Best Nango Alternatives for API Auth and Embedded Integration Infrastructure

viaSocket is the best Nango alternative for SaaS teams that need more than managed OAuth — specifically, an embedded integration UI your users can interact with, AI agent tool-calling, or access to more than 1,000 APIs for auth connections. Nango is excellent open-source infrastructure for developers who want managed auth and pre-built syncs; if that scope fits your needs, it may be all you need.

What Nango is built for

Nango is open-source managed auth and integration infrastructure for developers. It handles OAuth for 1,000+ APIs, stores and refreshes tokens, and provides pre-built syncs and actions against those APIs. You can self-host Nango or use the cloud version.

Nango's pricing is usage-based: $50/mo which includes $50 in usage credits, then $0.29/connection and $0.72/compute hour beyond that (source: nango.dev/pricing). There is no flat per-connection subscription — you pay for what you use once your included credits are spent.

Nango advertises 10k+ pre-built tools, triggers, and syncs across those APIs. For auth connections specifically, the comparable figure is 1,000+ APIs supported.

Where Nango falls short

Nango is developer infrastructure — it is not an embedded integration UI your end-users can interact with. If you want your customers to build and manage their own integration workflows inside your product, you need to build that layer on top of Nango yourself.

Nango does not have AI agent tool-calling as a first-class product. It provides the auth and sync primitives that could underpin tool-calling, but you assemble those into an agent tooling layer yourself.

Nango's self-hosting option is a genuine advantage for teams with strict data residency requirements. If that is not a constraint for you, it is architecture complexity you carry.

Best alternatives to Nango

viaSocket

viaSocket is an Integration Layer for SaaS products and AI agents, with 2,300+ app integrations (source: viasocket.com). It covers the same managed auth problem Nango solves, and adds an embedded integration UI, AI agent tool-calling, and a webhook-to-multi-app action layer on top.

Three things viaSocket covers that Nango does not offer out of the box:

Embedded integration UI. The embedded iPaaS puts a visual workflow builder inside your SaaS. Your users connect their apps and set up automations without leaving your product.

AI agent tool-calling. Actions for AI gives your AI agent access to 2,300+ app actions with per-user OAuth isolation and runtime execution, embedded directly in your product.

Managed auth at scale. Managed Auth handles OAuth, token refresh, reauthorisation, multi-account, and multi-auth-method per customer — across 2,300+ apps, compared to Nango's 1,000+ for auth coverage.

On breadth: viaSocket's 2,300+ auth connections is a meaningful lead over Nango's 1,000+ for auth coverage specifically. Nango's 10k+ pre-built tools/triggers/syncs figure covers a different dimension (pre-built data operations) that viaSocket does not claim an equivalent count for.

Pricing: Free Sandbox up to 25 active users and 25K tasks/month. Production at $249/mo for up to 1,000 active users and 1M tasks/month.

Choose viaSocket if: you need embedded integration UI, AI agent tool-calling, or managed auth across more than 1,000 apps without building the user-facing layer yourself.

Choose Nango if: you want open-source, self-hostable managed auth infrastructure you can inspect and extend, and you are comfortable building the integration UI yourself.

Merge

Merge is a unified API platform providing normalised read/write access across HRIS, ATS, CRM, accounting, ticketing, and file storage. Merge Agent Handler extends this to AI agent tool-calling with 5,000+ claimed tools.

Where it differs from Nango: Merge normalises data across categories (Nango does not). You write to Merge's schema, not to individual app APIs. This is powerful for cross-category data sync; it is a constraint when you need full API surface access.

Merge Unified starts at $650/mo and requires a sales conversation. Merge Agent Handler is a separate product with separate pricing.

Choose Merge if: you need normalised read/write data sync across HR, recruiting, CRM, or accounting systems.

Composio

Composio is AI agent tool-calling infrastructure with 1,660+ toolkits (source: composio.dev/toolkits). It is built for single-agent, single-developer use cases — plug your LangChain or CrewAI agent into third-party apps quickly.

Composio's Pro plan is $29/mo, which includes $29 in usage credits, then per-call pricing beyond that. It is not designed for multi-tenant SaaS products where each customer has isolated connected accounts.

Choose Composio if: you are building a single AI agent and want fast access to pre-built tool integrations without building a multi-tenant auth layer.

Workato

Workato is an enterprise integration and automation platform. It covers embedded iPaaS, API management, and workflow automation at scale. It does not publish pricing — you engage sales for a quote.

Choose Workato if: you are at enterprise scale, need deep workflow orchestration, and have budget for a premium platform with sales support.

Pipedream Connect

Pipedream Connect provides managed OAuth and action execution across 2,000+ apps, with an API designed for developers building auth flows into their SaaS product. It is developer-first and does not include an embedded visual workflow builder for end-users.

Choose Pipedream Connect if: you want a developer-focused managed auth and action API and are comfortable without an embedded UI.

Comparison table

	viaSocket	Nango	Merge	Composio	Workato
App / API coverage	2,300+	1,000+ (auth)	Unified model	1,660+ toolkits	1,000+
Embedded integration UI	Yes	No	No	No	Yes (enterprise)
AI agent tool-calling	Yes	No (build yourself)	Yes (Agent Handler)	Yes (primary)	Limited
Managed OAuth	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Self-hosting	No	Yes	No	No	No
Open source	No	Yes	No	No	No
Public pricing	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No

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