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APIs · head to head

Convoy vs Rutter

Convoy logo

Convoy

APIs

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

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Rutter logo

Rutter

APIs

One API across accounting, commerce, payments and advertising platforms

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Convoy has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • 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.; Rutter a unified schema exposes only the fields common across platforms, so the platform-specific detail underwriting models want usually requires passthrough calls and per-platform code, which is the work the unified API was bought to avoid.
  • They diverge on capability: Convoy covers Inbound and outbound, Rutter covers Accounting and ERP.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Convoy and Rutter actually diverge.

Attributes where Convoy and Rutter differ
AttributeConvoyRutter
Starting priceFreeOn request
Pricing modelPer month, flat rate regardless of volumequote
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, CloudWeb, API

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

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 Rutter

  • Accounting and ERP
  • Commerce data
  • Payments data
  • Advertising data
  • Write operations
  • Passthrough requests
  • Observability tooling
  • Sandbox

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 Rutter
  • A high-volume platform for which per-message webhook pricing costs more than the flat premium licencenot Rutter
  • A team that also receives webhooks from many providers and wants ingestion, verification and deduplication in the same gatewaynot Rutter
  • An engineering group that wants webhook delivery driven directly from an existing Kafka or SQS topicnot Rutter

Rutter

  • A revenue-based lender that must pull a merchant's sales, payouts and general ledger before pricing a facilitynot Convoy
  • A spend management product that needs to push bills and journal entries back into whichever accounting system its customer runsnot Convoy
  • A B2B payments platform reconciling invoices across customers using four different ERPsnot Convoy
  • An insurance or benefits provider that needs verified business financials without asking the customer to upload PDFsnot 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.

Rutter

  • A unified schema exposes only the fields common across platforms, so the platform-specific detail underwriting models want usually requires passthrough calls and per-platform code, which is the work the unified API was bought to avoid.
  • Write operations into accounting systems are where these products break, because each system validates differently, and a rejected journal entry surfaces as a support ticket against you rather than against the ERP.
  • No pricing is published beyond a sandbox trial, so cost cannot be compared against alternatives without a sales process, and pricing tends to scale with connected accounts.
  • QuickBooks Desktop and other on-premises systems require a local connector or hosted agent, which introduces installation steps your customers must complete and support burden you inherit.
  • Sync freshness varies by platform and by customer authorisation state, so a product promising near real-time figures will find some connections update far less often than the marketing implies.

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

Rutter

On request
  • Starter$undefined/month
    • Thirty day sandbox trial
    • Test integrations with QuickBooks, Xero, FreshBooks and Zoho Books
    • Documentation and workflow guides
  • Full Access$undefined/year
    • Production access across all platforms
    • Includes NetSuite, QuickBooks Desktop and Sage Intacct
    • Write operations and passthrough

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 Rutter if

  • You need accounting and erp.
  • You work on Web, API.
  • You also want commerce data.
Rutter review

Questions people ask

Is Convoy or Rutter better?
Neither clearly leads. Convoy starts at Free and Rutter at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Convoy or Rutter?
Convoy has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Convoy and On request for Rutter.
Does Convoy or Rutter run on more platforms?
Convoy runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Cloud. Rutter runs on Web, API.
Can I use Convoy for free?
Yes. Convoy has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Rutter starts at On request.
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 Rutter is typically brought in for.
What can Convoy do that Rutter cannot?
Convoy covers Inbound and outbound, Broker-driven ingestion, Payload transformation, Portal links. Rutter covers Accounting and ERP, Commerce data, Payments data, Advertising data.

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.

Rutter: Does Rutter support QuickBooks Desktop?

Yes, which distinguishes it from unified APIs that only cover cloud accounting, and matters because many small businesses still run it.

Convoy: What does premium cost?

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

Rutter: Can Rutter write data back?

Yes. Invoices, bills and journal entries can be pushed into supported accounting systems, not only read.

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.

Rutter: Is there a free tier?

There is a thirty day sandbox trial with test data. Production access requires a paid plan with quoted pricing.

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.

Rutter: What if the unified model lacks a field I need?

Rutter supports passthrough requests to the underlying platform API, though using them reintroduces platform-specific code.

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