Softwr

Accounting · head to head

Cledara vs Unit21

Cledara logo

Cledara

Accounting

Software subscription management with a virtual card per application, priced from £100 a month

From
£100/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Unit21 logo

Unit21

Cybersecurity

No-code fraud and AML risk operations platform for fintechs and neobanks

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Cledara control only extends to subscriptions paid on a Cledara card, so anything billed by invoice, bank transfer or a legacy company card is invisible to the system and undermines the inventory it promises.; Unit21 it is built for fintech scale rather than card issuer scale, so organisations reaching very high transaction volumes generally re-evaluate against heavier platforms and face a migration.
  • They diverge on capability: Cledara covers Virtual card per subscription, Unit21 covers No-code rule builder.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Cledara and Unit21 actually diverge.

Attributes where Cledara and Unit21 differ
AttributeCledaraUnit21
Starting price£100/monthOn request
Pricing modelPer month by number of applicationsquote
CategoryAccountingCybersecurity

Identical on both: free tier (No), platforms (Web), user rating (Not yet rated).

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 Cledara

  • Virtual card per subscription
  • Cancel by card
  • Application inventory
  • Approval workflow
  • Invoice collection
  • Accounting export
  • Spend optimisation module
  • IT management and compliance modules

Only in Unit21

  • No-code rule builder
  • Case management
  • SAR filing
  • Backtesting
  • Identity and device signals
  • Data ingestion API

What people use each for

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

Cledara

  • A finance team that cannot say what software the company pays for because everything is on three people's company cardsnot Unit21
  • A company that keeps paying for tools nobody uses and cannot get the vendor to process a cancellationnot Unit21
  • A startup wanting approval on new software purchases before the first charge rather than at the auditnot Unit21
  • A finance function that spends days each month chasing SaaS invoices for the accountantnot Unit21

Unit21

  • A neobank whose sponsor bank requires a documented monitoring programme before it will keep the BIN sponsorshipnot Cledara
  • A crypto exchange needing SAR filing and case management without building an internal compliance engineering teamnot Cledara
  • A payments startup where the fraud lead needs to ship a new rule the same day a new attack pattern appearsnot Cledara
  • A lender consolidating fraud alerts from three point tools into one investigator queue with a single audit trailnot Cledara

Where each one falls short

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

Cledara

  • Control only extends to subscriptions paid on a Cledara card, so anything billed by invoice, bank transfer or a legacy company card is invisible to the system and undermines the inventory it promises.
  • Tier limits are set by number of applications rather than headcount, and twenty applications on the Basic plan is fewer than most companies of fifty actually run, so buyers often land on a higher tier than the entry price suggests.
  • The modules that turn it from a payment layer into a management platform, spend optimisation, IT management and compliance, are each priced at £150 to £200 a month, comparable to the base plan itself.
  • Usage data is inferred from payment and integration signals rather than deep application telemetry, so its judgement of whether a tool is underused is weaker than a discovery product built on single sign-on and API usage.
  • It is a card issuer as well as a software vendor, which adds financial counterparty considerations and means a change in its banking arrangements would affect how the company pays every one of its suppliers.

Unit21

  • It is built for fintech scale rather than card issuer scale, so organisations reaching very high transaction volumes generally re-evaluate against heavier platforms and face a migration.
  • No-code rule authoring shifts power to the risk team, which is the point, but without governance it produces rule sprawl that nobody can explain to an examiner two years later.
  • Detection quality depends on the signals you feed it, so a thin integration produces thin results and the platform cannot compensate with proprietary consortium data the way larger vendors do.
  • Pricing is quoted by volume with an annual commitment, so a fintech whose growth stalls pays for headroom it did not use.
  • SAR filing coverage is oriented to United States FinCEN reporting, so firms filing in the United Kingdom, European Union or Asia handle those submissions outside the tool.

Pricing, plan by plan

Cledara

£100/month
  • Basic$100/month
    • Up to 20 software applications
    • Virtual card per subscription
    • Application inventory and approvals
  • Premium$undefined/month
    • Up to 75 software applications
    • Typically 51 to 150 staff
    • 1% cashback in the first year, capped at the subscription cost
  • Pro$undefined/month
    • For organisations above roughly 150 staff
    • Scoped individually
    • 1% cashback in the first year, capped at plan cost
  • Add-on modules$200/month
    • Spend Optimization £200 a month or £1,500 a year
    • IT Management £150 a month or £1,500 a year
    • Software Compliance £150 a month or £1,500 a year

Unit21

On request
  • Unit21 Platform$undefined/year
    • Priced by monitored volume and modules, annual contract
    • Fraud, AML and case management packaged separately
    • Implementation and historical data backfill quoted with the subscription

Which should you pick?

Choose Cledara if

  • You need virtual card per subscription.
  • You also want cancel by card.
Cledara review

Choose Unit21 if

  • You need no-code rule builder.
  • You also want case management.
Unit21 review

Questions people ask

Is Cledara or Unit21 better?
Neither clearly leads. Cledara starts at £100/month and Unit21 at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Cledara or Unit21?
Cledara starts at £100/month and Unit21 at On request.
Does Cledara or Unit21 run on more platforms?
Both run on Web, so platform support will not decide this one for you.
What is Cledara best used for?
Cledara is most often used for a finance team that cannot say what software the company pays for because everything is on three people's company cards, a company that keeps paying for tools nobody uses and cannot get the vendor to process a cancellation, a startup wanting approval on new software purchases before the first charge rather than at the audit, a finance function that spends days each month chasing saas invoices for the accountant. Of those, a finance team that cannot say what software the company pays for because everything is on three people's company cards and a company that keeps paying for tools nobody uses and cannot get the vendor to process a cancellation are not what Unit21 is typically brought in for.
What can Cledara do that Unit21 cannot?
Cledara covers Virtual card per subscription, Cancel by card, Application inventory, Approval workflow. Unit21 covers No-code rule builder, Case management, SAR filing, Backtesting.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Cledara: What does it cost?

Basic is £100 a month for up to 20 applications, with Premium covering up to 75 and Pro above that. Add-on modules are £150 to £200 a month each, and annual payment saves 16%.

Unit21: Do we need engineers to run it?

Only for the initial data integration. After that the design intent is that risk and compliance staff author and deploy rules themselves.

Cledara: Does it find software we did not tell it about?

Only what passes through its cards or connected integrations. Subscriptions paid by invoice or another card stay hidden, which is the main limitation of the model.

Unit21: Does it file SARs?

Yes, it generates and electronically files suspicious activity reports to FinCEN. Non-US regimes are not covered to the same depth.

Cledara: How does cancelling work?

You cancel the virtual card for that subscription, which stops the payment. It does not remove your contractual obligation, so check notice periods.

Unit21: Can we test a rule before it goes live?

Yes. Backtesting against historical data to see projected alert volume is one of the more useful parts of the product, because alert volume is the real cost.

Cledara: Is the application limit by users or by tools?

By tools. Twenty on Basic, seventy-five on Premium. Count your actual subscriptions before assuming the entry price applies to you.

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