Cybersecurity · head to head
Sardine vs Teleport
Sardine
Cybersecurity
Device intelligence and behaviour biometrics for fraud and compliance
- From
- On request
- Rated
- -
Teleport
Cybersecurity
Certificate-based access to servers, Kubernetes, databases and apps, replacing shared credentials and VPNs
- From
- On request
- Rated
- -
The short version
- Each has a real cost: Sardine signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.; Teleport pricing is not published and is described as active users plus protected resources, so an autoscaling estate cannot forecast the bill and finance teams discover the true cost only after the first true-up.
- They diverge on capability: Sardine covers Device intelligence, Teleport covers Short-lived certificates.
- Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.
Where they differ
Only the attributes on which Sardine and Teleport actually diverge.
Identical on both: starting price (On request), pricing model (quote), free tier (No), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Cybersecurity).
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 Sardine
- Device intelligence
- Behaviour biometrics
- Scam detection
- Onboarding risk scoring
- AML transaction monitoring
- Dispute and chargeback handling
- Rules editor
Only in Teleport
- Short-lived certificates
- Protocol coverage
- Session recording and replay
- Access Requests
- Device Trust
- Identity provider integration
- Machine identity
- FIPS and FedRAMP builds
What people use each for
The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.
Sardine
- A neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfernot Teleport
- A crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their ownernot Teleport
- A fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristicsnot Teleport
- A lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not containnot Teleport
Teleport
- Removing long-lived SSH keys and shared database passwords so that offboarding an engineer takes one action in the identity providernot Sardine
- Producing session recordings and per-user database audit trails as direct evidence for SOC 2 or FedRAMPnot Sardine
- Giving contractors or on-call engineers time-boxed, approved access to production instead of standing admin rightsnot Sardine
- Replacing a flat VPN with per-resource authorisation across servers, Kubernetes and internal web appsnot Sardine
Where each one falls short
Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.
Sardine
- Signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.
- Behavioural and device telemetry collection needs a documented lawful basis under GDPR, and EU privacy reviews frequently delay rollouts that were scoped as engineering work.
- Pricing is per session or per active user, so a consumer product with many low value sessions pays in proportion to traffic rather than to fraud exposure.
- As a younger private company it lacks the enforcement-tested audit history that a bank examiner expects, which makes it a harder sell inside a regulated bank than inside a fintech.
- It is strongest on session-time signals and weaker as a system of record for long horizon AML typologies, so larger institutions end up running it alongside a traditional monitoring platform rather than instead of one.
Teleport
- Pricing is not published and is described as active users plus protected resources, so an autoscaling estate cannot forecast the bill and finance teams discover the true cost only after the first true-up.
- The proxy is a hard dependency on reaching production, so it needs its own high availability deployment and a tested break-glass path or an outage in Teleport becomes an outage in your ability to respond to outages.
- The open source Community Edition omits Access Requests, Device Trust and the FIPS builds, which are exactly the controls an auditor asks about, so the free tier rarely survives a compliance review.
- Self-hosting means running and upgrading a certificate authority and its backing store, and Teleport releases frequently enough that upgrade work becomes a standing operational commitment.
- Coverage across protocols is uneven in depth, so teams with legacy systems, unusual databases or bespoke network appliances find gaps that still require the old VPN to remain in place alongside it.
Pricing, plan by plan
Sardine
On request- Sardine$undefined/year
- Priced per user session or per monthly active user
- Annual contract with volume commitment
- SDK for web, iOS and Android
Teleport
On request- Teleport Community Edition$undefined/year
- Open source, self-hosted
- SSH, Kubernetes, database and app access
- Session recording
- Teleport Enterprise$undefined/year
- Cloud-hosted or self-hosted
- Access Requests and approval workflow
- Device Trust and hardware key enforcement
Which should you pick?
Choose Sardine if
- You need device intelligence.
- You work on Web, iOS, Android.
- You also want behaviour biometrics.
Choose Teleport if
- You need short-lived certificates.
- You work on Linux, macOS, Windows, Kubernetes, Cloud.
- You also want protocol coverage.
Questions people ask
- Is Sardine or Teleport better?
- Neither clearly leads. Sardine starts at On request and Teleport at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
- Which is cheaper, Sardine or Teleport?
- Sardine starts at On request and Teleport at On request.
- Does Sardine or Teleport run on more platforms?
- Sardine runs on Web, iOS, Android. Teleport runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, Kubernetes, Cloud.
- What is Sardine best used for?
- Sardine is most often used for a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer, a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner, a fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristics, a lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not contain. Of those, a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer and a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner are not what Teleport is typically brought in for.
- What can Sardine do that Teleport cannot?
- Sardine covers Device intelligence, Behaviour biometrics, Scam detection, Onboarding risk scoring. Teleport covers Short-lived certificates, Protocol coverage, Session recording and replay, Access Requests.
Answered from the vendors’ own pages
Sardine: Does Sardine do document verification?
It focuses on device, behavioural and transaction signals, and integrates identity verification providers rather than being one. Treat it as complementary to a KYC vendor.
Teleport: Is the open source edition usable in production?
Yes, but it lacks Access Requests, Device Trust and FIPS builds, which most compliance programmes end up requiring.
Sardine: What does it need from us to work?
An SDK in your web and mobile applications plus transaction feeds. Without the client side collector you lose the signals that differentiate it.
Teleport: How is it priced?
Not publicly. The vendor prices on active users and protected resources and provides a quote after a sales conversation.
Sardine: Is pricing published?
No. It is quoted, typically per session or per monthly active user with an annual volume commitment.
Teleport: What happens if Teleport goes down?
Nobody reaches the resources behind it, so you need a highly available deployment and a documented break-glass procedure.
Teleport: Does it replace our VPN?
For anything you put behind it, yes. Legacy systems and appliances it does not support will keep the VPN alive.
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