# Keeper Secrets Manager vs Pulumi ESC

> Pulumi ESC scores 71.1 (BB) on agent readiness against Keeper Secrets Manager's 69.4 (B), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Keeper Secrets Manager leads on reliability, security & auth, maintenance & community and transparency & trust. Both do secrets store. Category…

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/keeper-secrets-manager-vs-pulumi-esc
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/keeper-secrets-manager-vs-pulumi-esc.md (~2,700 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/keeper-secrets-manager-vs-pulumi-esc.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/keeper-secrets-manager-vs-pulumi-esc.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

Pulumi ESC scores 71.1 (BB) on agent readiness against Keeper Secrets Manager's 69.4 (B), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Keeper Secrets Manager leads on reliability, security & auth, maintenance & community and transparency & trust. Both do secrets store.

- Keeper Secrets Manager: grade B, 69.4/100, rank #159 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/keeper-secrets-manager.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/keeper-secrets-manager.json
- Pulumi ESC: grade BB, 71.1/100, rank #120 of 722. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/pulumi-esc.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/pulumi-esc.json

## Which one, for what

### Keeper Secrets Manager (B)

Good for: Companies already on Keeper's business vault that want per-device machine identities with client-side decryption and an official MCP server.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 76 against 60
- Security & auth, 86 against 79
- Maintenance & community, 92 against 82
- Transparency & trust, 78 against 65

Also in its favour:
- Runs on your own machine

Watch for: Secrets Manager is priced by quote. The add-ons page shows Custom Pricing and Request a Quote

### Pulumi ESC (BB)

Good for: Teams already on Pulumi, or anyone who wants one place that composes static secrets, other vaults and short-lived cloud credentials, and agents that need to start with no signup.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 82 against 71
- Agent ergonomics, 75 against 63
- Payments & pricing, 55 against 20

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: Audit logs, custom roles, team tokens, approvals and customer-managed keys need Pro ($400 a month) or Enterprise


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Keeper Secrets Manager | Pulumi ESC | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 76 | 60 | Keeper Secrets Manager +16 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 71 | 82 | Pulumi ESC +11 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 63 | 75 | Pulumi ESC +12 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 86 | 79 | Keeper Secrets Manager +7 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 55 | Pulumi ESC +35 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 92 | 82 | Keeper Secrets Manager +10 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 78 | 65 | Keeper Secrets Manager +13 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **69.4 · B** | **71.1 · BB** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Keeper Secrets Manager | Pulumi ESC |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Keeper Security, Inc. | Pulumi Corporation |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | `https://api.pulumi.com` |
| Transports | HTTP, stdio | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under Keeper's SaaS Terms of Use. The SDKs, CLI, MCP server and agent kit on GitHub are MIT | Proprietary service under Pulumi's Terms & Conditions. The Pulumi CLI, the ESC evaluator and the ESC SDKs are Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | 19 | none |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | yes |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-06 | 2026-10-07 |
| Terms last updated | no date given | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | no date given |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | 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 | not found in the text | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 117 stars, 52k npm/wk, 45k PyPI/wk | 21k npm/wk, 54k PyPI/wk |

## Verdicts

**Keeper Secrets Manager.** Each client device signs requests with its own key, is locked to an IP address by default and can be revoked alone, and secrets decrypt only on the client. The add-on has no public price, no request limits were found in the reviewed documentation, and a person must create the application and device in the vault.

**Pulumi ESC.** An agent can start without a signup, because the Pulumi CLI creates a free ephemeral account that includes ESC, and the REST API has a public OpenAPI document. Audit logs, custom roles and approvals need the Pro edition at $400 a month, and no API rate limit was found in the reviewed documentation.

## Before you call either

### Keeper Secrets Manager

1. Ask the vault owner for a new device on an application that holds only the folders the task needs. Use the Base64 configuration, not the first one-time token
2. Run commands under `ksm exec` so secrets arrive as environment variables and stay out of the model's context
3. Expect HTTP 403 with `{"error":"throttled"}` under load. The Python SDK retries five times from 11 seconds, so allow for long waits
4. A device is locked to the IP address it first connects from unless it was created with `--unlock-ip`. Check this before running from a dynamic address
5. Leave `--auto-approve` off on the MCP server. It removes confirmation for deletes and for unmasking values

### Pulumi ESC

1. Use `pulumi env`, not `esc`. The standalone CLI stopped at v0.26.0 and gets no security fixes
2. Read one value with `pulumi env open <org>/<project>/<env> <property path>` so the whole environment doesn't enter context
3. Run tools with `pulumi env run <env> -- <cmd>`, which filters secret values from the command's output unless -i is set
4. Set PULUMI_ACCESS_TOKEN for the SDKs. From 0.14.0 they no longer read the CLI login on disk
5. Send `Authorization: token <token>` and `Accept: application/vnd.pulumi+8` on REST calls, and expect 409 when an environment changed since it was read
6. Relay the claim link an agent account prints. The account goes read-only after 72 hours and locks after 30 days unclaimed

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Keeper Secrets Manager or Pulumi ESC?

Pulumi ESC scores 71.1 (BB) on agent readiness against Keeper Secrets Manager's 69.4 (B), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Keeper Secrets Manager leads on reliability, security & auth, maintenance & community and transparency & trust.

### Do Keeper Secrets Manager and Pulumi ESC need an API key?

Keeper Secrets Manager needs an API key. Pulumi ESC takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call Keeper Secrets Manager and Pulumi ESC without installing anything?

Keeper Secrets Manager runs on your own machine, with no hosted endpoint listed. Pulumi ESC has a hosted endpoint at https://api.pulumi.com.


## For agents

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

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