Kinde vs WorkOS

SEPT 2026 audit

A comparison of Kinde and WorkOS built from values read directly from each provider's own documentation, with the source recorded against every figure.

Updated September 202615 criteria comparedSources last checked 8 September 2026

The short answer

Choose Kinde if…

Products that want a predictable flat fee and a large free user allowance that does not change when you start paying — 10,500 MAU on every tier is the opposite of Auth0's paid-plan cliff.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Choose WorkOS if…

B2B products where the enterprise features are the product requirement — a million users cost nothing and you pay only for the connections your customers actually use.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Consider something else if…

Kinde: Enterprise SSO only becomes free at the $75 tier, and if you use Kinde's billing there is a 0.5% cut of your own transactions on top of the plan fee.
WorkOS: Those connections are the most expensive here at $125 a month each, so a long tail of small SSO customers costs more than it does at Clerk or Better Auth.

5 sourced criteria separate them — see where, with sources, below.

Visit Kinde documentation Visit WorkOS documentation

No affiliate links, sponsored placements or paid rankings appear on this site. Ordering follows the sourced data and the stated criteria.

01.

At a glance.

Criterion	Kinde	WorkOS
Pricing
Free tier	Yes	Yes
Pricing model	A flat monthly fee with the same MAU allowance at every level, plus a transaction fee when you bill your own customers through Kinde — 0.5% per transaction, discounted 0.1% on Plus and 0.2% above.	No monthly platform fee and no per-user charge below a million: WorkOS gives user management away and bills per enterprise connection instead — SSO and Directory Sync at $125 each per month, audit log streaming at $125 per SIEM connection, event retention at $99 per million events.
Auth
Users included	10,500 monthly active users on every tier including free. Paying more does not buy more users — Pro adds uncapped MAU billing, and the higher tiers add MAU discounts of 6% and 13%.	1,000,000 active users free on AuthKit, then $2,500 per additional million. Two orders of magnitude above the other free allowances here.
SAML single sign-on	Supported	Supported
Multi-factor authentication	Supported	Supported
Compliance
SOC 2	SOC 2 Type 2 completed, with report and attestation from AssuranceLab.	SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
HIPAA	HIPAA compliant; supports customers as a Business Associate.	WorkOS can sign a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) for customers on enterprise plans.
GDPR / data residency	GDPR compliant per Kinde's own stated privacy principles.	WorkOS states it is GDPR compliant. Data residency options are not detailed on this page.

Only criteria both providers publish appear here; a tinted cell marks a real difference. Criteria only one of them documents are listed below, and an absence there means we found no source — not that the feature is missing. How we source this.

The small bar above a value is inetGeek's own lean toward that side — computed from the same facts shown, never a number the provider published. See the picker below "The short answer" to weigh only the criteria you care about.

02.

Where they differ.

Pricing model

Kinde: A flat monthly fee with the same MAU allowance at every level, plus a transaction fee when you bill your own customers through Kinde — 0.5% per transaction, discounted 0.1% on Plus and 0.2% above.
WorkOS: No monthly platform fee and no per-user charge below a million: WorkOS gives user management away and bills per enterprise connection instead — SSO and Directory Sync at $125 each per month, audit log streaming at $125 per SIEM connection, event retention at $99 per million events.

Sources (2) →

Pricing — Kinde ↗
“When you bill your customers with Kinde: 0.5% per transaction MAU is free [...] 0.1% transaction fee discount [...] 0.2% transaction fee discount”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Pricing — WorkOS ↗
“First 1 million active users free [...] $125 / ea [...] Log streaming Per SIEM connection $125 / mo Event Retention Per million events stored $99 / mo”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

Users included

Kinde

10,500 monthly active users on every tier including free. Paying more does not buy more users — Pro adds uncapped MAU billing, and the higher tiers add MAU discounts of 6% and 13%.

WorkOS

1,000,000 active users free on AuthKit, then $2,500 per additional million. Two orders of magnitude above the other free allowances here.

Sources (2) →

Pricing — Kinde ↗
“$0 forever 10,500 monthly active users (MAU) [...] $25 USD per month 10,500 MAU free [...] Uncapped MAU [...] 6% MAU discount [...] 13% MAU discount”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Pricing — WorkOS ↗
“Up to 1 million users Free [...] Per additional 1M users $2,500 / mo”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

SOC 2

Kinde: SOC 2 Type 2 completed, with report and attestation from AssuranceLab.
WorkOS: SOC 2 Type 2 certified.

Sources (2) →

Kinde Security ↗
“Kinde has completed a SOC 2 Type 2 with report and attestation from AssuranceLab.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site
WorkOS Security ↗
“SOC 2 Type 2 certified.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site

HIPAA

Kinde: HIPAA compliant; supports customers as a Business Associate.
WorkOS: WorkOS can sign a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) for customers on enterprise plans.

Sources (2) →

Kinde Security ↗
“Kinde is HIPAA compliant and supports our customers as a Business Associate.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site
WorkOS Security ↗
“Yes, WorkOS can sign business associate agreements for customers under enterprise plans.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site

GDPR / data residency

Kinde: GDPR compliant per Kinde's own stated privacy principles.
WorkOS: WorkOS states it is GDPR compliant. Data residency options are not detailed on this page.

Sources (2) →

Kinde Security ↗
“Kinde is compliant with the GDPR and supports our customers by maintaining strict privacy principles.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site
WorkOS Security ↗
“Yes, WorkOS is GDPR compliant.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official site

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03.

Documented by only one.

These criteria are published by one provider and not the other. An absence here means we have not found a source, not that the feature is missing.

Entry paid planKinde: $25/month for Pro. Plus is $75 and the top tier $250 — each including the same 10,500 MAU as the free plan.

Price per SSO connectionWorkOS: $125 per SSO connection per month for the first 15, falling to $100 at 16–30, $80 at 31–50 and $65 at 51–100. Directory Sync is priced on the same ladder, separately.

SCIM provisioningWorkOS: Supported

Audit logsWorkOS: Billed rather than bundled: $125 per month per SIEM connection for log streaming, plus $99 per month per million events stored.

ISO 27001Kinde: Certified, with a maintained information security management system (ISMS).

Encryption at restKinde: AES-256 encryption for data stored on Kinde's servers.

Role-based access controlWorkOS: Role-Based Access Control is a documented product capability.

04.

Questions this comparison answers.

Should I choose Kinde or WorkOS?

Pick Kinde if Products that want a predictable flat fee and a large free user allowance that does not change when you start paying — 10,500 MAU on every tier is the opposite of Auth0's paid-plan cliff.

Pick WorkOS if B2B products where the enterprise features are the product requirement — a million users cost nothing and you pay only for the connections your customers actually use.

Provider pages

KindeAuth and billing platform where every plan, paid or free, includes the same 10,500 monthly active users — the fee buys features rather than headroom.WorkOSEnterprise-readiness platform selling SSO, directory sync and audit logs per connection, with user management free to a million users.

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