handling stay with your team.

Forte puts these parts in one platform

With Forte

1 platform
  • Frontend & function hostingIncluded
  • Managed PostgresIncluded
  • User authenticationIncluded
  • Subscriptions & paymentsBuilt in, Stripe-backed

One operational view for deployments, users, payments, databases, and request-level debugging.

Migrate from Vercel in 15 minutes

No special tooling. No migration scripts. Just point Forte at your existing repository.

  1. 1

    Connect your GitHub repo

    Forte connects to GitHub and builds any container. Next.js, another framework, or a plain backend all work.

  2. 2

    Move your environment variables

    Copy your project's environment variables into Forte. Same keys, same values.

  3. 3

    Push your code

    git push to your branch. Forte builds and deploys automatically, or set the service to deploy only when you publish a GitHub release.

  4. 4

    Turn on sign-in and payments

    Turn on authentication and Stripe-backed payments in Forte. The same platform can now host your app, sign in users, and bill them.

  5. 5

    Point your domain

    Update your DNS to Forte's endpoint. TLS is automatic.

Want your exact number?

The figures above are modeled from public list prices. Send us last month's bill and we'll price your actual workload, line by line, within one business day.

Ship production-ready products faster with Forte.

Connect your repo and launch, operate, debug, scale, and monetize from one platform.