Ink vs Railway
How Ink compares to Railway — two bare-metal platforms with different philosophies on who operates infrastructure
Railway is one of the strongest modern PaaS platforms. It runs on bare metal, has usage-based pricing, a clean dashboard, and a real MCP server. If you're comparing human-operated platforms, Railway is a top choice. The difference with Ink is architectural: who the platform is designed for.
Feature comparison
| Ink | Railway | |
|---|---|---|
| Agent integration | Skill (prompt-guided), MCP (Streamable HTTP), CLI | Skill (prompt-guided), local MCP via CLI, hosted remote MCP via OAuth, CLI |
| MCP capabilities | Full read/write: deploy, delete, scale, databases, DNS, logs, metrics | Local CRUD tools plus a hosted agent entry point; exact coverage depends on local vs remote MCP |
| Infrastructure | Bare metal (self-owned) | Bare metal infrastructure |
| Build system | Railpack auto-detection | Railpack (Railway built it, successor to Nixpacks) |
| Pricing model | Per-minute compute, no seat fees | Usage-based plans with monthly included credits and no seat fees on Pro |
| Databases | PostgreSQL, Redis, MySQL, MongoDB (via templates) | Postgres, MySQL, Redis, MongoDB (containerized templates, user-managed) |
| DNS management | Full programmatic DNS via MCP (A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, TXT, CAA) | Domain purchasing with auto-DNS, CNAME for external domains — no MX/TXT/SRV management |
| WebSockets | Native support | Supported — no sticky sessions across replicas |
| Long-running processes | Yes, persistent containers | Yes, persistent containers |
| Observability via MCP | Build logs, runtime logs, CPU/memory/network metrics | Logs through direct tools; broader debugging through Railway's agent tool |
| GraphQL API | Yes, with introspection | GraphQL API (same as console) |
Capabilities checklist
| Capability | Ink | Railway |
|---|---|---|
| MCP server | ✅ | ✅ |
| Agent Skill (prompt-guided) | ✅ | ✅ |
| CLI | ✅ | ✅ |
| No CLI required for MCP | ✅ | ✅ via remote MCP |
| Multi-agent collaboration | ✅ | ❌ |
| Deploy via MCP | ✅ | ✅ |
| Delete services via MCP | ✅ | Local/agent-dependent |
| Deploy database templates via MCP | ✅ | ✅ |
| DNS management via MCP | ✅ | ❌ |
| Metrics via MCP | ✅ | Agent-dependent |
| Logs via MCP | ✅ | ✅ |
| GraphQL API | ✅ | ✅ |
| Bare metal infrastructure | ✅ | ✅ |
| Auto-detect frameworks (Railpack) | ✅ | ✅ |
| Per-minute billing | ✅ | ✅ |
| Self-hosted database templates | ✅ | ✅ |
| Template catalog | ✅ | ✅ |
| Visual project canvas | ❌ | ✅ |
Where the gap is real
Agent integration depth
Railway now offers several integration paths: an Agent Skill, a CLI, local MCP through the Railway CLI, and hosted remote MCP at mcp.railway.com with OAuth. Local MCP shares CLI authentication and project context; remote MCP avoids local installation and delegates complex requests through Railway's railway-agent tool.
Ink also offers CLI, Skill, MCP, and dashboard paths. The difference is product shape: Ink's MCP is a hosted product interface with direct tools for services, templates, volumes, DNS, logs, metrics, workspaces, and audit logs. The Skill and CLI expose the same platform for shell-based agents and CI/CD.
MCP capability depth
Railway's MCP surface is split between direct tools and the railway-agent entry point. That is powerful, but it means the direct tool surface and the agent-mediated surface need to be reasoned about separately.
Ink exposes a direct MCP toolset for the full Ink lifecycle: create, read, update, and delete services, deploy templates, manage volumes, manage DNS zones and records, read build/runtime logs, read CPU/memory/network metrics, and inspect audit logs.
Database management
Railway's databases are containerized templates. You get Postgres, MySQL, Redis, or MongoDB via a pre-configured template, but you're responsible for backups, failover, tuning, and upgrades. Railway's docs call them "pre-configured templates," not managed databases.
Ink deploys databases as template-backed services (PostgreSQL, PostgreSQL + pgvector, Redis, MySQL, MongoDB) with persistent volumes and connection credentials returned immediately through MCP or the CLI.
DNS depth
Railway lets you purchase domains with auto-managed DNS, or point external domains via CNAME. But you can't manage arbitrary DNS records (MX, TXT, SRV) through Railway — for that, they recommend an external registrar.
Ink gives agents full DNS zone management. Delegate your domain's nameservers, then create any record type through MCP: A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, TXT, CAA. Agents can configure email (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) and any other DNS need without leaving the conversation.
What Railway does well
Railway built Railpack — the same build tool Ink uses. Their project canvas gives a visual overview that's genuinely useful for humans. Usage-based pricing with no seat fees on Pro is fair. Their bare metal infrastructure investment is serious. And their template marketplace makes it easy to deploy complex stacks with one click.