Secrets management · Comparison
Doppler vs Google Secret Manager vs HCP Vault Dedicated
3 products compared side by side: what you pay for with each one first, then the five access facts, entry prices, recorded plan limits and the bottom line of each review. The evidence note under the table says how each product was checked.
Side by side
| Metric | Doppler | Google Secret Manager | HCP Vault Dedicated |
|---|---|---|---|
| What you're paying for | Saves engineering timeOne place to store, sync and rotate app secrets across environments, billed per engineer with machine identities free. | Worth the priceA pay-per-use secret store inside Google Cloud with a permanent free tier, IAM per secret and Google Cloud’s compliance coverage. | Saves engineering timeVault run for you by HashiCorp: dynamic credentials, rotation and fine-grained policies on a single-tenant cluster you do not operate. |
| Overall score | 7.3 | 8.5Best | 5.2 |
| Free option | Free plan | Free plan | Free trial |
| Card to start | No card needed | –Not measured | No card needed |
| Getting access | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve |
| Starter priceCheapest paid plan | $21/user/mo | $0.06/secret version/mo | $0.62/cluster-hour |
| Pricing model | Per seat | Usage-based | Usage-based |
| Pricing page | Public prices | Public prices | Public prices |
| Billing unit | Per human user per month; no secret, API or usage fees | Per active secret version per location and per 10,000 access operations | Per cluster-hour by tier and size, plus per client per month |
| Free option | Developer: 3 users free, $8 per additional user up to 25; 14-day Team trial, no card | Permanent free tier: 6 versions, 10,000 accesses, 3 rotation notifications a month | No free tier; $500 of trial credit for 6 months, no card |
| Machine identities | Free; service accounts from Team | Service accounts and IAM principals, not billed | Billed as clients, like people, at $72.92 a month |
| Audit log retention | 3 days on Developer, 90 days on Team, custom on Enterprise | Secret reads: 30 days once Data Access logs are on; admin activity 400 days | 30 days for download from Essentials; none on Development |
| Dynamic secrets | Enterprise (AWS IAM, Azure Service Principal) | Not offered | Every tier |
| Database rotation | Team for GCP Cloud SQL via API; proxied AWS databases on Enterprise | Managed Cloud SQL rotation in Preview (regional secrets); Pub/Sub notifications otherwise | Every tier (database static roles) |
| Kubernetes | Doppler Kubernetes Operator and External Secrets provider, all plans | Secret Manager add-on for GKE (CSI driver), sync to Kubernetes Secrets | Vault Secrets Operator and CSI provider |
| SAML SSO / SCIM | SAML on Team; SCIM on Enterprise | Through Cloud Identity Free; Entra ID provisioning guide | HCP SAML or OIDC SSO and SCIM, no plan gate stated |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type II; ISO 27001 | SOC 1, 2, 3; ISO 27001, 27017, 27018 | Restricted-use SOC 2 report, type not stated; ISO 27001 and 27017 |
| HIPAA BAA | Not described | Covered by the Google Cloud BAA, every account | Not supported |
| EU data storage | No EU region; GCP us-central1 | Regional secrets or user-managed replication in EU locations | EU regions on AWS and Azure; snapshots in the US |
| Self-hosting | Doppler On-prem, Enterprise only | Not offered | Vault Community (BSL 1.1); Vault Enterprise through sales |
| Secret export | CLI and API download as JSON, .env or YAML | One version at a time | Per path via CLI or API; no bulk export |
| Bottom line | From its public pages, Doppler is a simple seat-priced secrets platform: machine identities are free, and Team at $21 a user adds SSO, rotation and 90-day logs. Dynamic secrets, SCIM, SIEM forwarding and customer-managed keys need Enterprise, and the cloud runs in the US only. | From its public pages, Google Secret Manager is the lowest-cost option here, at $14.61 a month for our scenario, with a permanent free tier and Google Cloud’s compliance coverage. Rotation is mostly yours to build, and there are no dynamic secrets or push syncs. | From its public pages, HCP Vault Dedicated puts the most secret-lifecycle features on its entry production tier, with SSO, SCIM and audit streaming self-serve. At $2,245.73 a month it costs the most for our scenario, and it offers no HIPAA BAA or customer-managed keys. |
Evidence: Doppler: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Google Secret Manager: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; HCP Vault Dedicated: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run. Prices in USD as listed, excluding tax. "–" means not recorded.
When to pick each
In the words of each review, with the date its facts were checked.
From our Doppler review
Checked Oct 16, 2026- Pick Doppler when
- You want a seat-priced service at $210 a month for the scenario rather than a cluster billed by the hour.
- Pick HCP Vault Dedicated when
- You need dynamic database credentials, Vault policies and SCIM without an Enterprise contract.
From our Google Secret Manager review
Checked Oct 16, 2026- Pick Google Secret Manager when
- You want per-use pricing with no seat fees and Google Cloud’s compliance coverage.
- Pick Doppler when
- You want push syncs to CI and hosting platforms and one UI for environments across clouds.
From our HCP Vault Dedicated review
Checked Oct 16, 2026- Pick HCP Vault Dedicated when
- You need dynamic credentials, Vault policies and SCIM without an Enterprise contract.
- Pick Doppler when
- You want seat pricing at $210 a month for the scenario, free machine identities and syncs on the same plan.
Entry price
Baseline: each product's cheapest paid plan, per month. Included usage differs, so read the line under each price.
- DopplerTeam$21/user/moBilled per seat per month, prorated; 14-day trial, no card; machine identities free
- SAML SSO and role-based access per project and environment
- Automatic secret rotation and 100 config syncs
- 90 days of activity logs
- Add-ons at $9/seat/mo: custom roles, user groups, 500 syncs
- Google Secret ManagerPay as you go$0.06/version/moPer active version per location; $0.03 per 10,000 access operations; $0.05 per rotation notification
- Management operations free; destroyed versions free
- Automatic replication billed as one location
- CMEK through Cloud KMS
- Custom quote on request
- HCP Vault DedicatedDevelopment$0.62/cluster-hourExtra Small, single node; $0.61644 on IBM’s list; up to 25 clients, no per-client fee
- Dynamic and auto-rotating secrets
- No audit logging or secrets sync
- For exploring features in a limited environment
Prices as listed on each pricing page, in USD per month, excluding tax. Observed: Doppler 2026-10-16, Google Secret Manager 2026-10-16, HCP Vault Dedicated 2026-10-16.
Which one fits
- If you need to start today without a sales call
- Google Secret ManagerSelf-serve sign-up; the highest score of the 3 self-serve products here (8.5/10).
- If you want to try it without entering a card
- DopplerFree plan, no card needed; scored 7.3/10.
- Lowest starter price
- Google Secret Manager$0.06/secret version/mo for the Pay as you go (plus $0.03 per 10,000 access operations) plan. HCP Vault Dedicated lists no comparable paid price.
- Highest overall score
- Google Secret Manager8.5/10 (Excellent). The review shows the score breakdown and the run behind it.
Picked by fixed rules from the table above, not by hand. How we score
Full reviews
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