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APIs · head to head

Convoy vs Cucumber

Convoy logo

Convoy

APIs

Open source webhooks gateway you self-host, handling both sending and receiving

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Cucumber logo

Cucumber

Testing

Behaviour-driven development testing framework that returned to community ownership after nine years under SmartBear

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Convoy the default deployment is self-hosted, so you operate Convoy plus Postgres and Redis and carry the on-call burden for the system that delivers your customers' events.; Cucumber gherkin's plain-language layer adds a real maintenance burden, keeping feature files, step definitions and implementation code synchronised across a large suite is a known source of drift and duplicated effort.
  • They diverge on capability: Convoy covers Inbound and outbound, Cucumber covers Gherkin syntax.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Convoy and Cucumber actually diverge.

Attributes where Convoy and Cucumber differ
AttributeConvoyCucumber
Pricing modelPer month, flat rate regardless of volumeOpen source, no licence fee
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, CloudLinux, macOS, Windows
CategoryAPIsTesting

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), 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 Convoy

  • Inbound and outbound
  • Broker-driven ingestion
  • Payload transformation
  • Portal links
  • Circuit breaking
  • Retry policies
  • OpenTelemetry export
  • Role-based access control

Only in Cucumber

  • Gherkin syntax
  • Step definition binding
  • Multi-language support
  • Living documentation
  • Tagging and scenario outlines
  • Reporting plugins

What people use each for

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

Convoy

  • A fintech that cannot route customer webhook traffic through a third-party SaaS for compliance reasonsnot Cucumber
  • A high-volume platform for which per-message webhook pricing costs more than the flat premium licencenot Cucumber
  • A team that also receives webhooks from many providers and wants ingestion, verification and deduplication in the same gatewaynot Cucumber
  • An engineering group that wants webhook delivery driven directly from an existing Kafka or SQS topicnot Cucumber

Cucumber

  • A team practising behaviour-driven development that wants shared, readable specifications between product owners and engineersnot Convoy
  • An organisation wanting living documentation that stays synchronised with actual test coverage rather than a separate specification documentnot Convoy
  • A QA team migrating acceptance tests from a proprietary BDD tool to an open source, community-governed alternativenot Convoy
  • A Java, JavaScript or Ruby project needing a mature BDD framework rather than building Gherkin-style parsing from scratchnot Convoy

Where each one falls short

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

Convoy

  • The default deployment is self-hosted, so you operate Convoy plus Postgres and Redis and carry the on-call burden for the system that delivers your customers' events.
  • Frain Technologies is a small startup, and putting customer-facing delivery infrastructure on it means accepting real vendor continuity risk on a component that is hard to swap out quickly.
  • The premium tier at a flat 999 US dollars a month is poor value below substantial volume, while the community edition omits the portal, transformations and RBAC that most production deployments end up wanting.
  • The hosted cloud trial is capped at one project and 100 events a day, which is too small to properly evaluate the service before committing.
  • Documentation and the third-party ecosystem are thinner than the established webhook services, so unusual configurations often mean reading the Go source.

Cucumber

  • Gherkin's plain-language layer adds a real maintenance burden, keeping feature files, step definitions and implementation code synchronised across a large suite is a known source of drift and duplicated effort.
  • Ownership has moved twice in under a decade, from independent to SmartBear-owned to independent community ownership again, which should temper confidence in any specific long-range roadmap claim.
  • Non-technical stakeholders who are meant to read and write Gherkin scenarios often do not engage with them in practice, leaving the readability benefit unrealised while the maintenance cost remains.
  • Step definition reuse across a large feature file set can become tangled, with ambiguous step matching causing hard-to-debug failures as a suite grows.
  • As a community-owned project without a corporate backer's support infrastructure, enterprise buyers wanting a formal support contract have no vendor to buy one from, unlike some competing BDD tools still sold commercially.

Pricing, plan by plan

Convoy

Free
  • CommunityFree
    • Self-hosted open source gateway
    • Inbound and outbound webhooks
    • Automatic retries and message broker support
  • Premium$999/month
    • Flat rate irrespective of message volume
    • Portal links and payload transformation
    • RBAC, circuit breaking and white labelling
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • SAML SSO
    • Dedicated support with SLA
    • On-premises deployment assistance
  • Cloud$undefined/month
    • Hosted by Convoy
    • 14 day trial limited to one project and 100 events a day
    • Usage-based tiers above the trial

Cucumber

Free
  • CucumberFree
    • Full functionality across Cucumber-JVM, Cucumber-JS, Cucumber-Ruby and other implementations
    • Community support via GitHub
    • Returned to independent community ownership in December 2024 after nine years connected to SmartBear

Which should you pick?

Choose Convoy if

  • You need inbound and outbound.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Cloud.
  • You also want broker-driven ingestion.
Convoy review

Choose Cucumber if

  • You need gherkin syntax.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want step definition binding.
Cucumber review

Questions people ask

Is Convoy or Cucumber better?
Neither clearly leads. Convoy starts at Free and Cucumber at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Convoy or Cucumber?
Convoy starts at Free and Cucumber at Free.
Does Convoy or Cucumber run on more platforms?
Convoy runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Cloud. Cucumber runs on Linux, macOS, Windows.
Can I use Convoy for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Convoy best used for?
Convoy is most often used for a fintech that cannot route customer webhook traffic through a third-party saas for compliance reasons, a high-volume platform for which per-message webhook pricing costs more than the flat premium licence, a team that also receives webhooks from many providers and wants ingestion, verification and deduplication in the same gateway, an engineering group that wants webhook delivery driven directly from an existing kafka or sqs topic. Of those, a fintech that cannot route customer webhook traffic through a third-party saas for compliance reasons and a high-volume platform for which per-message webhook pricing costs more than the flat premium licence are not what Cucumber is typically brought in for.
What can Convoy do that Cucumber cannot?
Convoy covers Inbound and outbound, Broker-driven ingestion, Payload transformation, Portal links. Cucumber covers Gherkin syntax, Step definition binding, Multi-language support, Living documentation.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Convoy: Is Convoy really open source?

Yes, the community edition is open source and self-hostable, covering both inbound and outbound webhooks with retries.

Cucumber: Is Cucumber owned by SmartBear?

No, not currently. SmartBear acquired Cucumber Ltd in 2019 but the open source project returned to independent community ownership in December 2024.

Convoy: What does premium cost?

A flat 999 US dollars a month, self-hosted, regardless of message volume.

Cucumber: Is Cucumber free?

Yes, entirely open source with no licence fee across all its language implementations.

Convoy: Does it receive webhooks as well as send them?

Yes, inbound ingestion with verification and deduplication is a first-class feature, unlike most webhook services.

Cucumber: Does Cucumber replace Selenium or Appium?

No, Cucumber provides the Gherkin specification layer and step definition binding; the actual browser or mobile automation still needs a driver such as Selenium or Appium underneath.

Convoy: Do I have to self-host?

No, there is a hosted cloud, but the trial is capped at 100 events a day and self-hosting is the primary model.

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