Softwr

Databases · head to head

Canary Labs vs Dragonfly

Canary Labs logo

Canary Labs

Databases

Industrial process historian with published per-tag pricing and no client licence fees

From
$3000/year
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Dragonfly logo

Dragonfly

Databases

High-performance Redis-compatible in-memory datastore with 25x better throughput

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Dragonfly has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Canary Labs pricing steps by tag band rather than actual tags, so a site sitting just above a threshold pays the next band in full; growth from 3,400 to 3,600 tags is a licence purchase, not a rounding error.; Dragonfly flex tier starting at $36/month may be underpriced, requiring careful usage monitoring
  • They diverge on capability: Canary Labs covers Loss-less compression, Dragonfly covers Redis API compatibility.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Canary Labs and Dragonfly actually diverge.

Attributes where Canary Labs and Dragonfly differ
AttributeCanary LabsDragonfly
Starting price$3000/yearFree
Pricing modelPer tag band per yearUsage-based cloud pricing with flexible tiers
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWindows, WebCloud, AWS, GCP, Azure

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Databases).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Canary Labs

  • Loss-less compression
  • Unlimited clients
  • Store and forward
  • Views service
  • Sparkplug B
  • Calculation engine
  • Axiom
  • ODBC and REST

Only in Dragonfly

  • Redis API compatibility
  • Thread-per-core architecture
  • High-performance caching
  • Memory efficiency
  • Real-time leaderboards
  • Message queue support
  • ML feature serving
  • Cloud deployment

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Canary Labs

  • A manufacturer that needs a compliant historian but cannot justify a PI System enterprise agreementnot Dragonfly
  • A water utility replacing SCADA-embedded logging with a historian that survives the next SCADA replacementnot Dragonfly
  • An Ignition site that wants long-term storage and trending without paying per-client for dashboardsnot Dragonfly
  • A plant with regulatory data-retention obligations where swinging-door compression would not survive an auditnot Dragonfly

Dragonfly

  • High-throughput caching for web applicationsnot Canary Labs
  • Real-time leaderboards and rankingsnot Canary Labs
  • Message queue and event processingnot Canary Labs
  • ML model feature serving at millisecond latenciesnot Canary Labs
  • Gaming session state and player data storagenot Canary Labs

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Canary Labs

  • Pricing steps by tag band rather than actual tags, so a site sitting just above a threshold pays the next band in full; growth from 3,400 to 3,600 tags is a licence purchase, not a rounding error.
  • CustomerCare at 18 percent of licence cost is effectively mandatory on perpetual licences because lapsing it removes upgrades, so the perpetual option is not really a one-time cost.
  • The storage format is proprietary; getting data out at volume means the ODBC connector, an additional 2,500 USD one-time or 1,000 USD a year, or writing against the REST API.
  • Canary is a small vendor with a limited partner network outside North America, so support coverage and integrator availability in Europe and Asia are thinner than for AVEVA or Ignition.
  • It is a Windows-only server product with no Linux or container deployment, which complicates placing collectors in modern edge estates.

Dragonfly

  • Flex tier starting at $36/month may be underpriced, requiring careful usage monitoring
  • Business tier $2,000/month represents significant jump in cost
  • Limited to in-memory storage, not suitable for cold data or archival
  • Bring-your-own-cloud requirement on Business tier adds operational complexity
  • Cloud availability dependent on AWS/GCP/Azure uptime

Pricing, plan by plan

Canary Labs

$3000/year
  • Subscription, 3,500 tags$3000/year
    • Unlimited Axiom clients
    • Unlimited Excel clients
    • Support and upgrades included
  • Perpetual, 3,500 tags$8730/one-time
    • 7,400 USD licence plus 1,330 USD first-year CustomerCare
    • CustomerCare renews at 18 percent of licence cost per year
    • Unlimited clients
  • Private cloud, 3,500 tags$12320/year
    • Hosted by Canary
    • 1,500 USD one-time setup fee per system
    • Scales to around 58,684 USD per year at 60,000 tags
  • Enterprise unlimited$undefined/year
    • Unlimited tags
    • Negotiated licensing terms
    • Quoted pricing

Dragonfly

Free
  • Free TierFree
    • 100 cloud credits for new signups
    • Equivalent to free trial
  • Business$2000/month
    • Starting price for enterprise offering
    • Bring-your-own-cloud deployment
    • Auto-scaling with custom SLAs
  • Enterprise$undefined/custom
    • Custom pricing
    • Any-cloud deployment
    • Custom instances and sizing

Which should you pick?

Choose Canary Labs if

  • You need loss-less compression.
  • You work on Windows, Web.
  • You also want unlimited clients.
Canary Labs review

Choose Dragonfly if

  • You need redis api compatibility.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Cloud, AWS, GCP, Azure.
  • You also want thread-per-core architecture.
Dragonfly review

Questions people ask

Is Canary Labs or Dragonfly better?
Neither clearly leads. Canary Labs starts at $3000/year and Dragonfly at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Canary Labs or Dragonfly?
Dragonfly has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $3000/year for Canary Labs and Free for Dragonfly.
Does Canary Labs or Dragonfly run on more platforms?
Canary Labs runs on Windows, Web. Dragonfly runs on Cloud, AWS, GCP, Azure.
Can I use Dragonfly for free?
Yes. Dragonfly has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Canary Labs starts at $3000/year.
What is Canary Labs best used for?
Canary Labs is most often used for a manufacturer that needs a compliant historian but cannot justify a pi system enterprise agreement, a water utility replacing scada-embedded logging with a historian that survives the next scada replacement, an ignition site that wants long-term storage and trending without paying per-client for dashboards, a plant with regulatory data-retention obligations where swinging-door compression would not survive an audit. Of those, a manufacturer that needs a compliant historian but cannot justify a pi system enterprise agreement and a water utility replacing scada-embedded logging with a historian that survives the next scada replacement are not what Dragonfly is typically brought in for.
What can Canary Labs do that Dragonfly cannot?
Canary Labs covers Loss-less compression, Unlimited clients, Store and forward, Views service. Dragonfly covers Redis API compatibility, Thread-per-core architecture, High-performance caching, Memory efficiency.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Canary Labs: What does Canary cost?

8,730 USD for a 3,500 tag perpetual system including first-year CustomerCare, or 3,000 USD a year on subscription.

Dragonfly: How much faster is Dragonfly than Redis?

Dragonfly achieves 3.97M queries per second compared to Redis's 718K QPS, representing a 25x improvement. Memory efficiency is also 30% better.

Source
Canary Labs: Are client licences extra?

No. Unlimited Axiom browser clients and unlimited Excel clients are included on every tier.

Dragonfly: Can I migrate from Redis to Dragonfly without code changes?

Yes. Dragonfly maintains full API compatibility with Redis and Memcached, allowing drop-in replacement with minimal to no code modifications.

Source
Canary Labs: Is perpetual cheaper than subscription?

Canary states perpetual pays off after roughly three years, and after that you still pay 18 percent CustomerCare annually.

Canary Labs: Does it use lossy compression?

No. Canary stores every collected value rather than approximating the trend, which matters for regulated data retention.

Share

Related pages

More on Canary Labs

More on Dragonfly

Keep looking

Other head to heads