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Developer Tools · head to head

Cortex vs Krea

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Cortex

Developer Tools

Internal developer portal that scores service ownership and maturity rather than just cataloguing services

From
On request
Free plan
No
Visit CortexFull review
K

Krea

Design

Generate, enhance, and edit images, videos, or 3D meshes with AI

From
On request
Free plan
No
Visit KreaFull review

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Cortex and Krea actually diverge.

Attributes where Cortex and Krea differ
AttributeCortexKrea
Pricing modelQuoteUsage-based
PlatformsWeb, APIWeb
CategoryDeveloper ToolsDesign

Identical on both: starting price (On request), free tier (No).

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 Cortex

  • Service catalogue
  • Scorecards
  • Initiatives
  • Self-service templates
  • Query language
  • Eng intelligence
  • Integrations layer
  • On-call and ownership mapping

Only in Krea

Nothing recorded that Cortex does not also cover.

What people use each for

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

Cortex

  • A platform team that needs to prove to leadership how far a Kubernetes or framework migration has actually progressed across hundreds of servicesnot Krea
  • An organisation where ownership of production services is genuinely unknown after reorganisations or acquisitionsnot Krea
  • Enforcing production readiness standards on new services at creation time rather than at incident reviewnot Krea
  • Replacing a self-hosted Backstage that is consuming a full-time engineer or two just to stay upgradednot Krea

Krea

No use cases recorded yet. See the Krea review.

Where each one falls short

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

Cortex

  • Pricing is quote only, so a platform team cannot build a business case or compare against the true cost of self-hosted Backstage without entering a sales cycle first
  • The catalogue is only as accurate as the metadata you supply, so an organisation with inconsistent repository conventions spends its first quarter cleaning data before any scorecard means anything
  • Scorecards create political friction: publishing a per-team grade turns an engineering standard into a performance metric, and teams will game the rules rather than fix the underlying issue
  • It is closed source and hosted, so organisations with strict data residency or air-gap requirements have limited options compared with running Backstage themselves
  • Value scales with organisation size, so a company with fifty engineers and thirty services will find the catalogue tells them nothing they did not already know while still paying an enterprise contract

Krea

  • Usage is metered in compute units that vary by operation; the free tier grants only 100 units per day, and the $9 per month Basic tier steps up to 5,000 units, as of August 2026

Pricing, plan by plan

Cortex

On request
  • CortexOn request
    • Service catalogue and ownership mapping
    • Scorecards and initiatives
    • Self-service templates

Krea

On request

No published plan breakdown. See the Krea review.

Which should you pick?

Choose Cortex if

  • You need service catalogue.
  • You work on Web, API.
  • You also want scorecards.
Cortex review

Choose Krea if

Nothing in the data separates Krea from Cortex on the points above - pick on price and on how each one feels to use.

Krea review

Questions people ask

Is Cortex or Krea better?
Neither clearly leads. Cortex starts at On request and Krea at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Cortex or Krea?
Cortex starts at On request and Krea at On request.
Does Cortex or Krea run on more platforms?
Cortex runs on Web, API. Krea runs on Web.
What is Cortex best used for?
Cortex is most often used for a platform team that needs to prove to leadership how far a kubernetes or framework migration has actually progressed across hundreds of services, an organisation where ownership of production services is genuinely unknown after reorganisations or acquisitions, enforcing production readiness standards on new services at creation time rather than at incident review, replacing a self-hosted backstage that is consuming a full-time engineer or two just to stay upgraded. Of those, a platform team that needs to prove to leadership how far a kubernetes or framework migration has actually progressed across hundreds of services and an organisation where ownership of production services is genuinely unknown after reorganisations or acquisitions are not what Krea is typically brought in for.
What can Cortex do that Krea cannot?
Cortex covers Service catalogue, Scorecards, Initiatives, Self-service templates.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Cortex: How is Cortex different from Backstage?

Backstage is an open source framework you build and staff. Cortex is a hosted product with scorecards and initiatives out of the box and no platform team required to keep it running.

Cortex: Is pricing published?

No. Cortex requires a sales conversation and prepares a custom proposal.

Cortex: Can it self-host?

It is offered as a hosted product; on-premise arrangements are handled through sales rather than published.

Cortex: What is the main adoption risk?

Bad or missing service metadata. The catalogue and every scorecard on top of it inherit whatever quality your repositories already have.

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