KavachOS vs Clerk
Clerk is the gold standard for drop-in React auth components. But when your app needs to authorize AI agents, MCP servers, or self-host on your own infrastructure, it falls short. KavachOS covers both sides of the stack.
10
unique features
11
shared
MIT
open source
Why switch
Built for agents, not just humans
Clerk's auth primitives are designed around human sessions. KavachOS adds a full agent identity layer — dedicated tokens, delegation chains, and per-agent scopes — without removing any of the human auth you already rely on.
Self-host when you need to
Clerk is cloud-only with no self-hosting option. KavachOS is MIT-licensed and can run entirely on your infrastructure — a hard requirement for many regulated industries and enterprise customers.
Cost-effective at scale
Clerk's per-MAU pricing becomes expensive fast. At 50,000 MAU you are paying over $350/month with Clerk. KavachOS Cloud is $79/month at the same scale, and you can always self-host for the cost of compute alone.
Feature comparison
| Feature | KavachOS | Clerk |
|---|---|---|
| AI agent identity Clerk has no agent token concept | ||
| MCP OAuth 2.1 | ||
| Agent delegation chains | ||
| Agent permission scoping | ||
| Agent audit log | ||
| Self-hosting Clerk is SaaS-only | ||
| Open source (MIT) | ||
| Pre-built UI components (React) Clerk's components are more polished out of the box; KavachOS ships headless + shadcn variants | ||
| Social / OAuth providers (27+) | ||
| Passkeys / WebAuthn | ||
| Magic link / OTP | ||
| Multi-factor authentication | ||
| Organization management Clerk charges per organization member | ||
| Enterprise SSO (SAML, OIDC) Clerk requires Pro or Enterprise plan | ||
| SCIM provisioning Clerk requires Enterprise plan | ||
| Custom domains Clerk requires paid plan | ||
| Machine-to-machine tokens Clerk has no M2M token support | ||
| Brute force protection | ||
| Breach password detection | ||
| Cloudflare Workers runtime | ||
| Free tier Clerk free tier caps at 10,000 MAU but lacks org features |
Pricing
Clerk prices per MAU plus an additional per-member charge for Organizations. Enterprise SSO and SCIM are gated behind the Pro or Enterprise plans. Costs escalate quickly for B2B SaaS products.
KavachOS Cloud uses flat monthly tiers. No per-member charges, no per-org fees, and agent identity is included on every paid plan.
Migration
Export your user data from Clerk using the Clerk Backend API. KavachOS provides a migration importer that maps Clerk's user object fields to KavachOS user records.
Replace Clerk's SDK and provider components with `kavachos/react`. The `<SignIn>`, `<SignUp>`, and `<UserButton>` equivalents accept the same props pattern.
Update your middleware — swap `clerkMiddleware` for `kavachosMiddleware`. The session inspection API (`auth()`, `currentUser()`) is intentionally compatible.
Re-create your OAuth social connections and enterprise SSO connections in the KavachOS dashboard. Redirect URIs follow the same OAuth 2.0 callback pattern.
Remove per-member billing concerns from your org management code — KavachOS does not charge per organization member.
FAQ
MIT licensed. Self-hostable. Runs anywhere Node runs.