NGINX Plus Pricing 2026
Complete pricing guide with plans, hidden costs, and negotiation tips
NGINX Plus pricing varies by team size and features, ranging from $849 to $2.1K per per instance per year in 2026. Your actual cost depends on the tier you choose, contract length, and negotiated discounts.
Use the interactive pricing calculator to estimate your exact cost based on team size and requirements.
- Free tier: No free tier available
- Billing: Monthly and annual (save 15-20%)
- Hidden costs: Add ~35% for implementation, support, and training
NGINX Plus offers 4 pricing tiers: NGINX Plus Basic Support, NGINX Plus Standard Support, NGINX Plus Premium Support, NGINX Plus with WAF. The NGINX Plus Standard Support plan is general users and teams.
Compared to other load balancers software, NGINX Plus is positioned at the premium price point.
All NGINX Plus Plans & Pricing
| Plan | Monthly | Annual | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| NGINX Plus Basic Support | Contact | Contact | General users and teams |
| NGINX Plus Standard Support | Contact | Contact | General users and teams |
| NGINX Plus Premium Support | Contact | Contact | General users and teams |
| NGINX Plus with WAF | Contact | Contact | General users and teams |
View all features by plan
NGINX Plus Basic Support
- Single instance license
- Advanced load balancing (IP hash, least connections, least time)
- Session persistence
- Active health checks
- Dynamic configuration API
- Real-time monitoring dashboard
- Basic support (business hours)
NGINX Plus Standard Support
- All Basic features
- 24/7 email and phone support
- JWT authentication
- OpenID Connect integration
- Advanced API gateway features
- Content caching and optimization
- gRPC load balancing
NGINX Plus Premium Support
- All Standard features
- 24/7 premium support with faster SLA
- Technical account manager (TAM)
- Architecture review sessions
- Priority bug fixes and feature requests
- Custom SLA options
- Multi-year discounts available
NGINX Plus with WAF
- Add to any support tier
- Application-layer security
- OWASP ModSecurity integration
- Custom security rules
- Attack signature updates
- Security event logging
- DDoS mitigation capabilities
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Frequently Asked Questions
01 What's the difference between NGINX Open Source and NGINX Plus?
NGINX Open Source is free with community support. NGINX Plus adds advanced load balancing algorithms, active health checks, dynamic configuration via API, session persistence, JWT authentication, real-time monitoring, and 24/7 enterprise support. Plus is commercially supported by F5.
02 How does NGINX Plus licensing work?
NGINX Plus is licensed per instance with annual or three-year subscription terms. Licensing is socket-based—you pay per server socket. Each instance includes the software, updates, and support. Multi-year subscriptions typically offer 10-15% discounts.
03 Can I use NGINX Plus as an API gateway?
Yes, NGINX Plus includes robust API gateway features including rate limiting, JWT authentication, OpenID Connect integration, request/response transformation, API key validation, and comprehensive logging. These features are included in Standard and Premium support tiers.
04 How much does NGINX WAF cost?
NGINX Web Application Firewall is available for $2,000 per instance per year, in addition to your NGINX Plus subscription. It provides application-layer security with OWASP ModSecurity integration and regular security signature updates.
05 Is NGINX Plus suitable for microservices?
Yes, NGINX Plus is well-suited for microservices architectures with features like service discovery, dynamic reconfiguration without restarts, gRPC load balancing, JWT authentication for service-to-service communication, and comprehensive health checking.