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Modal vs RunPod

OCT 2026 audit

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

Reviewed by Palash BagchiUpdated 25 criteria compared

The short answer

Choose Modal if…

Bursty, self-deployed inference where the bill should follow the work. Compute meters per second and per CPU core — a physical core is $0.0000131 per core-second with a 0.125-core minimum — and the H100 hour is $3.95, the cheapest of the four here that publishes one.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Choose RunPod if…

Short experiments and bursty inference — per-second billing and a $0.27 entry card mean an idle hour costs nothing and a small job is genuinely small.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Consider something else if…

  • Modal: You want a large GPU named with its memory before committing, or support without an Enterprise contract. The page lists B200 and B300 but states VRAM only for the A100 rows, so the ceiling is unpublished; SOC 2, HIPAA, RBAC and SSO are all Enterprise.
  • RunPod: The catalogue mixes community and secure capacity, so the cheapest quoted rate is not always the tier a production workload should sit on.

Neither quite fits? Every other option, ranked by iScore: Modal alternatives · RunPod alternatives

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

Visit Modal documentationVisit RunPod 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.

CriterionModalRunPod
Pricing
Entry paid plan$0 a month on Starter — the plan carries no fee at all, and $30 of monthly compute is included before anything is billed. The first plan with a monthly fee is Team at $250.A new account can start with as little as $10 in prepaid credits; deploying a Pod requires at least one hour of credits for the chosen configuration.
Pricing modelA platform fee plus metered compute, and the fee buys a compute allowance rather than access. Starter is $0 a month and includes $30 of compute; Team is $250 a month and includes $100. Compute is billed per second on top of both.Prepaid credit balance drawn down by usage: all compute and storage billed per second, with no data transfer fees.
GPU
H100 SXM, per GPU-hour
$3.95 per hour for an Nvidia H100 SXM5, published as $0.001097 per second. Modal's own worked example on the same page prices a fleet at $3.95 per GPU-hour.
$3.99 per hour for H100 SXM 80GB, single card, on Secure Cloud (the page's default view). The PCIe variant is $2.89 and H100 NVL is $3.19.
Cheapest GPU, per hour
$0.59 per hour for an Nvidia T4, published as $0.000164 per second — the cheapest GPU on the resource table.
$0.27 per hour for an RTX A5000 with 24GB, on Secure Cloud (the page's default view). RTX 3090 is $0.50, RTX 4090 $0.89, L40S $1.09.
Billing granularityPer second, and per CPU core rather than per instance: a physical core is $0.0000131 per core per second with a minimum of 0.125 cores.Per second, with per-hour rates shown for comparison. Clusters can be started with no commitment and scaled to 64 GPUs.
Compliance
SOC 2SOC 2 compliance is listed as an Enterprise-plan feature on the pricing page, alongside HIPAA compatibility, audit logs, RBAC and SSO. No report or certificate is linked from the page itself.SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 examinations completed; reports are listed in the Runpod Trust Center and some require approved access before download.
HIPAAHIPAA compatibility is listed as an Enterprise-plan feature, grouped with SOC 2 and audit logs. The page says compatibility rather than a signed BAA.Maintains a HIPAA program; HIPAA sits among the Trust Center compliance resources, some of which require approved access before download.
Encryption at rest
All user data is encrypted in transit and at rest.
Optional per-Pod volume encryption: the volume disk is encrypted at rest on the host machine, but container disk and network volumes cannot be encrypted.

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.

Entry paid plan

Modal
$0 a month on Starter — the plan carries no fee at all, and $30 of monthly compute is included before anything is billed. The first plan with a monthly fee is Team at $250.
RunPod
A new account can start with as little as $10 in prepaid credits; deploying a Pod requires at least one hour of credits for the chosen configuration.
Sources (2) →

Pricing model

Modal
A platform fee plus metered compute, and the fee buys a compute allowance rather than access. Starter is $0 a month and includes $30 of compute; Team is $250 a month and includes $100. Compute is billed per second on top of both.
RunPod
Prepaid credit balance drawn down by usage: all compute and storage billed per second, with no data transfer fees.
Sources (2) →

H100 SXM, per GPU-hour

Modal
$3.95 per hour for an Nvidia H100 SXM5, published as $0.001097 per second. Modal's own worked example on the same page prices a fleet at $3.95 per GPU-hour.
RunPod
$3.99 per hour for H100 SXM 80GB, single card, on Secure Cloud (the page's default view). The PCIe variant is $2.89 and H100 NVL is $3.19.
Sources (2) →
  • Plans and Pricing — Modal ↗

    “H200 SXM $0.001261 / sec Nvidia H100 SXM5 $0.001097 / sec Nvidia RTX PRO 6000 $0.000842 / sec Nvidia A100, 80 GB $0.000694 / sec Nvidia A100”

    Read 2026-09-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

  • Pricing — RunPod ↗

    “GPU Community Cloud Secure Cloud Per hour Per second [...] H100 SXM 80 GB VRAM 125 GB RAM 20 vCPUs $ 3.99 /hr [...] H100 PCIe 80 GB VRAM 188 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 2.89 /hr [...] H100 NVL 94 GB VRAM 94 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 3.19 /hr”

    Read 2026-10-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

Cheapest GPU, per hour

Modal
$0.59 per hour for an Nvidia T4, published as $0.000164 per second — the cheapest GPU on the resource table.
RunPod
$0.27 per hour for an RTX A5000 with 24GB, on Secure Cloud (the page's default view). RTX 3090 is $0.50, RTX 4090 $0.89, L40S $1.09.
Sources (2) →
  • Plans and Pricing — Modal ↗

    “vidia L4 $0.000222 / sec Nvidia T4 $0.000164 / sec CPU Physical core (2 vCPU equivalent ) $0.0000131 / core / sec *minimum of 0.125 cores pe”

    Read 2026-09-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

  • Pricing — RunPod ↗

    “RTX A5000 24 GB VRAM 25 GB RAM 9 vCPUs $ 0.27 /hr [...] RTX 3090 24 GB VRAM 125 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 0.5 /hr [...] RTX 4090 24 GB VRAM 41 GB RAM 6 vCPUs $ 0.89 /hr [...] L40S 48 GB VRAM 94 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 1.09 /hr”

    Read 2026-10-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

Billing granularity

Modal
Per second, and per CPU core rather than per instance: a physical core is $0.0000131 per core per second with a minimum of 0.125 cores.
RunPod
Per second, with per-hour rates shown for comparison. Clusters can be started with no commitment and scaled to 64 GPUs.
Sources (2) →
  • Plans and Pricing — Modal ↗

    “vidia L4 $0.000222 / sec Nvidia T4 $0.000164 / sec CPU Physical core (2 vCPU equivalent ) $0.0000131 / core / sec *minimum of 0.125 cores pe”

    Read 2026-09-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

  • Pricing — RunPod ↗

    “Per hour Per second [...] Launch multi-GPU clusters in minutes with no commitments. Scale up to 64 GPUs, attach shared storage, and pay only for what you use.”

    Read 2026-10-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

SOC 2

Modal
SOC 2 compliance is listed as an Enterprise-plan feature on the pricing page, alongside HIPAA compatibility, audit logs, RBAC and SSO. No report or certificate is linked from the page itself.
RunPod
SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 examinations completed; reports are listed in the Runpod Trust Center and some require approved access before download.
Sources (2) →
  • Plans and Pricing — Modal ↗

    “eering services Security SOC 2 compliance HIPAA compatibility Audit logs Static IP proxy RBAC SSO Frequently asked questions How does server”

    Read 2026-09-17 · official pricing · Report a correction

  • AI Infrastructure Security & Compliance | Runpod ↗

    “Runpod has also completed SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 examinations, and maintains HIPAA and GDPR programs. [...] The Runpod Trust Center lists current compliance resources, including the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certificate, SOC 2 Type II, SOC 3, HIPAA, GDPR, and the SOC 2 Bridge Letter 2026. Some documents require approved access before download.”

    Read 2026-10-17 · official site · Report a correction

HIPAA

Modal
HIPAA compatibility is listed as an Enterprise-plan feature, grouped with SOC 2 and audit logs. The page says compatibility rather than a signed BAA.
RunPod
Maintains a HIPAA program; HIPAA sits among the Trust Center compliance resources, some of which require approved access before download.
Sources (2) →

Encryption at rest

Modal
All user data is encrypted in transit and at rest.
RunPod
Optional per-Pod volume encryption: the volume disk is encrypted at rest on the host machine, but container disk and network volumes cannot be encrypted.
Sources (2) →

When these numbers change, hear about it. Sources are re-checked monthly; a repricing goes out as a short note.

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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 — except where we say we read the other provider's own page on a given date and it does not state it. Those rows lean, and the provider can correct them with a link.

Free tierModal: Yes
Kind of free offerModal: Free credit — $30 of compute a month on Starter, recurring rather than one-off
What the free plan includesModal: Get started with $30 / month free compute Get Started
RegionsRunPod: 31 regions across the US, Europe, Asia and Australia for on-demand GPU instances.
Uptime SLARunPod: 99.99% uptime SLA, in an enterprise agreement only. Self-serve accounts run at usage-based rates with no contract, and contractual SLAs are added with reserved capacity and committed-use pricing.
Storage priceRunPod: From $0.05 per GB per month, for standard network storage over 1TB ($0.07 under 1TB); high-performance network storage is $0.14 per GB per month.
Audit logsModal: Per Enterprise contract (see Audit logs )
Largest GPU offeredRunPod: 288GB per GPU on B300; B200 at 180GB is $7.99 an hour and H200 at 141GB is $5.29, on Secure Cloud (the page's default view).
Reserved pricingRunPod: Savings plans: a 3-month or 6-month upfront prepaid commitment discounts GPU compute costs; storage stays at standard rates and plans are non-refundable.
Support on entry paid planModal: A community Slack on the lower plans; private Slack support and embedded ML engineering services are Enterprise. Support is a plan feature here rather than something every tier carries.
ISO 27001RunPod: ISMS certified to ISO/IEC 27001:2022 by Sensiba LLP; certificate RUN-ISMS-20260827 valid 27 August 2026 through 26 August 2029. Scope limited to the ISMS supporting Runpod's services and platform, not individual products.Modal: not stated on its own page when read on 2026-09-21 — corrections welcome · every such claim about Modal.
GDPR / data residencyRunPod: Stated fully GDPR compliant for data processed in European data center regions, with documented EU procedures for collection, storage, processing and deletion.Modal: not stated on its own page when read on 2026-09-21 — corrections welcome · every such claim about Modal.
PCI DSSRunPod: Claimed for Secure Cloud's vetted infrastructure partners, who meet enterprise standards including SOC 2, ISO 27001 and PCI DSS certifications. Stated of the data-centre partners behind Secure Cloud, not of Runpod Inc. itself.Modal: not stated on its own page when read on 2026-09-21 — corrections welcome · every such claim about Modal.
Customer-managed keysRunPod: Not supported: Runpod stores the volume encryption key, which cannot be retrieved, and the docs state bring your own key is not supported.Modal: not stated on its own page when read on 2026-09-21 — corrections welcome · every such claim about Modal.
Role-based access controlRunPod: Four team roles — Basic, Billing, Dev and Admin — each with set permissions; Admin has unrestricted access to members, settings, billing and resources.
Private networking / VPCRunPod: Global networking gives each Pod a private IP reachable only by other Pods in the same account; NVIDIA GPU Pods only, in 17 data centers.Modal: not stated on its own page when read on 2026-09-21 — corrections welcome · every such claim about Modal.
Dedicated infrastructureRunPod: Reserved Clusters: dedicated GPU clusters with guaranteed availability, custom configurations and SLA-backed uptime for enterprises scaling to 10,000+ GPUs.
04.

Questions this comparison answers.

Entry paid plan: Modal or RunPod?

Modal: $0 a month on Starter — the plan carries no fee at all, and $30 of monthly compute is included before anything is billed. The first plan with a monthly fee is Team at $250.

RunPod: A new account can start with as little as $10 in prepaid credits; deploying a Pod requires at least one hour of credits for the chosen configuration.

Should I choose Modal or RunPod?

Pick Modal if Bursty, self-deployed inference where the bill should follow the work. Compute meters per second and per CPU core — a physical core is $0.0000131 per core-second with a 0.125-core minimum — and the H100 hour is $3.95, the cheapest of the four here that publishes one.

Pick RunPod if Short experiments and bursty inference — per-second billing and a $0.27 entry card mean an idle hour costs nothing and a small job is genuinely small.

Provider pages

ModalServerless GPU compute metered by the second, sold as a monthly platform fee plus whatever the containers actually burn.RunPodPer-GPU cloud billed by the second, with community and secure tiers and no minimum commitment.

Related comparisons

CoreWeave vs RunPodModal vs BasetenReplicate vs ModalRunPod vs BasetenRunPod vs HyperstackRunPod vs LambdaVast.ai vs RunPodAnthropic vs DeepInfra

Comments

Every page here is sourced and dated.