Mockaroo vs Snowfakery
Mockaroo
mockaroo.comSnowfakery
snowfakery.readthedocs.ioSide by side
| Figure | Mockaroo | Snowfakery |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $5/mo | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | Yes | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | — |
| Linux | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 4 | 1 |
| Spec score · Test Data Generation Tools | 7.9 (#7) | 7.9 (#8) |
| Intended users | Mockaroo describes its use for developers and testers who need realistic test data, and for front-end developers working before a back end is ready. | The documentation describes installation paths for Salesforce users and for users who want to use Snowfakery without Salesforce. |
| Output formats | The Generate API supports JSON, CSV, tab-separated text, custom-delimited text, SQL, and XML output. | File-based output includes JSON, TXT, CSV, SQL, DOT, SVG, SVGZ, JPEG, and PostScript formats, with some diagram formats requiring Graphviz. |
| Purpose | Mockaroo generates realistic test data and can create mock back-end APIs for UI development. | Snowfakery generates unique, random fake data with relationships between tables from YAML recipe files. |
| Security | Mockaroo's privacy policy says sensitive information submitted through the site is encrypted in transit and that access to personal information is limited to employees who need it for their jobs. | The documentation warns that recipes can access much of Python's power, load plugins, and call Python methods, so it advises against running untrusted recipes where they can access secure resources. |
Plans
In their own words
Mockaroo
Mockaroo is a web-based synthetic data generator for developers and testers who need realistic test records or a mock back end while building a user interface. It offers more than 100 built-in data types; users can also upload reference data or define types with the formula API. The Generate API produces JSON, CSV, tab-separated or custom-delimited text, SQL, and XML. Mock APIs can connect request parameters to schemas and return dynamic or static data, or simulate errors. Both APIs require an API key, sent as a query parameter or an X-API-Key header. Free includes 1,000 rows per file and 200 API requests per day. Silver is $60 a year and allows 100,000 rows per file and 1 million API records per day; Gold is $500 a year and allows 10 million rows per file and 10 million API records per day. Synchronous API responses are limited to 5,000 records on every plan; background generation requires a paid plan. Enterprise is $7,500 a year, with unlimited data and users and Docker deployment in a private cloud or datacenter.
Snowfakery
Snowfakery generates synthetic data from YAML recipe files, including records linked across tables. Recipes can create names, addresses, text, URLs, random numbers and other values using Faker-based functions, and specify how many related objects to generate. Output can go to files in JSON, TXT, CSV, SQL, DOT, SVG, SVGZ, JPEG and PostScript formats; some diagram formats require Graphviz. Snowfakery can also write to databases accessible through SQLAlchemy, including SQLite, and generate records in Salesforce when used through CumulusCI. Python applications can embed it with its generate_data function, and Python plugins and providers can extend its functions and Faker capabilities. Strict mode checks a recipe before generation, while validate-only mode checks it without generating data. It is free, open source and self-hosted. The documentation says database output creates new tables, with generated columns as text, and that SQLite is the only database included in its SQL dataset URL test suite. The repository was archived on September 18, 2026, and is read-only.