Arroyo vs Lenses
Arroyo
arroyo.devLenses
lenses.ioSide by side
| Figure | Arroyo | Lenses |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $5/mo | $0.33/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 3 | 6 |
| Spec score · Stream Analytics Software | 9.2 (#1) | 8.1 (#11) |
| Deployment | Arroyo can run as a single binary, Docker container or Kubernetes deployment, with SQLite for local use and Postgres recommended for distributed production. | Lenses can be deployed in a cloud, on-premises, or hybrid environment. |
| Support | The deployment guide invites users rolling out clusters to contact [email protected] or ask questions on Discord. | The pricing page includes Team Support in the Team plan and Enterprise Support in the Multi-Kafka Enterprise plan. |
Plans
Arroyo
- Arroyo open-sourceFree
- Open-source Arroyo EngineFree
- Cloudflare Workers Paid with Pipelines$5 a month
Lenses
- K2K CommunityFree
- Lenses DevX Community EditionFree
- K2K add-on$1 a month
- Lenses DevX Team Edition$4 a year
- K2K EnterprisePriced on request
- Lenses DevX Multi-Kafka EnterprisePriced on request
In their own words
Arroyo
Arroyo is an open-source distributed engine for processing stateful computations on data streams, with sub-second results. Users build streaming pipelines in analytical SQL, including complex queries, windows and joins. Arroyo supports checkpointing for fault tolerance and recovery, exactly-once processing, and horizontal and vertical rescaling; it says the engine can handle millions of events per second. Its connectors include Kafka, Kinesis, MQTT, MySQL, Postgres, Redis, Delta Lake, HTTP and WebSocket, among others. It reads and writes JSON, Avro, Parquet, text and binary, and includes more than 300 SQL functions. Rust scalar, aggregate and asynchronous user-defined functions can extend SQL. The web UI supports connection management, query development and testing, and pipeline monitoring; pipeline management is also available through a REST API. Single-node clusters are intended for development and testing, while production deployments use a distributed cluster with Arroyo’s scheduler or Kubernetes. It is Apache 2.0 licensed, free at free, and self-hostable.
Lenses
Lenses describes its Operating Fabric as a platform for building, governing, and operating Kafka applications with engineers and AI agents. Users can discover streaming data across domains with SQL, prepare it for consumption, and deploy data streams independently. It connects to Confluent Platform, Confluent Cloud, Amazon MSK, Redpanda, and self-managed Apache Kafka, and can run in cloud, on-premises, or hybrid environments. Work interfaces include a Web App, VS Code Extension, Lenses MCP, and Lenses CLI. Lenses says OAuth 2.1 gives agents scoped, short-lived, revocable, and audited access. It also lists open-source Kafka connectors for systems including Amazon S3, Azure Event Hubs, GCP Storage, Cassandra, MongoDB, Redis, and Elasticsearch; the connectors are Apache 2.0 licensed and have enterprise support. The DevX Community Edition supports up to five free users, while SQL Studio supports up to two Kafka clusters. A trial key is available through the guided demo. Team Edition is listed from $4,000 per year and supports up to 15 users with SSO/SAML, RBAC, and Team Support.