§ CDN/securitychecked 25 Aug 2026

what Cloudflare actually costs in 2026

published list price

Pro $20/mo (annual) · Business $200/mo (annual)

unit: per month (flat tier)https://www.cloudflare.com/plans/checked 25 Aug 2026

the Free plan is unusually capable; the jump straight to Business ($200/mo) is rarely justified for a 5-50 person startup.

what companies your size actually pay

We have read no Cloudflare invoices so far, which is fewer than the five we require before publishing a range. Until then this page shows published list pricing only, above.

the levers that work

  • annual billing saves 20% vs monthly at every paid tier ($20 vs $25, $200 vs $250)
  • Free tier already includes core DNS, CDN, and basic DDoS protection — most small sites don't need Pro at all
  • Business tier is often bought for one WAF/image-optimization feature; Workers/Pages usage-based products may be cheaper than upgrading the whole zone plan

Across the audits we have run, roughly 20% of a small company's Cloudflare line is recoverable without changing provider.

the closest alternatives, priced

providerpublished pricesource
Fastlyusage-based, no comparable flat tier, starts ~$50/mo minimumlink
AWS CloudFrontusage-based, no flat tier, pay-per-GBlink

A published price is not a quote. In a full audit we email the alternative as a disclosed agent for your company and get a real price for your exact usage — which is the number your incumbent actually responds to.

see what the rest of your stack should cost.

Drop last quarter's invoices. We name every line you are overpaying, with an annualized amount, free. The full audit is $299 once: it gets a real quote from the alternative for your exact usage and runs the renegotiation with your incumbent until there is an answer. If it does not identify at least $2,990/yr, we refund it in full.

start an audit

Cloudflare is a trademark of its owner. SpendAudit is not affiliated with, endorsed by or a reseller for any vendor on this page. Prices are the vendor's own published figures, checked 25 Aug 2026, and change without notice.