SpiceDB is an open-source, Zanzibar-inspired permissions database from AuthZed. Compare self-hosted vs managed Cloud pricing and key features.
SpiceDB is an open-source database designed specifically for storing and evaluating authorization and permissions data. Its design is inspired by Zanzibar, the internal authorization system Google described in a widely cited engineering paper, which models permissions as relationships between users and resources rather than as scattered if-statements in application code.
SpiceDB is built and maintained by AuthZed, founded in 2020 by a team that previously worked on CoreOS and at Red Hat. The company is headquartered in New York and describes itself as building authorization infrastructure for AI and modern applications.
The core SpiceDB project is fully open source and free to self-host, while AuthZed sells managed hosting and enterprise support around it as its commercial product.
SpiceDB lets teams define a permissions schema that models roles, relationships, and hierarchies, then query whether a given user has access to a given resource with strong consistency guarantees. It supports role-based, relationship-based, and attribute-based access control patterns in a single system, and is designed to scale to large, complex permission graphs.
Open-source SpiceDB is free to self-host under the Apache 2.0 license with community support via Discord and GitHub. AuthZed Cloud offers pay-as-you-go managed hosting starting around $2 per hour. Self-Hosted enterprise licenses and Dedicated Cloud, which provides private, multi-region managed infrastructure, are both sold as custom annual quotes with tiered support levels.
SpiceDB is used to store and evaluate fine-grained authorization and permissions data for applications, replacing hardcoded permission logic with a centralized, queryable system.
Yes, the open-source core of SpiceDB is free to self-host under the Apache 2.0 license. AuthZed also sells managed Cloud, Dedicated, and Self-Hosted enterprise options.
SpiceDB is developed and maintained by AuthZed, a company founded in 2020 and headquartered in New York.
Zanzibar is the authorization system Google described in an engineering paper. SpiceDB is an open-source database inspired by that design for modeling permissions as relationships.
AuthZed Cloud is a pay-as-you-go managed offering starting at around $2 per hour, with premium and enterprise support tiers available.
SpiceDB supports role-based, relationship-based, and attribute-based access control patterns within a single permissions system.
OpenFGA, a CNCF project, is one of the other leading open-source, Zanzibar-inspired authorization systems and a direct alternative to SpiceDB.
Yes, SpiceDB can be self-hosted for free using the open-source release, or run through AuthZed's paid Self-Hosted enterprise license with support.