Idempotency keys for agent side effects
Exactly-once-ish side effects (charges, tickets, emails) across retries using durable workflows and idempotency keys agents can pass end-to-end.
At a glance — Oct 2026
Updated 2026-10-27 · forward this page: /jtbds/durable-idempotency#briefScores as of 2026-09-14 (43 days old; Depot marks scores stale after 30 days). The pick is still Depot's current editorial pick; it has not been re-reviewed since. Prices below carry their own dates.
- Depot Pick
- Restate · 8.20/10 for this job (curated estimate, medium confidence)
Distinct from generic `durable-agent-workflows`: emphasize idempotency primitives. Confidence: medium on Restate paid Cloud $/action.
- Runner-up
- Temporal Cloud · 8.18/10
Scores higher than the pick on: Capability fit, Latency / reliability, Maturity / track record.
- When not to use the pick
- Temporal already standard, Inngest/TS DX preferred, or DBOS Postgres-centric apps.
- Lock-in / migration
- The pick has lower stored lock-in risk than runner-up Temporal Cloud (3.8 vs 5). Self-host fallback listed for this job: Trigger.dev.
- Sourced price (no comparable unit)
Pick: no sourced price in this job's unit (no_sourced_price).
No cheapest SKU (no_comparable_unit_for_job). No price was invented.
- Free option
- Trigger.dev (oss) — source, as of 2026-10-25
- Failure modes to watch
- Non-determinism: Run the task more than once and compare the end state, not a single transcript. Record the trial count next to any success rate you cite.
- Observability gap: Alert on a drop in trace ingestion and on certificate expiry for the trace host. Do not treat a missing trace as a successful quiet run.
- Partial tool success: Require a per-item status and a failure count. Success for the task requires the failed count to be zero or explicitly handed to a retry queue.
- Runaway spend: Set a budget and a tool-call cap per task. Alert when spend jumps. Stop the run at the cap instead of summarizing a partial trace as success.
- Tool loop: Hash the last several tool names and arguments. Stop when the same call repeats and the observation did not change. Cap tool calls per task.
Cite: Agent Provider Depot, Depot Pick for durable-idempotency: restate, scores as of 2026-09-14. Agents: GET /api/decide?jtbd=durable-idempotency
Free Agent idempotency options · for scheduled-ops agents
Restate
Distinct from generic `durable-agent-workflows`: emphasize idempotency primitives. Confidence: medium on Restate paid Cloud $/action.
Pricing (directional): As of 2026-09-14: Restate Cloud public usage-based — free tier 50k actions/mo, no card (restate.dev/blog/announcing-restate-cloud-public + docs). Paid action rates sales/console (marketing /pricing page thin to bots). BYOC (Jul 2026) for VP…
Lock-in risk: higher = more lock-in (worse). Overall already inverts this dimension.
Strong Temporal alternative for durable AI agents, especially on Workers/Vercel. Remains medium until paid $/action card is durably public. Depot durability pick stays Temporal Cloud.
Quote for Idempotency keys for agent side effects
Depot Pick stays Restate. Prices below are sourced SKU rows only (as of 2026-10-27). Input and output are not blended. GET /api/quote?jtbd=durable-idempotency
Nothing was compared. no comparable sourced unit for this job; chat input $/1M and other units were not borrowed pickIsPriceWinner is null.
Sourced price unavailable for the Depot Pick. No row in the pricing index.
4 of 5 candidates have no sourced price row. 5 are excluded from the Matching price comparison (none). no comparable sourced unit for this job; chat input $/1M and other units were not borrowed
Runners-up
Temporal Cloud
Default durable orchestration for serious long-running agents. Inngest/Trigger.dev for lighter DX.
Inngest
Best DX default for durable agent workflows in TypeScript/Python. Temporal when you need harder multi-lang…
Hatchet
Temporal/Inngest peer for agent task orchestration. Prefer Temporal for serious durability; Inngest for TS…
DBOS
Embed durable steps in your app's Postgres rather than running a separate workflow cluster. Temporal remains…
When NOT to use the top pick
Temporal already standard, Inngest/TS DX preferred, or DBOS Postgres-centric apps.
Full ranking (score table)
Ranked with this JTBD's weights. Scores are curated estimates unless marked otherwise. Agents: prefer /api/decide then this table for tie-breaks.
| # | Provider | Overall | Fit | $/perf | Latency | DX | As of |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | RestateDepot Pick | 8.2 | 8.6 | 7.8 | 8.8 | 8.4 | 2026-09-14 |
| 2 | Temporal Cloud | 8.2 | 9.0 | 6.8 | 9.2 | 7.2 | 2026-09-14 |
| 3 | Inngest | 8.1 | 8.2 | 8.0 | 8.4 | 9.0 | 2026-09-14 |
| 4 | Hatchet | 8.1 | 8.2 | 7.8 | 8.4 | 8.6 | 2026-09-14 |
| 5 | DBOS | 8.0 | 8.0 | 8.0 | 8.6 | 8.4 | 2026-09-14 |
Score methodology for this job
Distinct from generic `durable-agent-workflows`: emphasize idempotency primitives. Confidence: medium on Restate paid Cloud $/action.
capabilityFit: 20%pricePerformance: 12%latencyReliability: 28%developerDx: 14%privacyPosture: 8%lockInRisk: 8%maturity: 10%