Faable Auth vs Auth0, Clerk & Keycloak
Short answer: Faable Auth is a managed, multi-tenant identity server built on OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect — comparable to Auth0 or Clerk, but hosted 100% in Europe with full GDPR data sovereignty, with no infrastructure for you to run (unlike self-hosted Keycloak), and bundled in the same subscription as Faable Deploy with simple MAU-based pricing and support from the engineers who run it.
Each option below is a strong identity solution; this page helps you pick by priorities.
Quick comparison
| Capability | Faable Auth | Auth0 | Clerk | Keycloak |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OAuth 2.0 / OIDC standards | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Social login (Google, GitHub, Microsoft) | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Passwordless (magic link / OTP) | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | Via extensions |
| Machine-to-machine (M2M) tokens | ✅ | ✅ | Limited | ✅ |
| Multi-tenant by design | ✅ | Add-on / Organizations | Organizations | Realms (you model it) |
| Extensibility (custom code in the flow) | ✅ Actions + Webhooks | ✅ Actions | Webhooks | SPIs (Java) |
| Fully managed (no servers to run) | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ self-hosted |
| 100% European hosting + GDPR sovereignty | ✅ | EU region available (US company) | US-based | Wherever you host it |
| Bundled with app hosting | ✅ Faable Deploy, same subscription | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
Competitor capabilities and tiers change frequently — confirm current details on each vendor’s own pricing and docs.
Other alternatives at a glance
| Alternative | What it really is | Pick it when |
|---|---|---|
| Supabase Auth | Auth built into the Supabase backend (Postgres + RLS) | You’re already all-in on Supabase |
| AWS Cognito | AWS-native identity, wired into IAM and API Gateway | You’re all-in on AWS |
| Firebase Authentication | B2C-oriented identity inside Google’s mobile stack | You’re shipping a consumer app on Firebase |
| Authelia | Self-hosted SSO portal that gates services behind a reverse proxy | You’re protecting self-hosted infrastructure, not building a product |
When Faable Auth is the better fit
- You need European data sovereignty. User identities stay in Europe under European law, with full GDPR compliance.
- You don’t want to operate auth infrastructure. Faable Auth is fully managed — no servers, upgrades, or database to run (the main cost of self-hosting Keycloak).
- You want auth and hosting together. Faable Deploy and Faable Auth share one subscription and one support relationship.
- You want predictable pricing based on monthly active users (MAU), not per-feature add-ons that escalate at scale.
- Multi-tenancy is first-class — isolate orgs, teams, and users by host without extra plumbing.
When another tool might fit better
- Auth0 has the deepest feature surface and ecosystem (now part of Okta); a fit for large enterprises already standardized on it, if EU sovereignty isn’t a hard requirement.
- Clerk offers excellent prebuilt React UI components and developer experience for B2C/B2B apps that are happy on US hosting.
- Keycloak is the go-to when you specifically want open-source, self-hosted identity and have the team to operate it.
- You need SAML or built-in MFA today. Faable Auth doesn’t implement either yet — enterprise connections speak OAuth 2.0 / OIDC only, and second factors have to be enforced in your own application (an Action can gate the login on it). All three alternatives ship both.
How Faable Auth works
Four concepts model the whole product: Accounts (your tenant), Connections (sources of users), Clients (your apps), and Users & Teams. Add login with the @faable/auth-js SDK or a framework quickstart, and call the Management API from your backend with client credentials.
See Get Started with Faable Auth, or learn the concept first in What is a multi-tenant identity server?.
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