Civo vs Modal: Complete Comparison (2026)
An in-depth comparison of Civo and Modal to help you choose the right tool for your business.
Last updated: November 2026
Civo
6.7/10
Civo is a UK cloud provider offering fast managed Kubernetes on K3s, compute instances, managed databases, object storage and GPUs for developer teams.
Modal
6.7/10
Modal is a serverless cloud platform that runs Python code on GPUs and CPUs with per-second billing, aimed at teams building and serving AI applications.
Feature-by-Feature Comparison
| Feature | | |
|---|---|---|
| Scores | ||
| Overall Rating | 6.7/10 | 6.7/10 |
| Analytics | 4/10 | 6/10 |
| Cost | 9/10 | 5/10 |
| Customization | 6/10 | 7/10 |
| Ease of Use | 8/10 | 8/10 |
| Integration | 6/10 | 6/10 |
| Scalability | 6/10 | 9/10 |
| Security | 7/10 | 7/10 |
| Support | 5/10 | 6/10 |
| Pricing | ||
| Free plan | No | Yes |
| Cheapest paid plan | $5/mo Compute instances | $250/mo Team |
| Estimated cost for 10 users | $5/mo Compute instances | $250/mo Team |
| Features | ||
| API and CLI | ||
| Managed Databases | Not listed | |
| Multiple Regions | ||
| Object Storage | ||
| Managed Kubernetes | Not listed | |
| Cloud Compute | ||
| Managed WordPress | Not listed | |
| Serverless Functions | Not listed | |
| Dedicated Servers | Not listed | |
| Shared Hosting | Not listed | |
Civo vs Modal cost by team size
Modal costs less at 1 user; Civo costs less from 5 users.
| Team size | Civo | Modal |
|---|---|---|
| 1 user | $5/moCompute instances | FreeStarter |
| 5 users | $5/moCompute instances | $250/moTeam |
| 10 users | $5/moCompute instances | $250/moTeam |
| 25 users | $5/moCompute instances | $250/moTeam |
| 50 users | $5/moCompute instances | $250/moTeam |
The plan that fits each team size, billed monthly, before add-ons and usage charges. Each cost opens that tool's pricing calculator for the team size.
Which One Should You Choose?
Why choose Civo
- Lower estimated cost for 10 users: $5/mo vs $250/mo
- Higher Cost score (9/10 vs 5/10)
Why choose Modal
- Has a free plan (Civo does not)
- Higher Scalability score (9/10 vs 6/10)
- Higher Analytics score (6/10 vs 4/10)
- Better fit for enterprise (7/10 vs 5/10)
Pros & Cons
Civo
Pros
- The Kubernetes control plane is free, and clusters launch in about 90 seconds.
- Ingress and egress bandwidth are free and unlimited, which avoids surprise transfer bills.
- Pricing is published and billed hourly, with nodes starting at $5.43 a month.
- Resources can be managed through a CLI, a REST API, Terraform and Pulumi, plus a marketplace of over 100 apps.
- It holds ISO 27001, SOC 2 and Cyber Essentials Plus, and it is a UK G-Cloud supplier.
Cons
- It offers far fewer managed services and regions than the hyperscalers.
- Reviewers describe the documentation as limited or uneven.
- Very few independent reviews exist; G2 has none and Gartner has one.
- No core-platform SLA or 24/7 support matrix is clearly published.
- Observability tooling is basic.
Modal
Pros
- GPUs from the T4 up to the B300 are available without quota requests or reservations, and workloads can burst to thousands of containers.
- Per-second billing and scale-to-zero mean idle bursty inference workloads cost nothing.
- Python developers define infrastructure in code and deploy with a single CLI command, with no Kubernetes or Dockerfiles needed.
- The free Starter plan includes $30 a month of compute, and startup and academic credit programs are available.
- Sandboxes support large numbers of concurrent isolated environments for AI agents and untrusted code.
Cons
- Always-on or steady workloads can cost more than reserved GPU rentals from providers such as RunPod or Lambda.
- Containers stay billable for 60 seconds after the last request by default, and keep-warm settings are a common source of bill surprises.
- Region pinning raises prices by 1.15 to 1.75 times, and non-preemptible execution by 3 times.
- SSO, audit logs, and HIPAA support are limited to the custom-priced Enterprise plan.
- Credits from AWS, GCP, or Azure cannot be applied to Modal usage.
Not sold on either?
Frequently Asked Questions
Civo and Modal both score 6.7/10 on our AI Software criteria. The largest gap is in Cost: 9/10 for Civo and 5/10 for Modal.
Civo costs less for 10 users: about $5/mo on its Compute instances plan, against about $250/mo on its Team plan for Modal, billed monthly.
Modal has a free plan; Civo does not list one.
Modal is the better fit for enterprise: we rate it 7/10 for them, against 5/10 for Civo.
