Lago
Open SourceOpen-source billing platform for flexible usage-based pricing models
AI Summary
Lago is an open-source billing infrastructure that combines real-time usage metering, flexible billing models, and automated invoicing. The platform enables engineering and business teams to manage complex pricing models such as usage-based, subscriptions, and hybrid models via API and visual interface. Lago offers complete transparency, self-hosting options, and integration into existing stacks.
✓ Pros
- +Open-source with full transparency and self-hosting capabilities
- +Flexible combination of different pricing models in one platform
- +Extensive integrations with payment, accounting, and CRM systems
✗ Cons
- −Complexity may require technical know-how for setup and configuration
- −As a self-hosted solution, additional maintenance effort for on-premise deployment
Use Cases
- →Usage-based billing for AI products with token, GPU, and credit billing
- →Hybrid pricing models for SaaS products with subscription and usage components
- →IoT and telco billing with complex metering at device level
- →White-label billing solutions for platforms and marketplaces
Who is it for?
Engineering and finance teams in SaaS, AI, IoT, and enterprise companies that require complex, flexible billing models and want to maintain control over their billing infrastructure.
Tags
What is Lago?
Lago is an open-source billing infrastructure that combines real-time usage metering, flexible billing models and automated invoicing in a single platform. Engineering and finance teams can use it to implement complex pricing logic via an API or a visual interface, without depending on proprietary third-party solutions. Lago can be self-hosted or run as a cloud variant and integrates with existing payment, accounting and CRM stacks.
Core features
- Real-time metering: Usage events are captured and processed live, which matters for token-, GPU- or credit-based billing.
- Hybrid pricing models: Subscription and usage-based components can be combined within a single plan, rather than maintaining separate systems.
- Automated invoicing: Lago generates invoices based on the configured pricing logic without manual steps in between.
- Self-hosting option: The full source code is accessible, enabling custom deployments and modifications.
- API-first approach: All features are controllable via API, complemented by a visual interface for non-technical team members.
- White-label support: Platforms and marketplaces can use Lago as a billing layer for their own customers.
Who is Lago for?
Lago targets teams that are running up against the limits of simple subscription tools. SaaS products with usage-based components, AI platforms billing by tokens or GPU time, and IoT and telco applications with device-based metering are well suited to the model. Technical knowledge is a prerequisite: anyone who has never run Docker will struggle with the self-hosted setup. Ongoing maintenance of a self-managed instance also takes time that hosted alternatives do not require.
Context & alternatives
In the billing segment, Lago competes with commercial solutions such as Stripe Billing and Chargebee, which offer more out-of-the-box convenience but less control over infrastructure and pricing logic. Metronome and Orb are specialized usage-based billing platforms with a similar focus, but without an open-source option. The key distinction with Lago: teams that need full control over billing logic within their own stack, for example for data privacy or compliance reasons, have few real options, and Lago is one of them.
