Edge bot paywall (Merchant of Record, fiat) from Cloudflare
A Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl alternative
Looking for an alternative to Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl? Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl lets site owners charge AI crawlers at the edge, with Cloudflare as Merchant of Record settling in fiat via Stripe, and cryptographic bot identity via Web Bot Auth. It’s powerful but gated (closed beta / enterprise). Payrelayer is a self-serve developer platform pricing APIs, MCP tools, and content per request via open x402 in USDC.
| Payrelayer (x402) | Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl | |
|---|---|---|
| Availability | Self-serve | Closed beta / enterprise |
| Where it runs | Any stack (SDK) or edge worker | Cloudflare edge |
| What you price | APIs, MCP tools, content | Crawlable content |
| Settlement | USDC on Base | Fiat (MoR via Stripe) |
| Bot identity | User-Agent rules today | Web Bot Auth verification |
| Protocol | Open x402 (standard clients) | Cloudflare platform |
- Runs at Cloudflare’s edge with cryptographic bot identity (Web Bot Auth)
- Cloudflare as Merchant of Record — fiat settlement via Stripe
- Deep integration for sites already on Cloudflare
- Backed by the largest CDN’s bot-management data
- Self-serve today — no waitlist or enterprise contract to start
- Prices APIs and MCP tools, not just crawlable page content
- Open x402 protocol any standard agent client can pay directly
- Works regardless of your CDN; nine framework SDKs plus MCP
Your site is on Cloudflare, you want edge-level enforcement with cryptographic bot identity and fiat payouts, and enterprise onboarding is fine.
You want to start today without a waitlist, price API/MCP calls (not just page content) over an open protocol, and settle in USDC on any stack.
FAQ
Pay Per Crawl charges crawlers for page content at Cloudflare’s edge with fiat settlement and is gated behind beta/enterprise access. Payrelayer is self-serve, prices APIs and MCP tools per request over the open x402 protocol, and settles in USDC.
Not yet — bot rules today match on User-Agent. Cryptographic Web Bot Auth verification is on the roadmap; the open x402 payment itself is what gates access.