GPUBank vs Akash Network
Akash Network is a decentralized compute marketplace on its own blockchain, where independent providers bid to run container deployments; the Console terms are a contract with Overclock Labs Inc. Its pricing page shows the H100 SXM at $2.72 per GPU-hour, a bid-weighted average of live asks from third-party hosts, for the GPU alone; GPUBank charges a fixed $1.85 with vCPU, RAM, disk, IPv4 and traffic included. Akash has 25 GPU models, hosts in 21 countries and a wallet path with no account; GPUBank has fixed prices, a stop state and disks that survive it.
GPUBank
Tallinn, Estonia
H100 SXM
$1.85 / h
- vCPU, RAM, NVMe, IPv4 and traffic included
- Per-second billing after the health check
- Top up in Bitcoin, USDT and 12+ other coins
vCPU, RAM, NVMe, IPv4 and traffic included
Akash Network
United States
H100 SXM · marketplace
$2.72 / h
- 25 GPU models, from a Tesla P4 at $0.03 to a B300 at $6.00 per GPU-hour
- Providers online in 21 countries, many of them in Europe
- Pay by card via Stripe in the managed Console, with Auto Top-Up
Akash Network
Decentralized
26 points compared27 of their pages readprices last checked on 29 September 2026page updated 2 November 2026
The verdict
A wider catalogue and a permissionless wallet path at Akash. Lower all-in prices and persistent disks at GPUBank.
Akash prices are averages of recent provider bids, not fixed rates, and they cover the GPU only: CPU, memory, storage and a dedicated IP are bid on top. Even before those extras, GPUBank costs 17 to 44 % less for the GPUs both of us rent. Akash has no stop state, and its persistent storage is provider-local, lost when a deployment closes or changes provider. Akash wins on catalogue width, including B300 and very cheap legacy cards, on provider locations, and on a self-custody path with no account.
Akash NetworkGPUBank 01The real cost
The same GPUs, side by side, per hour.
Every GPU model both of us rent, at each provider's own published price for one card, in US dollars, excluding VAT. Prices last checked on 29 September 2026.
| GPU | Akash Network per hour | GPUBank per hour | Difference | 100 h at Akash Network | 100 h at GPUBank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 B200 SXM180 GB · their marketplace price |
$5.00 | $4.15 | −17 % | $500.00 | $415.00 |
 H200 SXM141 GB · their marketplace price |
$4.45 | $2.49 | −44 % | $445.00 | $249.00 |
 H100 SXM80 GB · their marketplace price |
$2.72 | $1.85 | −32 % | $272.00 | $185.00 |
 RTX PRO 600096 GB · their marketplace price |
$1.50 | $1.15 | −23 % | $150.00 | $115.00 |
 A100 SXM80 GB · their marketplace price |
$1.71 | $0.95 | −44 % | $171.00 | $95.00 |
 RTX 509032 GB · their marketplace price |
$0.67 | $0.48 | −28 % | $67.00 | $48.00 |
 RTX 409024 GB · their marketplace price |
$0.30 | $0.23 | −23 % | $30.00 | $23.00 |
Akash figures are bid-weighted averages of live asks from independent providers, for the GPU only. CPU, memory, storage and a dedicated IPv4 are bid on top. B200 and B300 are fixed rates.
Where Akash Network publishes no on-demand price for a model, its lowest published marketplace price is used, as labelled on the row.
A fine-tune, 40 h on an H100 SXM
Akash Network
$108.80
GPUBank
$74.00
Saves $34.80 at GPUBank (−32 %)
Image generation, 200 h on an RTX 4090
Akash Network
$60.00
GPUBank
$46.00
Saves $14.00 at GPUBank (−23 %)
A long-context job, 40 h on an H200
Akash Network
$178.00
GPUBank
$99.60
Saves $78.40 at GPUBank (−44 %)
02Their catalogue
Every GPU Akash Network lists.
Akash Network lists 25 GPU models. The 23 below are the ones recorded in our check, each at its lowest public price per GPU-hour. 7 of them are also rented at GPUBank (in blue).
- Blackwell and Hopper4
- B300288 GB · marketplace$6.00
- B200180 GB · marketplace$5.00
- H200141 GB · marketplace$4.45
- H100 SXM80 GB · marketplace$2.72
- Ampere, Ada and older data-centre5
- A100 SXM 80GB80 GB · marketplace$1.71
T416 GB · marketplace$0.16
V10032 GB · marketplace$0.15
- Ampere, Ada and older data-centre continued5
P4024 GB · marketplace$0.08- P48 GB · marketplace$0.03
- Workstation5
- RTX PRO 600096 GB · marketplace$1.50
RTX 4000 Ada20 GB · marketplace$0.14- P20005 GB · marketplace$0.25
Quadro RTX 600024 GB · marketplace$0.15- M40008 GB · marketplace$0.06
- Consumer9
- RTX 509032 GB · marketplace$0.67
- RTX 409024 GB · marketplace$0.30
- RTX 408016 GB · marketplace$0.15
RTX 3090 Ti24 GB · marketplace$0.25- RTX 309024 GB · marketplace$0.16
RTX 3060 Ti8 GB · marketplace$0.14- RTX 306012 GB · marketplace$0.14
GTX 1070 Ti8 GB · marketplace$0.14- GTX 10502 GB · marketplace$0.14
03What the price includes
What appears on the bill besides the GPU.
The same H100 SXM session of 2 h 14 m 03 s, line by line, as each provider describes its billing.
Akash Network
2 h 14 m 03 s on H100 SXM
- GPU · $2.72 / h
- $6.08
- vCPU and RAM
- Billed separately
- Storage
- $21.99 per 256 GiB-month, calculator estimate
- Egress
- Not published
- Public IPv4
- Extra IP lease, typically $5 to $15 a month
- Billing granularity
- Per block, about 6 seconds
- Minimum charge
- None published
GPUBank
2 h 14 m 03 s on H100 SXM
- GPU · $1.85 / h
- $4.13
- vCPU and RAM
- Included
- Storage
- Local NVMe included; persistent disk $0.03 per GB-month
- Egress
- Included
- Public IPv4
- Included
- Billing granularity
- Per second, from the health check
- Minimum charge
- None
While stopped
What keeps running on the bill.
Akash Network
No stop state; runs until closed.
Persistent storage is lost when the deployment closes or changes provider.
GPUBank
Only the persistent disk, $0.03 per GB-month. Compute, IPv4 and scratch cost nothing.
04Where the GPUs run
21 countries against 4, and where they are.
Countries where Akash Network says its GPUs run, from its own region list or documentation, against GPUBank's four regions. A pin marks a country, not the exact site.
Paris
Frankfurt
Ashburn
Singapore
Akash Network21
Australia
Belgium
Bulgaria
Czech Republic
Finland
Germany
Guatemala
India
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
South Africa
Spain
Switzerland
Thailand
Netherlands
Ukraine
United Kingdom
United States
Vietnam
GPUBank4
Paris- Frankfurt
- Ashburn
Singapore
Akash Network · 21 countriesGPUBank · 4 regions
05Paying and signing up
How each one takes your money.
Akash Network
Payments and sign-up
Payment methods
CardsCrypto: ACT or AKT, self-custody wallet path only
Minimum top-up About 5 ACT escrow per wallet deployment
To start
- 1Email (6-digit code, no password)
- 2Card to go past the trial
- 3Keplr-compatible wallet for self-custody
Billing modelPrepaid credits into escrow
GPUBank
Payments and sign-up
Payment methods
No cardsA prepaid USD balance, topped up in crypto. Every GPU-second is drawn from it.
Minimum top-up $25
To start
- 1Email and password
- 2Top up in crypto
- 3Launch a GPU
Billing modelPrepaid balance
06Trust and support
Certificates, uptime and who answers.
| Akash Network | GPUBank | |
|---|---|---|
| SOC 2 | Not published | Not published |
| ISO 27001 | Not published | Not published |
| HIPAA | Not published | No |
| GDPR DPA | Not published | Published DPA, applies automatically |
| Availability target | None; services provided as is | 99.9 % monthly, per region |
| Status page | None | Public status page |
| Support | Discord, GitHub, contact form | Tickets from a $25 balance |
07Their site, our site
What you see before you pay.
Both sites as a visitor sees them, without an account: the Akash Network pricing page captured on 29 September 2026, and GPUBank's live board. Cookie banners and chat bubbles are closed; nothing else is edited.
- 1The GPU pricing page is public, with 26 rows, filters by model, VRAM and interface, and a Rent button on each row.
- 2Figures are labeled Starting at, but they equal the bid-weighted average in the public API: the H100 minimum bid was 2.04 against 2.72 shown.
- 3The trial credit differs across official pages: 1 USD in the docs, 100 USD in a blog call to action, 10 USD in a 2024 announcement.
- 1Live stock per region and every price, without an account.
- 2Per-hour and per-second prices, with vCPU, RAM, NVMe, IPv4 and traffic in them.
- 3A machine-readable price feed at /prices.json.
08The spec sheet
26 points, read off both sites.
GPUBank aheadAkash Network aheadEven
| Criterion | GPUBank | Akash Network |
|---|---|---|
| Price and catalogue | ||
| H100 SXM, per GPU-hourBids ranged from $2.04 to $3.16 on 2026-09-29. The home page claim of $1.33 matches neither the pricing page nor the API. | $1.85, all-in | $2.72 average bid, GPU only |
| Cheapest GPU-hour | $0.23, RTX 4090 | $0.03, Tesla P4Ahead |
| GPU models listed | 10 | 25Ahead |
| What the GPU price includes | vCPU, RAM, NVMe, IPv4, traffic | GPU only; CPU, RAM, storage, IP bid separately |
| Billing | ||
| Billing granularityPaid from an on-chain escrow, 600 blocks per hour. | Per second | Per block, about 6 seconds |
| Minimum chargeWallet deployments need about 5 ACT in escrow, returned on close if unused. | None | None published |
| Stopped instancePersistent storage is lost when the deployment closes or changes provider. | Disk only | No stop state; runs until closed |
| Persistent storageAbout 0.086 USD per GiB-month. The actual rate is set in each provider bid. | $0.03 per GB-month | $21.99 per 256 GiB-month, calculator estimate |
| Egress traffic | Included | Not published |
| Public IPv4By default, services are exposed through provider ingress hostnames and ports. | Included | Extra IP lease, typically $5 to $15 a month |
| Billing model | Prepaid balance | Prepaid credits into escrow |
| Payment and sign-up | ||
| Crypto paymentsThe managed Console no longer accepts wallets. GPUBank takes Bitcoin, USDT, Ethereum and more. | Bitcoin, USDT, Ethereum and 12+ more | ACT or AKT, self-custody wallet path only |
| Card paymentsCard top-ups are converted to a stablecoin and are non-refundable per the terms. | No | Cards via Stripe in the managed ConsoleAhead |
| Minimum depositNo minimum top-up is published for the managed Console. Minting ACT on the wallet path needs 10 ACT. | $25 | About 5 ACT escrow per wallet deploymentAhead |
| Platform | ||
| API and CLI | REST API, CLI, Python SDK | REST API, CLI, Go and JS/TS SDKs |
| TerraformThe repository sits in the akash-network GitHub org but is not referenced in current docs. | Official provider | Community provider, v0.0.x |
| Serverless GPUs | No | No |
| Managed Kubernetes | No | No managed Kubernetes |
| Ready-made templates | 25 | 1-click templates, 290+ SDL examplesAhead |
| Interruptible or spot | Yes, 40 % off | No |
| GPUs per instanceMulti-node Ray clusters are advertised on the home page. | Up to 8 | Not published |
| Multi-node interconnect | Not offered | Not published |
| Network and regions | ||
| RegionsLocations come from provider IPs; docs claim providers in 85+ countries. | 4 | 60 online providers, no fixed regionsAhead |
| Countries | France, Germany, US, Singapore | 21Ahead |
| EU regions | Paris, Frankfurt | Providers in Germany, Netherlands, Finland and moreAhead |
| Trust and support | ||
| Availability target | 99.9 % monthly | None; services provided as is |
| Compliance reportsTenants can restrict bids to audited providers, 32 of 60 online. | None published | None published; some providers audited |
| Public status pagePer-provider uptime is exposed in the public providers API. | Yes | None |
| Support | Tickets from a $25 balance | Discord, GitHub, contact form |
09The right fit
Different needs. A clear choice.
What Akash Network does better
- 25 GPU models, from a Tesla P4 at $0.03 to a B300 at $6.00 per GPU-hour
- Providers online in 21 countries, many of them in Europe
- Pay by card via Stripe in the managed Console, with Auto Top-Up
- Opt-in confidential compute, including GPUs, on capable providers
Choose GPUBank if
- H100 SXM at $1.85 all-in, against a $2.72 average bid for the GPU only
- Fixed prices, where Akash prices are known only after bids arrive
- Stop an instance and keep its disk, at $0.03 per GB-month
- Pay in Bitcoin, USDT and 12+ other coins from a normal account
- Interruptible (-40 %) and reserved (-20 %) rates, a status page and an SLA target
Moving from Akash Network takes an afternoon.
Akash workloads are container images described in SDL, so they run elsewhere unchanged. Persistent volumes have no documented snapshot or export, so copy data out before closing the deployment.
- 1Copy your data out of the Akash deployment with the shell file-copy command or rsync.
- 2Launch the same GPU on GPUBank with a persistent disk and run the same Docker image.
- 3Close the Akash deployment to get the unused escrow back.
# 1. a GPU and a disk on GPUBank gpubank launch --gpu h100-sxm --region eu-paris --disk data # 2. copy your data from the old machine rsync -azP old-host:/workspace/ root@<new-ip>:/workspace/ # 3. run the same image or template ssh root@<new-ip> 'cd /workspace && ./start.sh'
A few things you might be wondering.
Yes. Akash shows the H100 SXM at $2.72 per GPU-hour, the weighted average of recent provider bids, with bids from $2.04 to $3.16. That covers the GPU only; CPU, memory and storage are bid on top. GPUBank charges a fixed $1.85 with vCPU, RAM, NVMe, IPv4 and traffic included.
Yes, on the self-custody path: Console Air, the CLI or the SDK with a Keplr wallet, funded in ACT, a USD-pegged credit minted from AKT. The managed Akash Console is card only. GPUBank takes Bitcoin, USDT, Ethereum and more than a dozen other coins into a normal account balance.
Akash persistent storage is local to the provider. It survives restarts on the same provider, but it is lost when the deployment is closed or moved to another provider. On GPUBank you can stop an instance, keep its disk at $0.03 per GB-month and move it between regions.
No. Akash is a marketplace: independent providers bid on each deployment, and the published figures are averages of recent bids. The price you pay is the bid you accept. B200 and B300 are the exception, listed at fixed rates of $5.00 and $6.00 with access on request.
Sources
Every figure about Akash Network was read on its own pages or official documentation. Prices last checked on 29 September 2026.
- 01akash.network/pricing/gpus/GPU catalogue and per-GPU-hour prices, price basis footnote
- 02console-api.akash.network/v1/gpu-pricesBid min/max/weighted average, GPU counts and availability per model
- 03akash.network/Positioning, H200 comparison widget, network stats, H100 1.33 claim, Ray clusters
- 04akash.network/pricing/usage-calculator/CPU/memory/storage estimate, 730 h basis
- 05akash.network/docs/getting-started/how-funding-works/Credits in USD, card/coupon, escrow, Auto Top-Up, runtime limits
- 06akash.network/docs/getting-started/what-is-akash/Bid model, per-block payment, AKT/ACT, trial
- 07akash.network/docs/getting-started/quick-start/Sign-up methods, trial 1 USD / 30 days / 24 h, trial GPU limit
- 08akash.network/docs/getting-started/choosing-your-console/Managed card billing vs self-custody AKT/ACT
- 09akash.network/docs/developers/deployment/console-air/Wallet funding, minimum AKT, ACT mint minimum, gas fees, escrow
- 10akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/deployments/Per-block billing (6 s, 600/h), escrow minimum about 5 ACT, closure
- 11akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/providers-leases/Audited providers, bidding, provider attributes
- 12akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/persistent-storage/Storage classes, provider-local data loss on close
- 13akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/ip-leases/Dedicated IPv4 extra cost
- 14akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/gpu-deployments/GPU SDL, older typical price ranges
- 15akash.network/docs/learn/core-concepts/shell-access/Interactive shell, exec, file copy
- 16akash.network/docs/api-documentation/getting-started/Console API, SDKs, payment options per integration
- 17akash.network/docs/api-documentation/console-api/REST API with API key, card funding
- 18akash.network/docs/developers/deployment/cli/provider-services CLI
What we could not verify (8)
- Company HQ city/country and founding year not read on an official page on the check date (ToS names Overclock Labs Inc., governed by Texas law).
- Egress/bandwidth pricing not published; set implicitly by provider bids.
- Maximum GPUs per deployment and interconnect (NVLink/InfiniBand) not published at network level.
- B200 has no data in the gpu-prices API and B300 has no price there; only the fixed rates on the pricing page are available, access terms not published.
- Current protocol take fee on payments not read on an official page on the check date.
- Actual trial credit amount: docs say 1 USD, marketing CTA says 100 USD.
- Whether USDC is still accepted for self-custody escrow: deployments docs say ACT only (AKT under circuit breaker), the API docs page says AKT or USDC.
- Regions are provider locations from IP geolocation in the Console providers API (online providers on 2026-09-29), not fixed data centres; cities not given.
In short
GPUBank vs Akash Network, in facts.
The essentials of this comparison in one table, for quick readers and AI assistants. Prices last checked on 29 September 2026.
Read as Markdown- H100 SXM, per GPU-hour
- Akash Network: $2.72 average bid, GPU only
GPUBank: $1.85, all-in - Cheapest GPU-hour
- Akash Network: $0.03, Tesla P4
GPUBank: $0.23, RTX 4090 - Billing granularity
- Akash Network: Per block, about 6 seconds
GPUBank: Per second - Stopped instance
- Akash Network: No stop state; runs until closed
GPUBank: Disk only - Persistent storage
- Akash Network: $21.99 per 256 GiB-month, calculator estimate
GPUBank: $0.03 per GB-month - Egress traffic
- Akash Network: Not published
GPUBank: Included - Crypto payments
- Akash Network: ACT or AKT, self-custody wallet path only
GPUBank: Bitcoin, USDT, Ethereum and 12+ more - Card payments
- Akash Network: Cards via Stripe in the managed Console
GPUBank: No - Minimum deposit
- Akash Network: About 5 ACT escrow per wallet deployment
GPUBank: $25 - GPU models listed
- Akash Network: 25
GPUBank: 10 - Regions
- Akash Network: 60 online providers, no fixed regions
GPUBank: 4 - Serverless GPUs
- Akash Network: No
GPUBank: No - Availability target
- Akash Network: None; services provided as is
GPUBank: 99.9 % monthly - Compliance reports
- Akash Network: None published; some providers audited
GPUBank: None published - Support
- Akash Network: Discord, GitHub, contact form
GPUBank: Tickets from a $25 balance - Headquarters
- Akash Network: United States
GPUBank: Tallinn, Estonia
How this page was made
Every price and policy of Akash Network was read on its own website, documentation or public API on 29 September 2026, with the address of each page listed above. A value we could not read on a primary source is marked "Not published" rather than estimated. GPUBank figures come from this site and its terms. Prices change: check both providers before you buy. Akash Network, its logo and its website belong to their owner and are shown only to identify the service compared. GPUBank is not affiliated with Akash Network.
