Beam Cloud vs Napkin
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Beam Cloud and Napkin.
Quick Verdict
3.6/5
Beam Cloud
0 reviews
3.5/5
Napkin
0 reviews
Beam Cloud is rated higher (3.6 vs 3.5). Beam Cloud provides serverless GPU and CPU compute for AI model serving and data pipelines. Scale to zero when not running. Python SDK for easy integration. Pay only for compute used. Napkin lets you write and run Node.js and Python serverless functions directly in the browser with zero setup, deploying them as authenticated HTTP endpoints.
Beam Cloud Serverless GPU infrastructure with per-second billing and instant scaling | Napkin Write and deploy Node.js and Python functions as HTTP endpoints from a browser editor | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 3.6 (0 reviews)✓ | 3.5 (0 reviews) |
| Pricing model | freemium | freemium |
| Starting price | Free tier available | Free tier available |
| Best for | Teams shipping AI inference, agent sandboxes, and spiky GPU workloads who want per-second pricing and the option to self-host or run on their own cloud credits. | Developers who need an HTTP endpoint today — webhooks, bots, scheduled automations, and prototypes — without opening a cloud console or running infrastructure. |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ||
| DDoS protection | ||
| Automated backups | ||
| Snapshots | ✓ | |
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ✓ | |
| Free tier | ||
| Tags | ||
| Tags | free tiergpu availableus datacenterapi access | free tier |
| Visit Beam Cloud → | Visit Napkin → | |
Beam Cloud
Pros
- + Aggressive GPU pricing: H100 PCIE from $1.83/hr on-demand, RTX 4090 serverless at $0.000192/sec
- + Free Developer tier with $30 compute credits every month and no mandatory production subscription
- + Open-source beta9 runtime (AGPL-3.0) with self-host and BYOC on AWS/GCP/Azure
- + Millisecond billing with scale-to-zero; sandboxes with GPU support and GPU checkpoint restore
- + Published per-second and per-hour rates with a transparent cost calculator
Cons
- - No published uptime SLA; young company with a small team behind it
- - Multiple billing units (per-second, per-hour, per-core-second, management fees) make comparison hard
- - Cold-start figures are vendor claims; uncached large images and weight downloads are slower
- - Managed fleet's regional footprint is not published; BYOC assumes you already run a cloud account
- - Container platform, not a VPS — no bare-metal root or kernel-level control on the serverless line
Napkin
Pros
- + Genuinely free plan: $0/month with 25,000 API calls, unlimited functions, custom domains, and team invites
- + One-click deploy from a browser editor — Node.js and Python, no cloud console or CLI required
- + Clear published limits: 500 MB/0.5 vCPU free (2 GB/2 vCPU Pro), 15s/30s timeouts, explicit rate caps
- + Endpoint SSL, auth, production logs, and scheduled triggers included on both tiers
- + Pro tier is capacity-only at $10 per user per month — no feature gating, no sales call
Cons
- - No published SLA, regions, or data residency; small-vendor reliability story
- - Free tier caps at 5 requests/second and a 15-second timeout — real design constraints
- - Browser-only workflow with no local development story and no obvious export path
- - Node.js and Python only — no Go, Rust, PHP, or Ruby runtimes
- - Stale limit figures circulate on marketing and third-party pages, so verify before budgeting
Stay in the loop
Get weekly updates on the best new hosting and infrastructure providers, deals, and comparisons.
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.