# Cerebrium vs Replicate Deployments

> Replicate Deployments scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against Cerebrium's 55.3 (C), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cerebrium leads on security & auth and maintenance & community. Both do compute gpu. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy.md (~2,250 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy.min.md (~680 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-08

Replicate Deployments scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against Cerebrium's 55.3 (C), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cerebrium leads on security & auth and maintenance & community. Both do compute gpu.

- Cerebrium: grade C, 55.3/100, rank #512 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cerebrium.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cerebrium.json
- Replicate Deployments: grade B, 63.6/100, rank #303 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/replicate-deploy.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/replicate-deploy.json

## Which one, for what

### Cerebrium (C)

Good for: Teams serving their own models as real-time endpoints (voice, LLM, image) who want per-second billing, multi-region placement and a scriptable management API.

Ahead on:
- Security & auth, 60 against 40
- Maintenance & community, 75 against 70

Watch for: `disable_auth` defaults to true, so a deployed endpoint answers without a token unless the owner changes it

### Replicate Deployments (B)

Good for: Teams already calling Replicate's public models who want their own model behind the same API, MCP server and webhooks.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 75 against 48
- Schema & documentation, 85 against 70
- Agent ergonomics, 68 against 49
- Transparency & trust, 78 against 63

Also in its favour:
- Runs on your own machine
- Open source

Watch for: Private instances bill set-up and idle time, H100 at $5.49 an hour


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Cerebrium | Replicate Deployments | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 48 | 75 | Replicate Deployments +27 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 70 | 85 | Replicate Deployments +15 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 49 | 68 | Replicate Deployments +19 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 60 | 40 | Cerebrium +20 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 30 | 30 | even |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 70 | Cerebrium +5 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 63 | 78 | Replicate Deployments +15 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **55.3 · C** | **63.6 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Cerebrium | Replicate Deployments |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Model platform | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Cerebrium Inc. | Replicate |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://rest.cerebrium.ai` | `https://api.replicate.com/v1` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP, SSE (legacy), stdio |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Pay per use |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under Cerebrium's terms of service. The CLI is MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-09-16 | 2026-09-22 |
| Terms last updated | no date given | 2026-04-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | 2026-04-01 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | yes |
| Popularity | 920 PyPI/wk | 9.5k stars, 634k npm/wk, 387k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**Cerebrium.** Per-second GPU prices are public, a 94-operation OpenAPI spec covers the management API, and service account tokens expire and are limited to named projects. Deployed endpoints are callable without a token unless `disable_auth = false` is set, and no request rate limits, 429 handling or SLA were found in the reviewed documentation.

**Replicate Deployments.** OpenAPI file, llms.txt and an MCP server with a two-tool code mode. Private instances bill set-up and idle time, H100 at $5.49 an hour.

## Before you call either

### Cerebrium

1. Set `disable_auth = false` in `cerebrium.toml` before deploying. The default leaves the endpoint callable by anyone with the URL
2. Authenticate headless with `CEREBRIUM_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_TOKEN`. `cerebrium login` opens a browser
3. Raise `response_grace_period` for long work. It defaults to 15 minutes and async runs stop at 12 hours
4. Send `?async=true` to get a `run_id` with HTTP 202, and add `webhookEndpoint` because async calls return no result to the caller
5. Check the plan before choosing hardware. A100, H100, H200, B200 and RTX PRO 6000 need Standard, and `protected` compute bills at twice the listed rate

### Replicate Deployments

1. List `GET /v1/hardware` first and use the returned `sku` in the deployment body
2. Set `min_instances` to 0 for bursty work; a warm H100 bills $5.49 an hour whether called or not
3. Send `Prefer: wait` on deployment predictions to block instead of polling
4. Copy outputs within an hour; API prediction data is deleted after that
5. Wait for the reset time in the 429 body before retrying; prediction creates cap at 600 a minute

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Cerebrium or Replicate Deployments?

Replicate Deployments scores 63.6 (B) on agent readiness against Cerebrium's 55.3 (C), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cerebrium leads on security & auth and maintenance & community.

### Can an agent call Cerebrium and Replicate Deployments without installing anything?

Yes. Cerebrium has a hosted endpoint at https://rest.cerebrium.ai and Replicate Deployments at https://api.replicate.com/v1.

### Are Cerebrium and Replicate Deployments open source?

No open-source release is listed for Cerebrium. Replicate Deployments is open source (Apache-2.0).


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cerebrium-vs-replicate-deploy.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "cerebrium", "b": "replicate-deploy"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare cerebrium replicate-deploy`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cerebrium.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/replicate-deploy.json

## Other comparisons with Cerebrium or Replicate Deployments

- [Baseten vs Cerebrium](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/baseten-vs-cerebrium.md)
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