# Axiom vs Better Stack

Canonical: https://inetgeek.com/compare/axiom-vs-betterstack/

Every value below is read from Axiom's and Better Stack's own documentation. See https://inetgeek.com/methodology/ for how.

## At a glance

| Criterion | Axiom | Better Stack |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Entry paid plan | $25/month platform fee for Cloud, plus usage, with no minimum commitment. The plan carries an always-free allowance of 1 TB loaded, 100 GB-hours of query compute and 100 GB stored. | From $29/month, or $34/month depending on the plan selected; Better Stack advertises both figures as starting prices on the same page. |
| Pricing model | A platform fee plus three separate meters — data loaded, query compute in GB-hours, and stored GB — each with an always-free allowance included on every plan and automatic volume discounts above it. | One plan covering uptime monitoring, log management and error tracking together, with exceptions counted per month and web events metered by volume and retention rather than by count. |
| Retention window | 30 days on the free Personal plan; configurable on Cloud rather than fixed. | 90 days for errors and session replays. Logs, traces and web events are retained 3 days on the free personal plan, where retention is what the 3 GB allowance buys rather than a fixed window. |

## Where they differ

### Entry paid plan

- Axiom: $25/month platform fee for Cloud, plus usage, with no minimum commitment. The plan carries an always-free allowance of 1 TB loaded, 100 GB-hours of query compute and 100 GB stored. ([source](https://axiom.co/pricing))
- Better Stack: From $29/month, or $34/month depending on the plan selected; Better Stack advertises both figures as starting prices on the same page. ([source](https://betterstack.com/pricing))

### Pricing model

- Axiom: A platform fee plus three separate meters — data loaded, query compute in GB-hours, and stored GB — each with an always-free allowance included on every plan and automatic volume discounts above it. ([source](https://axiom.co/pricing))
- Better Stack: One plan covering uptime monitoring, log management and error tracking together, with exceptions counted per month and web events metered by volume and retention rather than by count. ([source](https://betterstack.com/pricing))

### Retention window

- Axiom: 30 days on the free Personal plan; configurable on Cloud rather than fixed. ([source](https://axiom.co/pricing))
- Better Stack: 90 days for errors and session replays. Logs, traces and web events are retained 3 days on the free personal plan, where retention is what the 3 GB allowance buys rather than a fixed window. ([source](https://betterstack.com/pricing))

## Which should you choose?

Pick Axiom if Small projects that want a real telemetry platform for nothing — 500 GB a month loaded with 30-day retention, permanently, is the most generous free allowance in this category.

Pick Better Stack if Teams who would otherwise buy uptime monitoring, log management and error tracking separately, and would rather have one bill and one dashboard.

Consider something else: Axiom — Query compute is billed as its own meter in GB-hours, so an expensive dashboard costs money even when ingest is inside the allowance.

Consider something else: Better Stack — Web event retention is 3 days on the free plan, which is short enough to miss a Monday-morning investigation of a Friday-night incident.

## Documented by only one

- When you exceed a cap: Axiom: Billed, then paused per meter. Charges accrue past the Always Free allowance until they reach the spending limit you set, at which point Axiom stops the actions that cost money — and it stops them meter by meter: exhausting query compute halts queries and the monitors that depend on them while ingestion keeps running on an unspent data-loading allowance. Axiom says plainly that this can interrupt service.
- Regions: Axiom: Two, both on AWS: US East 1 and EU Central 1. Axiom calls them edge deployments — you pick one per organisation and event data is stored at rest there, while the console stays at app.axiom.co. Datasets in one organisation can sit in different deployments. New ones are added on request rather than published as a roadmap.
- Events included: Better Stack: 100,000 exceptions and 5,000 session replays a month on the free personal plan, plus 30 GB metrics and 3 GB each of logs, traces and web events. Six meters, priced separately: exceptions at $0.000050 each, replays at $0.00150, metrics at $0.50 per GB per month.
- Session replay: Better Stack: Supported

## Questions this comparison answers

**Entry paid plan: Axiom or Better Stack?**

Axiom: $25/month platform fee for Cloud, plus usage, with no minimum commitment. The plan carries an always-free allowance of 1 TB loaded, 100 GB-hours of query compute and 100 GB stored.
Better Stack: From $29/month, or $34/month depending on the plan selected; Better Stack advertises both figures as starting prices on the same page.

**Should I choose Axiom or Better Stack?**

Pick Axiom if Small projects that want a real telemetry platform for nothing — 500 GB a month loaded with 30-day retention, permanently, is the most generous free allowance in this category.
Pick Better Stack if Teams who would otherwise buy uptime monitoring, log management and error tracking separately, and would rather have one bill and one dashboard.