tunnels.io vs ngrok
The ngrok alternative that stayed a tunnel.
ngrok is now an AI gateway that also does tunnels. Their own homepage says it: "Way more than a tunnel to localhost." If you wanted the tunnel, you are paying for the rest of it. tunnels.io gives you a public HTTPS URL for your local server, at a quarter of the monthly price, with 25 times the included bandwidth.
The short answer
Both give your local server a public HTTPS URL. The difference is what you pay and what you have to think about. ngrok meters usage: endpoint hours, gigabytes and request counts all draw down a monthly credit. tunnels.io sells a flat plan with the bandwidth included, so there is nothing to model and nothing to be surprised by.
Paid entry price
$4 vs $10
tunnels.io Pro is $4 a month. ngrok Hobbyist is $10 billed monthly, or $8 if you commit to a year.
Included bandwidth
128 GB vs 5 GB
On the paid entry tier. Past 5 GB, ngrok bills $0.10 per additional gigabyte.
Free plan visitors see
Your app
ngrok's free tier puts an interstitial page in front of your site. Ours does not have one at any tier.
The interstitial is the reason most people leave.
ngrok's pricing page lists "Interstitial page on HTTP/S endpoints" on the free plan, and "No Interstitial page" on the paid plans. In practice that means the client you sent a link to, or the webhook provider you are trying to test against, hits a warning screen before they reach your app. For a demo it is embarrassing. For an automated webhook it is simply broken, because the caller is not a browser and will not click through.
tunnels.io has no interstitial on any plan, including the free one. Traffic reaches your server. That is the whole product.
Side by side
ngrok figures taken from ngrok.com/pricing, verified 1 August 2026. tunnels.io figures from our live plan catalog; /pricing is always authoritative.
| ngrok Free | tunnels.io Basic | ngrok Hobbyist | tunnels.io Pro | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $0 | $0 | $10/mo, or $8 billed annually | $4/mo, or $40/year |
| Data transfer out | 1 GB | 4 GB | 5 GB, then $0.10/GB | 128 GB included |
| Request limits | 20k requests per month | 1,024 requests/second, no monthly cap | 100k, then $1 per 100k | 8,192 requests/second, no monthly cap |
| Concurrent tunnels | 3 online endpoints | 1 | 3 online endpoints | 5 |
| Interstitial page | Yes | No | No | No |
| Reserved subdomain | Assigned dev domain | Random URL | ngrok-branded domains | Yes, up to 3 |
| Pricing model | Usage credit, metered by endpoint hour and GB | Flat plan | Usage credit, metered | Flat plan |
Why people move
You stop doing arithmetic
ngrok charges $0.02 per active endpoint hour and $0.01 per hour for a custom domain, drawn against a monthly credit, on top of per-GB and per-request pricing. Working out what a month costs takes a spreadsheet. A tunnels.io plan is one number.
The bandwidth is not a teaser
5 GB disappears fast if you are proxying a real app with images and API traffic. 128 GB on our $4 plan is 25 times as much, and it is included rather than billed at $0.10 per gigabyte after the fact.
It is still a tunnel product
ngrok's roadmap is gateways, traffic policy and AI routing. That is a real business, and it is not the thing you searched for. Every release we ship is about getting a local port onto the internet reliably.
Where ngrok is genuinely stronger
If you need an API gateway, traffic policy rules, mutual TLS, SSO and SCIM, or a vendor with a procurement process and contracts starting at $10,000 a year, ngrok has built all of that and we have not. They have been at this since 2013 and the product is deep. If your requirement is a governed ingress layer for production traffic, they are the safer choice and we would rather you knew that now.
If your requirement is a public HTTPS URL for the thing running on your laptop, keep reading.
Questions
Is tunnels.io cheaper than ngrok?
Yes at the entry tier. tunnels.io Pro is $4 a month and includes 128 GB of transfer. ngrok Hobbyist is $10 billed monthly, or $8 a month if you pay annually, and includes 5 GB before per-gigabyte charges apply. Both have a free plan.
Does tunnels.io show an interstitial page like ngrok's free tier?
No. tunnels.io serves your application directly on every plan, including the free one. ngrok lists an interstitial page on its free tier and removes it on paid tiers.
Can I keep the same URL between restarts?
Yes on any paid plan. Pro includes up to three reserved subdomains, and Gold and above add your own custom domains. Our free plan issues a random URL each time, which is fine for a quick share but not for a registered webhook.
Is there a monthly request limit?
No. tunnels.io limits the sustained request rate rather than a monthly total: 1,024 requests per second on the free plan and 8,192 on Pro. ngrok's free plan allows 20,000 requests per month and Hobbyist 100,000 before per-request charges.
How long does switching take?
Install the client, authenticate, and run one command against the same local port. If you use a reserved subdomain you update the URL wherever it is registered. Most people are done in a few minutes.
Try it on the free plan first.
No credit card. Four gigabytes a month, no interstitial, and a public HTTPS URL in about thirty seconds.
Also compare against Cloudflare Tunnel, Tailscale, localtunnel and Serveo.