Epok vs Elastic / ELK Stack
Elasticsearch is the most widely deployed log search engine. Running it is a full-time job. Elastic Cloud removes the ops burden but adds the bill.
Pricing
Elastic Cloud
$500–1,500/mo
typical for 1 TB/month, 15-day retention*
Standard tier starts at ~$95/mo for a minimal single-node configuration. Realistic log workloads with replication and adequate storage run significantly higher.
Self-Hosted ELK
“Free” + ops time
10–20 hrs/month typical ops cost
Open-source software, but production requires a 3-node cluster minimum, JVM tuning, shard management, ILM policies, and ongoing upgrade maintenance.
Epok
$500/mo (Team)
Trial: 14 days · Team: 1.5 TB/mo
14-day trial includes every detector and full AI root cause analysis. Team ($500/mo) is 1.5 TB/month, 30-day retention, 10 users. No infrastructure to operate.
*Elastic Cloud pricing based on the public Elastic Cloud pricing calculator as of April 2026. Actual costs vary by region, node type, and replication factor.
Feature Comparison
| Feature | Elastic / ELK | Epok |
|---|---|---|
| Search | Elasticsearch full-text search with aggregations, nested queries, and an extensive query DSL. | LogsQL — simpler, purpose-built for log queries. Fast for filtering and exploring logs; not a general-purpose search engine. |
| Anomaly detection | Elastic ML (requires Platinum or Enterprise license). Manual job configuration per index. | 20+ statistical detectors included on every tier. Volume anomaly, new error, silence, pattern clustering, K8s intelligence, golden signals — all activate automatically. |
| Dashboards | Kibana — extensive visualization library, Lens, Canvas, saved objects, drill-downs. Mature and powerful. | Basic built-in dashboards. Sufficient for incident investigation; not a general-purpose visualization tool. |
| Data ingestion | Logstash, Beats, Elastic Agent, Fleet. Flexible and well-documented, but complex to configure and maintain. | JSON, Loki, OTLP, syslog, Elasticsearch _bulk API, FluentBit, Fluentd, CloudWatch. No proprietary agents. |
| Index management | Required. ILM policies, shard sizing, rollover, index templates, mapping conflicts. Ongoing operational overhead. | Automatic. No index management, no shard tuning, no mapping configuration. |
| Ops burden | High. JVM heap sizing, disk watermarks, shard rebalancing, version upgrades, cluster health monitoring. Self-hosted ELK typically requires 10-20 hrs/month of dedicated ops time. | Zero. Fully managed. No infrastructure to maintain. |
| APM / tracing | Elastic APM — full distributed tracing, service maps, transaction profiling. | No APM. Log intelligence only. |
| SIEM / security | Elastic Security — detection rules, timeline investigation, case management. A full SIEM platform. | Basic security detection via log pattern analysis. Not a SIEM. |
| Root cause analysis | Manual investigation via Kibana. No automatic RCA. | Automatic. What Changed analysis, blast radius, causal ranking, dimension lift — runs on every incident. |
| Protocol compatibility | Native Elasticsearch protocol. Beats and Logstash use proprietary formats. | Accepts the Elasticsearch _bulk API — the same format your Logstash output or Beats already produce. |
Where Elastic Wins
If you need application search (site search, e-commerce catalog), a SIEM for threat hunting, or APM with distributed tracing, Elastic is the more complete platform. But most teams running ELK for log management spend 10–20 hours/month on JVM tuning, shard rebalancing, and ILM policies — and still don't get automatic anomaly detection without paying for Platinum.
When to Choose Each
Choose Elastic when
- ·You need full-text search beyond logs (application search, site search)
- ·You need a SIEM for security analytics and compliance
- ·You need Elastic APM for distributed tracing
- ·Your team has dedicated Elasticsearch ops expertise
- ·You rely on Kibana's advanced visualization and Canvas
- ·You need cross-index correlation with complex nested queries
Choose Epok when
- ·You want anomaly detection without configuring ML jobs or writing rules
- ·You don't have ops time for JVM tuning, shard management, and ILM policies
- ·You need root cause analysis that runs automatically on every incident
- ·You want to stop paying for Elastic ML / Platinum just for detection features
- ·You're a small team that needs log intelligence without a platform team
- ·You want predictable pricing without per-node or per-GB-indexed charges
Migration
Epok accepts the Elasticsearch _bulk API. If you're running Logstash, point your Elasticsearch output at Epok's ingest endpoint. If you're using Filebeat or other Beats, change the output.elasticsearch host. Same JSON format, same bulk protocol. No log format changes needed.
Logstash output config
output {
elasticsearch {
hosts => ["https://app.getepok.dev"]
# Same _bulk API format — no changes
# to your filters or input plugins
}
}Filebeat output config
output.elasticsearch: hosts: ["https://app.getepok.dev"] # No other changes required
Epok also accepts Loki push, OTLP, syslog (RFC 5424/3164), FluentBit, Fluentd, CloudWatch subscription filters, and raw JSON over HTTP. If you want to migrate away from Beats entirely, any standard log shipper works.
Try Epok free. Keep Elastic for what it does best.
Every detector included. No credit card. 14-day trial.
Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, Beats, Elastic Cloud, and Elastic APM are trademarks or registered trademarks of Elasticsearch B.V. in the United States and other countries. Epok is not affiliated with or endorsed by Elasticsearch B.V. All product names, trademarks, and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Pricing and feature information is based on publicly available documentation as of April 2026 and may have changed since publication.