--- title: "Arcjet vs Cloudflare | Agent Ready Crawlers" description: "Arcjet vs Cloudflare: rubric grades side by side, the sourced difference and verdicts for platform engineers, security engineers and publisher ops." canonical: https://agentreadycrawlers.com/compare/arcjet-vs-cloudflare site: "Agent Ready Crawlers" last_updated: 2026-11-04 section: "Comparisons" --- # Arcjet vs Cloudflare | Agent Ready Crawlers > Arcjet vs Cloudflare: rubric grades side by side, the sourced difference and verdicts for platform engineers, security engineers and publisher ops. Source: https://agentreadycrawlers.com/compare/arcjet-vs-cloudflare Site: Agent Ready Crawlers Last reviewed: 2026-11-04 Head-to-head # Arcjet vs Cloudflare In short Arcjet runs in application code with published prices from USD 25 a month; Cloudflare runs at its edge with AI controls on the free plan. On verifies agents the rubric grades Arcjet partial and Cloudflare yes, and on per-purpose policy the rubric grades Arcjet partial and Cloudflare yes. For publisher operations: Cloudflare can write your robots.txt preferences; Arcjet cannot. ## The sourced difference Arcjet runs in application code with published prices from USD 25 a month; Cloudflare runs at its edge with AI controls on the free plan. [Source](https://arcjet.com/pricing), read 2026-11-04. ## Side by side | Question | Arcjet | Cloudflare | | --- | --- | --- | | Tells a verified agent from a spoof | Partial; IP data and reverse DNS for known bots; Web Bot Auth not mentioned in docs (checked 2026-11-04) | Yes; Web Bot Auth signatures, IP validation, verified bot and signed agent directory (BotBase) | | Per-purpose policy (train, search, answer, act) | Partial; allow or deny by bot name or category (e.g. CATEGORY:AI) per route | Yes; separate Search, Training and Agent controls on all plans, plus Disallow AI Training since 2026-09-15 | | Charging for access | Not published; support (checked 2026-11-04) | Partial; Pay per crawl with HTTP 402, Cloudflare as Merchant of Record, private beta | | Lets signed commerce agents through | Not published; Visa TAP or Mastercard Agent Pay support (checked 2026-11-04) | Partial; Visa TAP and Mastercard Agent Pay built on Web Bot Auth, managed rulesets announced Oct 2025; current rule name not confirmed in docs (checked 2026-11-04) | | Cost | published: from USD 25/month plus USD 5 per 1M web requests | free tier covers AI Crawl Control; Pro from USD 20/month; Bot Management and BotBase are Enterprise and sales-led | | Reporting | Partial; request decision logs with 1 to 24 hours retention on self-serve plans | Yes; AI Crawl Control analytics on crawler activity, request patterns and robots.txt compliance | | Where it runs | app: SDK calls in application code | edge: enforced on Cloudflare's reverse proxy, no app code needed | | Points, rank | 3 of 10, rank 11 (tied) | 8 of 10, rank 1 (tied) | | Price read 2026-11-04 | Individual USD 25/month, Startup USD 299/month, Enterprise custom; usage USD 5 per 1M web requests and USD 50 per 1M agent requests; free plan 10,000 requests/month (hard stop) after a 15-day trial. | AI Crawl Control and the Search, Training and Agent controls are on all plans including Free (USD 0). Pro USD 20/month billed annually or USD 25 monthly; Business USD 200/month annually or USD 250 monthly; Enterprise Bot Management and BotBase are sales-led. Pay per crawl prices are set by the site owner (private beta). | ## Verdicts by reader Platform engineer Arcjet suits apps not behind a CDN; Cloudflare needs DNS on Cloudflare. Security engineer Cloudflare verifies Web Bot Auth; Arcjet uses IP and reverse DNS. Publisher operations Cloudflare can write your robots.txt preferences; Arcjet cannot. ## What each does not do ### Arcjet - No Web Bot Auth or cryptographic agent verification in bot protection docs (checked 2026-11-04). - Does not run at the CDN edge; requests reach the app before Arcjet decides (concepts page). - No AI crawler monetization or pay-per-crawl (docs read 2026-11-04). ### Cloudflare - BotBase does not block traffic itself; mitigation needs Security rules or AI traffic options (BotBase docs, updated 2026-10-08). - Disallow AI Training cannot pass a no-training preference to Bing until Microsoft ships robots.txt support, targeted early 2027 (Cloudflare blog, 2026-09-15). - Web Bot Auth verification does no nonce validation today; Cloudflare relies on short expires values (Web Bot Auth docs). - Pay per crawl is not self-serve: the docs (updated 2026-07-28) tell site owners to reach out to Cloudflare to join the beta. More: [alternatives to Arcjet](https://agentreadycrawlers.com/vendors/arcjet/alternatives/), [alternatives to Cloudflare](https://agentreadycrawlers.com/vendors/cloudflare/alternatives/). ## Sources - [arcjet.com: pricing](https://arcjet.com/pricing) read 2026-11-04 - [cloudflare.com: network cdn.md](https://www.cloudflare.com/plans/network-cdn.md) read 2026-11-04 - [docs.arcjet.com: concepts](https://docs.arcjet.com/bot-protection/concepts) read 2026-11-04 - [developers.cloudflare.com: verified bots](https://developers.cloudflare.com/bots/concepts/bot/verified-bots/) read 2026-11-04 - [docs.arcjet.com: reference](https://docs.arcjet.com/bot-protection/reference) read 2026-11-04 - [Have it both ways: stay discoverable in search while disallowing AI training](https://blog.cloudflare.com/accountable-mixed-use-ai-crawlers/) read 2026-11-04 - [developers.cloudflare.com: what is pay per crawl](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ai-crawl-control/features/pay-per-crawl/what-is-pay-per-crawl/) read 2026-11-04 - [Securing agentic commerce: helping AI Agents transact with Visa and Mastercard](https://blog.cloudflare.com/secure-agentic-commerce/) read 2026-11-04 Last reviewed 2026-11-04