How Sectigo and Let's Encrypt differ on deployment, pricing, openness and what each is actually built for.
| Sectigo | Let's Encrypt | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Public CA + CLM | Public CA (free) |
| Deployment | SaaS | SaaS (ACME) |
| How it works | Formerly Comodo CA. Issues public TLS, code-signing and S/MIME at volume through a large reseller channel. Sectigo Certificate Manager handles discovery, renewal and private PKI alongside the public roots. | Issues domain-validated TLS certificates at no cost, exclusively through the ACME protocol. Short 90-day lifetimes force automation, which is the point: renewal is a cron job, not a calendar reminder. |
| Pricing* | From $110/yr (1-yr DV) | Free |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Open source | — | Boulder (MPL-2.0) |
| Compliance | WebTrust, CA/B Forum | WebTrust, CA/B Forum |
| Best for | Cost-sensitive estates that still want a CLM | Public web TLS on anything you can automate |
Choose Sectigo for cost-sensitive estates that still want a clm. Choose Let's Encrypt for public web tls on anything you can automate.
* Indicative list pricing (vendor documentation and public pricing pages, August 2026).