A total-cost analysis shows that self-hosting Lastest with Docker is free beyond your existing infrastructure, while SaaS alternatives like Percy ($199–$699+/mo) and Applitools scale costs with every new test. Factor in setup time, maintenance overhead, and data privacy, and self-hosting still wins by a wide margin.
The SaaS cost curve
SaaS visual testing tools typically charge based on the number of screenshots you take per month. Here's what the market looks like:
- Percy: $199/mo for 5,000 screenshots, $699/mo for 25,000
- Applitools: Custom pricing, typically $400–$1,200/mo for mid-size teams
- Chromatic: Free tier at 5,000 snapshots, then $149/mo+
These costs compound as your test suite grows. A team that starts at $199/mo can easily hit $699/mo within a year as they add more tests - which is exactly what you want them to do.
The self-hosting cost curve
Lastest runs as a Docker container on your existing infrastructure. The compute cost for comparing screenshots is negligible - most CI runners can handle thousands of diffs per minute. Storage costs are minimal since you're only storing baseline images and diffs.
For a typical team, the annual cost of running Lastest is effectively $0 beyond what you're already paying for CI/CD infrastructure.
What about maintenance?
This is the most common objection to self-hosting. But Lastest is designed to be low-maintenance:
- Single Docker image - deploy with
docker pullanddocker run - Automatic updates - point at
:latestand restart on deploy - No database - baselines are stored as files, versioned with your code
- No external dependencies - everything runs in the container
The total setup time is under 15 minutes. The ongoing maintenance is zero hours per month for most teams.
Data privacy
With SaaS tools, your application screenshots - which may contain customer data, internal dashboards, or pre-release features - are uploaded to a third-party server. With Lastest, your screenshots never leave your infrastructure.
For teams in regulated industries (healthcare, finance, government), this isn't just a preference - it's a requirement.