Agentic Index
Hyperbrowser vs Steel (2026)
Hyperbrowser and Steel both sell headless browser infrastructure for agents, split by build philosophy: Hyperbrowser is managed and credit metered (one credit is a tenth of a cent, a browser hour about ten cents, a scraped page a tenth of a cent, free tier with one thousand credits), while Steel is open source first, free to self host via Docker, with a managed cloud offering free starter credits and Launch, Scale, and Enterprise plans on metered browser rates, sessions up to twenty four hours, and an inactivity timeout that stops billing idle runs. Choose Hyperbrowser for the simplest managed path, Steel when open source control or self hosting matters.
| At a glance | Hyperbrowser | Steel |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Agent infrastructure | Agent infrastructure |
| Entry price | Free tier (1,000 credits, 1 concurrent); credit based (browser hour about ten cents); subscription plans; Enterprise | Open source self host free; free cloud credits; Launch, Scale, Enterprise (metered browser rates) |
| Free / trial | Free tier with 1,000 credits and 1 concurrent browser, no card | Open source free to self host, plus free cloud credits to start |
| Pricing confidence | public exact | public partial |
| Feature |
S
Steel
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Action & orchestration | ||
|
Integrations & Tool Calling Ability to connect agents to real systems through native integrations, OAuth-authenticated actions, custom tools, APIs, webhooks, or MCP-compatible tools. |
Full / Explicit | Full / Explicit |
|
Workflow Orchestration Ability to sequence, branch, retry, route, and combine deterministic workflow nodes with autonomous agent steps. |
Partial | Partial |
|
Triggers & Channel Coverage How agents wake up and where they work: schedules, webhooks, message events, CRM events, inbox events, chat, email, voice, and collaboration tools. |
No / Not documented | No / Not documented |
| Knowledge & context | ||
|
Knowledge Grounding & RAG Ability to ground agent behavior in company data through document ingestion, retrieval, external knowledge APIs, semantic search, or RAG layers. |
Partial | Partial |
|
Memory & State Persistence Ability to persist context across a run, conversation, workflow, user, team, or longer-term memory layer. |
Partial | Partial |
| Control & trust | ||
|
Human Oversight & Guardrails Approval steps, consent checkpoints, escalation rules, structured guardrails, policy constraints, and pause/resume controls. |
No / Not documented | No / Not documented |
|
Security, Identity & Governance RBAC, SSO, auditability, encryption, least-privilege tool access, compliance posture, and data handling policy. |
Partial | Full / Explicit |
|
Observability & Auditability Traces, logs, execution histories, metrics, audit events, and debugging detail for production agent behavior. |
Partial | Partial |
|
Deployment & Data Residency Deployment modes and options, including SaaS, dedicated cloud, VPC, on-prem, hybrid, local runtime, and self-hosting. |
Partial | Full / Explicit |
| Solution readiness | ||
|
Prebuilt Agents, Templates & Packs Ready-made workflows, packaged employees, templates, blueprints, industry solutions, and role-specific agents that reduce time-to-value. |
Partial | Partial |
| Platform extensibility | ||
|
Model Flexibility & Routing Ability to work across multiple foundation models, route tasks to different models, or let buyers bring their own providers and keys. |
No / Not documented | No / Not documented |
|
APIs, SDKs & MCP Extensibility Composability layer: stable APIs, SDKs, MCP tool consumption/serving, custom tools, and integration into internal systems. |
Full / Explicit | Full / Explicit |
|
Testing, Debugging & Optimization Testing, debugging, scoring, retries, fallbacks, quality gates, and optimization loops for improving agent workflows before and after deployment. |
Partial | Partial |
| Specialist automation | ||
|
Browser & Computer Use Browser, desktop, or remote/local computer control for workflows that cannot be handled through stable APIs alone. |
Full / Explicit | Full / Explicit |
Pricing snapshot
Sourced from the Index pricing dataset · open each vendor's profile for full detail.
| Pricing |
S
Steel
|
|
|---|---|---|
|
Entry price Lowest public entry point |
Free tier (1,000 credits, 1 concurrent); credit based (browser hour about ten cents); subscription plans; Enterprise | Open source self host free; free cloud credits; Launch, Scale, Enterprise (metered browser rates) |
|
Pricing confidence How public the numbers are |
Public — exact | Public — partial |
|
Billing Primary billing axis |
credits (browser hours, pages) | browser session usage and credits |
|
Variable cost Workload / overage exposure |
High variable cost | High variable cost |
|
Free tier / trial Try before you buy |
Free tier
|
Free tier
|
|
Buying motion Self-serve vs sales call |
Mixed | Mixed |
Choose Hyperbrowser if
- A fully managed service with transparent per credit costs is what you want.
- Scraping and browsing workloads price out cleanly at a tenth of a cent a page.
- You would rather not operate browser infrastructure at all.
Choose Steel if
- Open source self hosting keeps browser infrastructure inside your perimeter.
- The inactivity timeout protects you from paying for crashed or idle sessions.
- You want the option to move between self hosted and managed cloud over time.