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A login-walled site: the fine print

The detail behind the website only named people can open page — pricing, the domain catch, and the one fiddly setup step. Pull these up before you rely on a number or hit a snag.

Last verified: 2026-06-07 · checked against developers.cloudflare.com and clerk.com · Confidence: high on the mechanics; Cloudflare's free-seat count and per-seat price aren't printed on its plans page, so they carry as [unclear].

The gate attaches to a domain on Cloudflare, not a raw host URL

Cloudflare's docs require the protected hostname to be an active zone in your account. [confirmed] So:

  • A Cloudflare Pages site is already on Cloudflare — nothing extra.
  • A raw *.vercel.app / *.netlify.app URL needs a custom domain pointed through Cloudflare first — a ~10-min DNS step your agent sets up. [estimate]
  • A Fly app needs a Cloudflare tunnel. [estimate]

It's easy to miss: the login screen simply won't appear until the domain runs through Cloudflare. [confirmed]

Registering the Google sign-in app is the real cost

A one-time ~10-min trip through Google Cloud Console — a project, a consent screen, an OAuth client — then you paste the Client ID and Secret into Cloudflare. The redirect URI must match Cloudflare exactly or Google refuses the login. [confirmed] Walked through in Add a login wall to your site.

What it costs

  • Free to 50 people on Cloudflare's Zero Trust plan, full features, no per-seat bill (signup asks for a card but doesn't charge it). [unclear]
  • Past 50, the whole team moves to pay-as-you-go — widely reported at ~$7/user/month, billed for all users. [unclear]
  • Cloudflare's plans page links out rather than printing these numbers, so re-check live before relying on them: cloudflare.com/plans. [unclear]

Sources