Upstash Redis vs Dragonfly(2026)
Upstash Redis is better for teams that need pay-per-use (no idle cost). Dragonfly is the stronger choice if dramatically faster than redis. Upstash Redis is freemium (from $0) and Dragonfly is open-source (from $0).
Full feature breakdown, pricing details, and pros & cons below.
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Upstash Redis
Upstash provides serverless Redis with per-request pricing — pay only for what you use, with global replication and edge compatibility, perfect for serverless and edge function workloads.
Starting at $0
Visit Upstash RedisDragonfly
Dragonfly is a modern in-memory data store fully compatible with Redis and Memcached APIs, but up to 25x faster and more memory-efficient thanks to its multi-threaded, shared-nothing architecture.
Starting at $0
Visit DragonflyHow Do Upstash Redis and Dragonfly Compare on Features?
| Feature | Upstash Redis | Dragonfly |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | freemium | open-source |
| Starting price | $0 | $0 |
| Serverless Redis | ✓ | — |
| Per-request pricing | ✓ | — |
| Global replication | ✓ | — |
| REST API | ✓ | — |
| Edge compatible | ✓ | — |
| TLS | ✓ | — |
| Vector store (Upstash Vector) | ✓ | — |
| Redis API compatible | — | ✓ |
| Multi-threaded | — | ✓ |
| Up to 25x faster than Redis | — | ✓ |
| Lower memory usage | — | ✓ |
| Snapshots + replication | — | ✓ |
| Managed cloud | — | ✓ |
| Lua scripting | — | ✓ |
Upstash Redis Pros and Cons vs Dragonfly
Upstash Redis
Dragonfly
Should You Use Upstash Redis or Dragonfly?
Choose Upstash Redis if…
- •Pay-per-use (no idle cost)
- •Edge/serverless native
- •Free tier available
Choose Dragonfly if…
- •Dramatically faster than Redis
- •Drop-in Redis replacement
- •Less memory usage