Replicate
Hacker ApprovedShares rank 7 of 14 inference providers by recommenders
Recommended for running open-source image and language models through a simple pay-per-request API and for quick prototyping. Main caveat: unclear pricing and billing errors, plus doubts about the Cloudflare acquisition's direction.
Recommended for running open-source image and language models through a simple pay-per-request API and for quick prototyping. Main caveat: unclear pricing and billing errors, plus doubts about the Cloudflare acquisition's direction.
16 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 13
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 81%
Recommended in 5 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 13 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 4.3 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 5 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Pay-per-request access to open models
“or something like Fal or Replicate where you can try out the open source models and pay per request”
Comment from 2 Jan 2026 in “Dell's version of the DGX Spark fixes pain points” “On replicate.com a single image takes 1.5s at a price of 1000 images per $1.”
Comment from 6 Dec 2025 in “Z-Image: Powerful and highly efficient image generation model with 6B parameters” “I use replicate, fal for all api and for LLM openrouter”
Comment from 11 Dec 2025 in “Getting a Gemini API key is an exercise in frustration” Cloudflare acquisition seen positively
“Cloudflare has the strategic incentive to invest in this line of business and it puts Replicate in the hands of a very good product marketing and sales team”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare” “Overall I think it's a good acquisition for both of them.”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare” “Good to see their purchase of Replicate paying off!”
Comment from 16 Apr 2026 in “Cloudflare's AI Platform: an inference layer designed for agents” Easy prototyping of AI models
“Replicate is my preferred go to for image models and easy proof of concepts for language models”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare” “Replicate just make it so easy to bundle a bunch of different AIs up into a prototype”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare” Praised as awesome and a match
“Replicate has been so awesome though.”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare” “Replicate seems a perfect match”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Replicate is joining Cloudflare”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Billing and pricing transparency problems
“I keep getting rate limited with error that my balance should be above $5.”
Comment from 9 Apr 2026 in “I've been waiting over a month for Anthropic support to respond” “Neither fal nor replicate return accurate pricing in the response body.”
Comment from 1 Feb 2026 in “Show HN: Ziframe – generate AI assets directly on the After Effects timeline”
Other inference providers people recommend
The four most recommended other inference providers, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fireworks AI | 67 | 19 | 78% | 11 | — | Approved |
| DeepInfra | 36 | 11 | 77% | 11 | — | Approved |
| Together AI | 20 | 7 | 74% | 9 | — | Approved |
| fal.ai | 19 | 7 | 73% | 8 | — | Approved |
| ReplicateThis page | 13 | 3 | 81% | 5 | — | Approved |
What people said
14 of the 17 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I feel like they could do some much more interesting stuff with their replicate acquisition.”
“Good to see their purchase of Replicate paying off!”
“I keep getting rate limited with error that my balance should be above $5.”
“Neither fal nor replicate return accurate pricing in the response body.”
“or something like Fal or Replicate where you can try out the open source models and pay per request”
“I use replicate, fal for all api and for LLM openrouter”
“On replicate.com a single image takes 1.5s at a price of 1000 images per $1.”
“If you aren't afraid of a Dockerfile, the "ease of use" premium evaporates.”
“Replicate seems a perfect match”
“Cloudflare has the strategic incentive to invest in this line of business and it puts Replicate in the hands of a very good product marketing and sales team”
“Replicate is my preferred go to for image models and easy proof of concepts for language models”
“Overall I think it's a good acquisition for both of them.”
“Replicate has been so awesome though.”
“Replicate just make it so easy to bundle a bunch of different AIs up into a prototype”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.