Cavalry vs Spline Comparison 2026
Both cover motion graphics & animation. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
At a glance
- Both have a genuinely free tier.
Side by side
Cavalry | Spline | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free | From $15 |
| Pricing model (they differ) | Free | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | Not stated | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | None |
| API | Not stated | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | None | None |
| Runs on (they differ) | macOS, Windows |
Shaded rows are where the two answers disagree and both listings have answered. A row where one side has not stated a fact is left plain, because silence is not a difference.
Cavalry
Procedural 2D animation, free for individuals
Cavalry animates by rules rather than by keyframe: shapes driven by generators, behaviours and data, so a hundred elements move together without a hundred edits. Motion designers use it for the work that would be tedious anywhere else, and it exports to the formats a video timeline expects. The company states plainly that individuals pay nothing. Coming from a keyframe tool, the model takes a while to click, and then it is hard to leave.
Our note
The free licence removes the only reason not to try it, so the real question is whether the procedural way of thinking suits your work. Give it a project with repetition in it, because a single moving logo will not show you anything After Effects does not already do.
Spline
3D scenes that run in a browser
Spline is a 3D editor in the browser whose output is an interactive scene rather than a rendered file, so the thing you made can sit on a web page and respond to a cursor. Video export and code export are there for when it needs to be flat or embedded properly. The learning curve is much shorter than the desktop tools it competes with.
Our note
Spline is the fastest route from nothing to a 3D thing on a web page, and the free plan is enough to find out whether you enjoy it. Blender is free and does everything, and will take you a month to reach the point Spline reaches in an afternoon.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.