Fivetran, Airbyte or pipelines you own?
Managed ingestion is quick to set up and covers a lot of sources. This page uses the published consumption table to work out at what volume a pipeline of your own pays off.
In short
The price tracks monthly active rows, and the ladder is sub-linear: fifteen times the data does not cost fifteen times as much. Even so, a mid-sized volume sits well above a pipeline of your own, where only hosting remains. What Fivetran delivers for it is a very large connector catalogue and the maintenance of other people's APIs, which is exactly the part a build takes on.
There is no three-year total on this page. The only rate Fivetran publishes openly is the 5 USD base charge per connection up to one million active rows. The thresholds above that sit in a consumption table that cannot be retrieved freely. We do not put figures on a page we cannot evidence. Airbyte likewise publishes no per-unit rate for its Standard tier.
Where the two routes differ
| Criterion | Fivetran | FW Delta |
|---|---|---|
| Billing | by monthly active rows, on a sub-linear ladder | one-time build plus hosting |
| Predictability | the bill follows data growth | the figure is known |
| Connectors | a very large ready-made catalogue | the sources built; more cost effort |
| Custom sources | not offered through self-service | possible, but you build them |
| Maintaining third-party APIs | handled by the vendor | yours, or covered by a maintenance agreement |
| Transformations | priced separately by model runs | in SQL, with no separate billing |
| After cancelling | ingestion stops, the target schema stays | code and configuration stay |
Stay with Fivetran when
- many different standard sources need connecting
- volume is low and stays low
- nobody in-house can operate data pipelines
- maintaining third-party APIs is deliberately outsourced
A pipeline of your own pays off when
- row volume sits in the millions on a permanent basis
- few but stable sources are served
- a source is missing from the catalogue and will not be added
- transformations already run in SQL inside the warehouse
FAQ
Why is there no cost calculation here?
Because the values needed are not public. Fivetran states the formula and the base charge; the thresholds and incremental rates sit in a consumption table that cannot be retrieved freely. We do not put amounts on a page we cannot evidence.
Do the costs rise exponentially?
No, and that is a common error. Fivetran states explicitly that the per-row cost decreases as volume rises, so the ladder is sub-linear. The problem is not the curve, it is the absolute level at high volume.
What counts as a monthly active row?
Inserts plus updates and deletes during the billing month. Unchanged rows and the initial sync do not count. A ten-million-row table that barely changes therefore costs far less than one rewritten daily.
Run it with your own volume
The decision hangs on active rows. The calculator takes your number.
01
A 30-minute call
We walk through your starting point and say honestly whether a move pays off for you.
02
A fixed-price proposal
Within five working days, with scope, assumptions and what is explicitly not included.
03
Build and handover
Repository access from day one, documentation at the end, no obligation to keep us.
How these figures were produced
- Price as of
- August 2026
- Basis
- Publicly listed prices from Fivetran, together with the assumptions on this page for user count, volume and term.
- Not included
- Discounts, annual prepayment, enterprise terms, partner rates and country-specific pricing. Internal staff cost on either side is not counted.
- Limits
- Vendor pricing and packaging change. This calculation is a model, not a quote and not a general market price. Check the current vendor price list before deciding, and run the numbers with your own figures.