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APIs · head to head

GraphQL Playground vs Skyflow

GraphQL Playground logo

GraphQL Playground

APIs

GraphQL IDE and documentation tool for building GraphQL APIs

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Skyflow logo

Skyflow

APIs

Data privacy vault that holds sensitive records outside your own systems

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only GraphQL Playground has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: GraphQL Playground apollo's own documentation states GraphQL Playground is officially retired and no longer recommended, directing users to Apollo Sandbox instead; Skyflow reported contracts near 195,000 US dollars a year with a platform fee before usage put this out of reach of early stage companies, which are precisely the ones whose architecture is still cheap to change.
  • They diverge on capability: GraphQL Playground covers Query building, Skyflow covers Tokenised storage.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which GraphQL Playground and Skyflow actually diverge.

Attributes where GraphQL Playground and Skyflow differ
AttributeGraphQL PlaygroundSkyflow
Starting priceFreeOn request
Pricing modelopen-sourcequote
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWeb, Electron, Self-hostedAPI, Web, Self-hosted
Founded2018Unknown

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 GraphQL Playground

  • Query building
  • Schema introspection
  • Real-time testing
  • GraphQL servers
  • Apollo Studio
  • Custom servers
  • Web support
  • Electron support

Only in Skyflow

  • Tokenised storage
  • Polymorphic encryption
  • Field level access policies
  • Data residency
  • Secure functions
  • PCI scope reduction
  • Detokenisation gateway
  • Audit trail

What people use each for

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

GraphQL Playground

  • API Developmentnot Skyflow
  • API Gatewaynot Skyflow
  • API Testingnot Skyflow
  • API Documentationnot Skyflow
  • Microservicesnot Skyflow

Skyflow

  • A fintech that wants card and bank account data out of its own infrastructure so its application servers leave PCI DSS assessment scopenot GraphQL Playground
  • A company entering India or the EU with data localisation obligations that would otherwise require standing up regional databases and operationsnot GraphQL Playground
  • A health technology business that needs protected health information isolated from the analytics stack while still supporting aggregate reportingnot GraphQL Playground
  • An engineering team that wants support agents to see masked identifiers and payment services to see real ones, enforced centrally rather than in every servicenot GraphQL Playground

Where each one falls short

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

GraphQL Playground

  • Apollo's own documentation states GraphQL Playground is officially retired and no longer recommended, directing users to Apollo Sandbox instead

Skyflow

  • Reported contracts near 195,000 US dollars a year with a platform fee before usage put this out of reach of early stage companies, which are precisely the ones whose architecture is still cheap to change.
  • Every read of a protected field becomes a network call to a third party, so latency and an external availability dependency enter paths that were previously local database reads, and outage planning has to account for a vendor you do not control.
  • Analytics and joins on vaulted data are constrained; work that was a simple SQL join now happens through secure functions or on tokens, and data teams routinely discover this after the engineering team has committed.
  • Unwinding the vault later is a rewrite rather than a migration because tokens are threaded through every service, so the switching cost climbs steadily and the negotiating position at renewal weakens with each release.
  • Scope reduction is an architectural claim your own assessor must accept, so the audit saving is real only if the implementation genuinely keeps sensitive values off your systems, and partial implementations that leave a cache or a log line in place deliver the cost without the benefit.

Pricing, plan by plan

GraphQL Playground

Free
  • Open SourceFree
    • Full GraphQL IDE
    • Community support

Skyflow

On request
  • Skyflow Data Privacy Vault$undefined/year
    • Platform fee plus usage by data subject count
    • Priced additionally per data residency region
    • PCI Level 1, SOC 2 Type 2, ISO 27001 and HIPAA coverage

Which should you pick?

Choose GraphQL Playground if

  • You need query building.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Electron, Self-hosted.
  • You also want schema introspection.
GraphQL Playground review

Choose Skyflow if

  • You need tokenised storage.
  • You work on API, Web, Self-hosted.
  • You also want polymorphic encryption.
Skyflow review

Questions people ask

Is GraphQL Playground or Skyflow better?
Neither clearly leads. GraphQL Playground starts at Free and Skyflow at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, GraphQL Playground or Skyflow?
GraphQL Playground has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for GraphQL Playground and On request for Skyflow.
Does GraphQL Playground or Skyflow run on more platforms?
GraphQL Playground runs on Web, Electron, Self-hosted. Skyflow runs on API, Web, Self-hosted.
Can I use GraphQL Playground for free?
Yes. GraphQL Playground has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Skyflow starts at On request.
What is GraphQL Playground best used for?
GraphQL Playground is most often used for api development, api gateway, api testing, api documentation. Of those, api development and api gateway are not what Skyflow is typically brought in for.
What can GraphQL Playground do that Skyflow cannot?
GraphQL Playground covers Query building, Schema introspection, Real-time testing, GraphQL servers. Skyflow covers Tokenised storage, Polymorphic encryption, Field level access policies, Data residency.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

GraphQL Playground: Is GraphQL Playground free to use?

GraphQL Playground is a testing tool for Apollo Server and is free to use as part of the Apollo Server documentation. However, the broader Apollo GraphQL platform has various paid tiers available for production use.

Source
Skyflow: Does Skyflow really take my systems out of PCI scope?

It can, if card data never touches your infrastructure and the detokenisation happens at the boundary. Your QSA has to agree the design, so validate the architecture with your assessor before signing.

GraphQL Playground: Is GraphQL Playground part of a paid product?

GraphQL Playground is a testing tool within the Apollo ecosystem. While Playground itself is free, Apollo offers paid tiers starting at $5 per million requests for the Developer tier, with Standard and Enterprise plans available at custom pricing.

Source
Skyflow: What does it cost?

Nothing is published. Reported annual contracts sit around 195,000 US dollars, built from a platform fee plus usage by data subject count and additional charges per data residency region.

GraphQL Playground: What is the cost structure for Apollo GraphQL's paid plans?

Apollo uses volume-based tiered pricing for requests: first 250M operations cost $5.00 per million plus $2.00 for performance add-on; next 750M operations are $4.25 per million plus $1.50 add-on; additional tiers scale down to $3.00 per million plus $0.50 add-on for operations over 5 billion.

Source
Skyflow: How does it help with data localisation?

Records can be pinned to a specified region, so an Indian or EU residency requirement is met by the vault rather than by you running regional databases and operations teams.

Skyflow: Can I still run analytics on vaulted data?

Partly. Aggregates and comparisons are supported through polymorphic encryption and secure functions, but arbitrary joins against other datasets are harder than they were, and this is the most common late surprise.

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