How Google Trust Services and DigiCert differ on deployment, pricing, openness and what each is actually built for.
| Google Trust Services | DigiCert | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Public CA (cloud) | Public CA + CLM |
| Deployment | SaaS (ACME) | SaaS |
| How it works | Google’s own publicly trusted CA, issuing DV certificates free through ACME and through Certificate Manager for Google Cloud load balancers. The certificates cost nothing; Certificate Manager itself is metered past the first 100 per month. Certificate Authority Service covers private CAs on the same platform. | Issues publicly trusted TLS, code-signing, S/MIME and document-signing certificates from its own roots. DigiCert ONE adds discovery, automation and policy enforcement across the estate, with ACME and REST APIs for issuance. |
| Pricing* | Certificates free; manager metered | From $218/yr (Basic OV) |
| Free tier | Yes | No |
| Open source | — | — |
| Compliance | WebTrust, CA/B Forum | WebTrust, CA/B Forum, FIPS 140-2 (HSM-backed) |
| Best for | Workloads already inside Google Cloud | Enterprises needing public trust plus governance |
Choose Google Trust Services for workloads already inside google cloud. Choose DigiCert for enterprises needing public trust plus governance.
* Indicative list pricing (vendor documentation and public pricing pages, August 2026).