Head-to-head

EvalGuard vs Helicone. 

Open-source LLM observability + cost dashboard, ClickHouse-backedHelicone (helicone.ai, YC W23) is an open-source LLM observability platform focused on tracing, cost tracking, and a real-time dashboard. ClickHouse-backed for trace scale, Helm chart published, free OSS tier with paid SaaS. Strong observability primitives, but no eval framework, no red-team library, no runtime firewall.

6
EvalGuard wins
·
7
Ties
·
1
Helicone wins

Competitor data (GitHub stars, downloads, feature counts, funding / acquisition status) verified as of 2026-04-28. EvalGuard's own counts are sourced live from the drift-checked registry.

Coverage at a glance

EvalGuard vs Helicone, by the numbers

Where both platforms publish a number, here's the gap. Our values come straight from the drift-checked registry; Helicone's are quoted as published.

Attack Plugins
EvalGuard0
Helicone0
Compliance Frameworks
EvalGuard0
Helicone0
FeatureEvalGuardHelicone
Attack Plugins2490
Eval Scorers188Custom (no built-in library)
LLM Providers91 (typed registry)Proxy-based (broad)
Compliance Frameworks330
LLM Firewall5-layer, 2.57ms p95No
LLM GatewayYesYes (proxy-based)
Agent Tracing (OTel)YesYes (custom format)
Cost / FinOps AnalyticsYesYes (their strength)
ClickHouse for trace scaleRoadmap (Tier A)Yes (today)
Red Team SuiteYes (249 plugins, 42 strategies)No
Prompt IDEYesNo
Open SourceApache 2.0Apache 2.0
Helm chartYesYes
Self-hosted DockerYesYes

Why choose EvalGuard over Helicone

  • Helicone is observability-only — we ship eval (188 scorers), red team (249 plugins), firewall, and compliance (33 frameworks) alongside the same observability surface
  • Runtime LLM firewall at 2.57ms p95 — Helicone has no inline protection layer
  • Compliance Center with 33 frameworks (OWASP LLM Top 10, EU AI Act, ISO 42001, NIST AI RMF, India DPDP, HIPAA + 27 more) — Helicone has none
  • BYOK encryption + Vault-backed envelope encryption — Helicone stores keys in plaintext per their codebase

Where Helicone leads

  • Helicone is mature on cost/observability (their primary focus) — strong real-time cost dashboard with caching analytics
  • ClickHouse-backed trace storage scales past 500K traces/day — we use Postgres until volume justifies the migration
  • Strong YC W23 community + funding; 4K+ GitHub stars
  • Proxy-based gateway covers more provider edge cases since it intercepts at the HTTP layer

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