What LaunchDarkly can do for you‍

LaunchDarkly is a SaaS application that enables developers to implement and manage feature toggles or ‘flags’. This method of release management provides an alternative to traditional branching version control. Rather than developing features in separate branches and later merging them into the main codebase, new code can be released to production without making it immediately available to end users — a so-called ‘dark launch’. Under this model, feature flags can be used to determine which portions of code are executed at runtime, allowing specific functionality to be enabled or disabled ad hoc. There are a number of benefits to using feature flags with a service like LaunchDarkly:

• De-risked releases – By decoupling deployment and release, new code can be tested by your teams in production before it’s made available to customers. Flags can quickly be toggled on and off, letting you instantly release features or roll them back if anything goes awry. Code reviews are also more manageable as merges take place more often.
• Personalized product experiences – Feature flags can be toggled on or off for specific subsets of users such as by region, account settings, or any other targeting metric. New features can be tested on small audiences before rolling them out more widely, with no developer intervention required.
• Experimentation – By using feature flags, teams can conduct A/B testing to ensure new functionality is going to positively impact business metrics before it’s made available to the full customer base.
• Mobile releases – Feature flags mean you can decouple new releases from app store approval windows so you can push features to your users at the optimal time.

Ultimately, LaunchDarkly aims to make the feature release process safer, faster, and more flexible. It supports every major language thanks to 29 SDKs including JavaScript, Python, Swift, and NodeJS.

‍LaunchDarkly pricing structures and tiers‍

The LaunchDarkly pricing structure is straightforward and split into three tiers. Customers can upgrade at any time. New accounts also get a 14-day free trial of the Pro tier. Pricing is per seat per month, with a seat counting as each team member logging in with a unique email address.

LaunchDarkly pricing – Starter

Price per seat per month: $10 ($8.33 billed annually)

The cheapest LaunchDarkly pricing tier is available at a one-seat minimum and allows customers to create unlimited feature flags within their project. What is a project? It typically aligns with a certain business objective — a web app and a mobile app would be two discrete projects, for example. Within each project, you can split things out into ‘environments’ (such as Production, QA, or Staging) which are sets of rules for your feature flags. The Starter tier comes with a single-project limit, although there’s no cap on environments. Server-side monthly active users (MAUs) — defined as the number of unique users evaluating flags from server-side SDKs over a 30-day period — are unlimited, while client-side MAUs are limited to 1,000. Customers can target users individually or by attribute and assign them specific flag variations. Integration with Slack, Trello, and Microsoft Teams is included along with access to all SDKs. Support is provided via email, with a first reply service-level agreement (SLA) of two business days.

LaunchDarkly pricing – Pro

Price per seat per month: $20 ($16.67 billed annually)

The LaunchDarkly Pro tier has a five-seat minimum. Customers get unlimited flags and environments, plus an unlimited number of projects. Full access to all 29 SDKs is included, and the client-side MAU cap is raised to 10,000 with the option to increase this to 300,000. Pro customers can also use the majority of integrations, plus API controls and some additional targeting and flag management features such as reusable segments and flag cloning. Experimentation — LaunchDarkly’s A/B testing suite — is available as an add-on. In terms of customer support, the first reply SLA is reduced to one business day.

LaunchDarkly pricing – Enterprise

Price: quote available on request

For the LaunchDarkly Enterprise tier, there’s a minimum seat count of 25. Customers get everything in the Pro tier, but there’s no limit on additional client-side MAUs. The ability to export raw analytics data in real time is also included. Enterprise includes the full roster of flag management and targeting tools plus access to all integrations with external apps. It also introduces a selection of workflow automation features including scheduling of flag rule changes and automating feature flags based on metrics. A degree of white-glove service is available to Enterprise customers. The first reply SLA is just four business hours, and there are options for premium support or a dedicated Client Success Manager.

‍Additional LaunchDarkly costs to consider

For the most part there aren’t too many additional costs within the LaunchDarkly pricing structure, but here are a few you may need to consider.

Experimentation

If you want access to LaunchDarkly’s A/B testing features, you’ll need the Experimentation add-on. This is available for Pro and Enterprise customers — but not the Starter plan — at an additional cost. A quote for Experimentation is available on request.

Additional client-side MAUs

Pro and Enterprise customers can increase their client-side MAU limit (up to 300,000 for Pro and unlimited for Enterprise) for an extra cost. If you’re opting for the Enterprise plan, you can request a base level of client-side MAUs to suit your needs anyway, but it’s reassuring to know you can scale up further if necessary.

SSO / SAML

Single sign-on can be enabled for Starter and Pro customers for an extra cost of $10 per seat per month. It’s included by default for Enterprise customers.

Other vendors offering feature flags

There are many software delivery tools on the market, so you might want to consider one of these alternatives to LaunchDarkly when evaluating SaaS vendors.

LaunchDarkly pricing vs Unleash

The Unleash feature flags product is pretty comparable to LaunchDarkly, but with one key difference — it’s open source. That means it’s incredibly extensible and you can build on top of it to meet your development team’s needs. Another benefit? Unleash pricing includes a free tier, although this isn’t suited to commercial purposes. The Pro tier starts at $80 a month for five seats, with additional seats charged at $15 a month. This is slightly cheaper than LaunchDarkly pricing, although there is a three-project limit unless you opt for the Enterprise tier.

LaunchDarkly pricing vs GitLab

Billing itself as a DevSecOps tool, the scope of GitLab is substantially wider than LaunchDarkly — so whether that’s of benefit depends on your business requirements. There is a free tier for personal projects, while the Premium tier of the GitLab pricing structure is $29 per user per month. This is higher than LaunchDarkly, so you’ll want to consider whether GitLab could meet other needs within your stack alongside feature flags. The Vertice platform can help here, optimizing your cloud footprint to reduce redundant spend.

LaunchDarkly pricing vs Optimizely

If you’re looking for a truly free feature flags solution, look no further than Optimizely, a SaaS vendor that provides digital experience platform (DXP) software. With zero cost, Optimizely is hard to beat as a way to get familiar with this method of software delivery, especially when the core functionality is similar to paid options like LaunchDarkly. The paid-for Optimizely pricing plan expands your capabilities with a robust suite of server-side experimentation tools.

LaunchDarkly pricing – the Vertice verdict

At the end of the day, LaunchDarkly is a solid choice for feature flags within your software delivery process. As a best-of-breed solution, its focus is quite narrow, so whether it’s worth the cost depends on your business needs. That said, the pricing structure is flexible and there are savings to be had if you opt for annual billing.Speaking of savings, why not consider leveraging the Vertice platform for your software acquisitions? We’ll negotiate LaunchDarkly pricing on your behalf to lower your costs and streamline your SaaS procurement process — simply get in touch to start saving your people time and your organization money.