Question 1

Is OpenRouter better than Portkey?

Accepted Answer

It depends on your use case. OpenRouter is known for Unified API for 200+ AI models from all providers, while Portkey AI gateway for reliable and fast LLM applications. See our full comparison above for a detailed breakdown.

Question 2

Is OpenRouter free?

Accepted Answer

OpenRouter pricing: Pay-per-use (varies by model).

Question 3

Is Portkey free?

Accepted Answer

Portkey pricing: Free + Pro plans.

Question 4

What are the main differences between OpenRouter and Portkey?

Accepted Answer

OpenRouter and Portkey differ in features, pricing, and platform support. OpenRouter: Unified API for 200+ AI models from all providers. Portkey: AI gateway for reliable and fast LLM applications. See the full side-by-side comparison above for details.

Feature	OpenRouter	Portkey
Category	LLM APIs & Inference	LLM APIs & Inference
Pricing	Pay-per-use (varies by model)	Free + Pro plans
GitHub Stars	—	✓ More stars 6k
Platforms	Web	Web, Docker
Key Features	✓ 200+ models ✓ Unified API ✓ Auto-fallback ✓ Rate limiting ✓ Usage tracking ✓ OpenAI-compatible	✓ AI gateway ✓ Fallbacks ✓ Load balancing ✓ Caching ✓ Observability
Pros	+ Access to 100+ models via one API + Automatic fallbacks + Pay-per-use pricing + Model comparison features + Free models available	+ Automatic fallbacks + Load balancing + Request caching + Observability built-in + Open-source gateway
Cons	− Added latency from proxy layer − Markup on some model prices − Depends on upstream availability − Limited advanced features	− Added infrastructure layer − Learning curve − Some features need Pro − Latency overhead
Tags	apimulti-modelgatewayroutingpay-per-use	gatewayreliabilityobservabilityapi

OpenRoutervsPortkey

OpenRouter

Portkey

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