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Developer Tools · head to head

Hookdeck vs Snowplow

Hookdeck logo

Hookdeck

Developer Tools

Event gateway that receives, queues, retries and replays inbound webhooks

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Visit HookdeckFull review
Snowplow logo

Snowplow

Business Intelligence

Behavioural data pipeline you run in your own cloud, relicensed away from Apache 2.0 in 2024

From
On request
Free plan
No
Visit SnowplowFull review

The short version

  • Hookdeck starts at $39/mo; Snowplow prices on request.
  • Only Hookdeck lists ingest and persist; only Snowplow lists own-cloud deployment.
  • Where Hookdeck falls short: pricing meters delivered events, so fan-out multiplies the bill: one inbound event routed to four services counts as four deliveries.
  • Prices and features on this page were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Hookdeck and Snowplow actually diverge.

Attributes where Hookdeck and Snowplow differ
AttributeHookdeckSnowplow
Starting priceFreeOn request
Pricing modelPer month by delivered event countQuote
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWeb, Linux, macOS, WindowsLinux, Web, Self-hosted
CategoryDeveloper ToolsBusiness Intelligence

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 Hookdeck

  • Ingest and persist
  • Automatic retries
  • Filters and fan-out
  • Transformations
  • Local development CLI
  • Rate limiting

Only in Snowplow

  • Own-cloud deployment
  • Schema enforcement
  • Warehouse loading
  • Enrichment
  • Trackers
  • Streaming output
  • Data models
  • Snowplow BDP

What people use each for

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

Hookdeck

  • A payments integration where losing a Stripe event during a deploy causes an order to go unfulfillednot Snowplow
  • Fanning one provider webhook out to several internal services without each subscribing separatelynot Snowplow
  • Debugging a partner integration by replaying the exact failing payload after shipping a fixnot Snowplow
  • Receiving production-shaped webhooks on a developer laptop without running a public tunnelnot Snowplow

Snowplow

  • A data team that needs full-fidelity event data in its own warehouse to build attribution or machine learning features rather than to populate dashboardsnot Hookdeck
  • A regulated business that cannot send behavioural data to a third-party analytics vendor and must keep collection inside its own cloud accountnot Hookdeck
  • A product organisation tired of silently malformed events, which wants a schema contract enforced at collection timenot Hookdeck
  • A company modelling customer behaviour across web, mobile and server events that needs them in one consistent structurenot Hookdeck

Where each one falls short

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

Hookdeck

  • Pricing meters delivered events, so fan-out multiplies the bill: one inbound event routed to four services counts as four deliveries
  • Free-tier retention is three days, which is shorter than the time it typically takes to notice a failing integration, so the payloads needed for a replay are often already gone
  • It becomes a single point of failure in front of every third-party integration, and an outage there means every provider webhook queues or fails at once
  • The transformation layer runs JavaScript in a constrained environment, so anything that needs a database lookup or an external call has to happen downstream instead
  • For a team already running Kafka or SQS the value is mostly the console and the replay UI, which is a hard cost to justify against infrastructure they already operate

Snowplow

  • The core pipeline was relicensed from Apache 2.0 on 8 January 2024 to the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement and a Confluent-derived community licence, so organisations that adopted it as permissively licensed software must now review their entitlement, buy a licence, or migrate
  • You run the pipeline in your own cloud, which means the infrastructure bill, the on-call rota and the upgrade work are yours, and at high event volume that operational cost frequently exceeds what a hosted product would have charged
  • Schema enforcement is the main benefit and the main friction, because every new event requires a schema to be authored and versioned, and teams without discipline around that end up blocked on their own governance process
  • There is no analysis layer: Snowplow delivers data to your warehouse and nothing else, so you still need modelling, a BI tool and the people to run them before anyone sees a number
  • The licence change fractured the community, spawning an Apache 2.0 fork, which means community contributions and third-party tooling are now split across two codebases with uncertain long-term maintenance

Pricing, plan by plan

Hookdeck

Free
  • DeveloperFree
    • Up to ten thousand events per month
    • Three-day retention
    • One user
  • Team$39/mo
    • Ten thousand events included
    • Unlimited users
    • Pay as you go metering above the included events
  • Growth$499/mo
    • Ten thousand events included plus metered usage
    • Thirty-day retention
    • Uptime and latency SLAs
  • EnterpriseOn request
    • Negotiated event volume
    • Custom retention
    • Dedicated support

Snowplow

On request
  • Snowplow BDPOn request
    • Commercial pricing quoted by event volume and deployment
    • Core pipeline components under the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement, not Apache 2.0
    • Trackers, analytics SDKs and Iglu SDKs remain Apache 2.0

Which should you pick?

Choose Hookdeck if

  • You need ingest and persist.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want automatic retries.
Hookdeck review

Choose Snowplow if

  • You need own-cloud deployment.
  • You work on Linux, Web, Self-hosted.
  • You also want schema enforcement.
Snowplow review

Questions people ask

Is Hookdeck or Snowplow better?
Neither clearly leads. Hookdeck starts at Free and Snowplow at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Hookdeck or Snowplow?
Hookdeck has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Hookdeck and On request for Snowplow.
Does Hookdeck or Snowplow run on more platforms?
Hookdeck runs on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows. Snowplow runs on Linux, Web, Self-hosted.
Can I use Hookdeck for free?
Yes. Hookdeck has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Snowplow starts at On request.
What is Hookdeck best used for?
Hookdeck is most often used for a payments integration where losing a stripe event during a deploy causes an order to go unfulfilled, fanning one provider webhook out to several internal services without each subscribing separately, debugging a partner integration by replaying the exact failing payload after shipping a fix, receiving production-shaped webhooks on a developer laptop without running a public tunnel. Of those, a payments integration where losing a stripe event during a deploy causes an order to go unfulfilled and fanning one provider webhook out to several internal services without each subscribing separately are not what Snowplow is typically brought in for.
What can Hookdeck do that Snowplow cannot?
Hookdeck covers Ingest and persist, Automatic retries, Filters and fan-out, Transformations. Snowplow covers Own-cloud deployment, Schema enforcement, Warehouse loading, Enrichment.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Hookdeck: Is there a free plan?

Yes, ten thousand events a month with three-day retention and one user.

Snowplow: Is Snowplow still open source?

Not in the permissive sense. On 8 January 2024 the core pipeline moved from Apache 2.0 to the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement, with version 1.1 following in December 2024, alongside a community licence based on the Confluent Community Licence. Trackers and analytics SDKs remain Apache 2.0.

Hookdeck: How is usage counted?

By delivered events, so a single inbound webhook fanned out to three destinations counts as three.

Snowplow: Can we still run it for free in production?

Free use of the relicensed core components is materially constrained and commercial use generally requires an agreement. Read the current licence text against your intended use rather than relying on older documentation.

Hookdeck: Can I replay a failed webhook?

Yes, individually or in bulk from the console, with the original payload.

Snowplow: Is there an Apache 2.0 alternative?

Yes, a fork called OpenSnowcat was created in response to the relicensing and continues under Apache 2.0.

Hookdeck: Does it work for outbound webhooks too?

Yes, the same queueing, retry and observability applies to webhooks you send.

Snowplow: What does Snowplow BDP cost?

Not published. It is quoted by event volume and deployment, and your own cloud infrastructure costs are separate and additional.

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