---
title: Best Heroku alternatives in 2026: 9 options compared on price, limits and fit
description: A sourced guide to Heroku alternatives in 2026, after Heroku's move to sustaining engineering. Render, Railway, Fly.io, Northflank, Koyeb, DigitalOcean App Platform, Google Cloud Run, Antideploy and Coolify, with what each is best for, its free plan, its price and its catch. Last verified 21 September 2026.
platform: Heroku
tagline: For sustaining engineering, no free plan, and a 30-second request limit
order: 2
published: 2026-09-21
verified: 2026-09-21
canonical: https://antideploy.com/alternatives/heroku
---

# The best Heroku alternatives in 2026

**Last verified 21 September 2026.** Antideploy wrote this page, and Antideploy is one of the nine options on it. So every statement about every platform, including Antideploy, comes from that platform's own pricing page or documentation, listed under [Sources](#sources) with the date it was checked. The list is grouped by what each platform is good for rather than ranked, and Antideploy's own limits are set out in full further down. If anything here is wrong or out of date, email antideploy@gmail.com and we will correct it within 48 hours.

## The short answer

Heroku still runs, and on 6 February 2026 it said there is no change for customers using it today. But it also said it is moving to "a sustaining engineering model focused on stability, security, reliability, and support". For a platform you plan to build on for years, that is worth knowing, and it is why many teams are looking.

The closest replacement in how it works is **Render**: web services, background workers and cron jobs as service types, managed Postgres, and deploys from Git. **Railway** suits projects made of several services and databases, billed by use. **Fly.io** covers the regions Heroku's Common Runtime does not. **Northflank** has a free tier that does not sleep. **Koyeb** scales to zero, and **Google Cloud Run** bills by use with a large free allowance. **DigitalOcean App Platform** has fixed monthly prices. **Antideploy** fits apps a coding agent wrote. **Coolify** runs on your own server.

## Pick by what you need

| If you want | Look at | Why |
|---|---|---|
| The platform most like Heroku, with web, worker and cron services | Render | Service types for web, background workers and cron jobs, plus managed Postgres, from $7 a month per instance |
| Several services and databases in one project, billed by use | Railway | Long-running containers, with Postgres, MySQL, Redis or MongoDB added in one click |
| Regions outside the US and Europe | Fly.io | Machines in 17 listed regions on six continents, including Singapore, Tokyo and Sydney |
| A free tier that does not sleep | Northflank | The Developer Sandbox runs 2 services and a database on always-on compute |
| No monthly fee, and apps that sleep when nobody is using them | Koyeb | A pay-as-you-go plan with one free instance and paid instances from $1.61 a month |
| A large free allowance on Google Cloud | Google Cloud Run | 2 million requests a month free, scaling with traffic |
| Fixed monthly instance prices | DigitalOcean App Platform | Containers from $5 a month, the same as a Heroku Eco dyno |
| A web app your coding agent wrote, with Postgres created for it | Antideploy | It reads the code and the `web:` line of a Procfile, creates the database, and is driven over an HTTP API |
| Full control on your own server | Coolify | Open source and free to self-host; you pay only for the server |

## Why people look for a Heroku alternative

- **Sustaining engineering.** On 6 February 2026 Heroku announced it is "transitioning to a sustaining engineering model focused on stability, security, reliability, and support", and that Enterprise Account contracts "will no longer be offered to new customers". It also said: "There is no change for customers using Heroku today."
- **No free plan.** The cheapest option is an Eco dyno at $5 a month, which sleeps after 30 minutes of inactivity and is for personal accounts only. A dyno that stays on starts at $7 a month (Basic).
- **A 30-second request limit.** A web request has 30 seconds to start its response, which rules out long-running requests without a background job.
- **Two regions on the Common Runtime.** Apps on Heroku's standard runtime run in the US or Europe. Private Spaces add other regions, including Mumbai and Singapore.
- **Data is priced per add-on.** Heroku Postgres starts at $5 a month for 1 GB and 20 connections, and Heroku Key-Value Store at $3 a month for 25 MB.

## The alternatives

### Render

- **Why switch from Heroku:** The closest in shape: web services, background workers and cron jobs are service types, Postgres is managed, and apps deploy from Git. It also has a free web service for trying it out, which Heroku no longer offers.
- **Best for:** Backends that should run as ordinary long-running servers, with background workers, cron jobs and private services, on a platform that works much like Heroku.
- **How it runs your app:** Web services run as long-running processes in Oregon, Ohio, Virginia, Frankfurt or Singapore. Background workers, cron jobs and private services are separate service types.
- **Free plan:** A free web service (0.1 CPU, 512 MB) that spins down after 15 minutes without traffic and takes about a minute to wake, within 750 free instance hours per workspace a month. Render's documentation says: "Do not use them for production applications." A free Postgres database holds 1 GB and expires 30 days after it is created.
- **Paid plans from:** $7 a month for an always-on instance with 0.5 CPU and 512 MB, and Postgres from $6 a month. The Hobby workspace plan is free and Pro is $25 a month, each plus compute.
- **Watch out for:** The free tier's one-minute wake-up and 30-day database. Preview environments and autoscaling need the Pro workspace plan.
- **Website:** https://render.com

### Railway

- **Why switch from Heroku:** Services and databases sit side by side in one project, so a worker is simply another service. There is a free plan with $1 of usage a month, and Hobby is $5 a month including $5 of usage.
- **Best for:** Apps made of several services and databases (an API, a worker, Postgres, Redis) in one project, billed by what they use.
- **How it runs your app:** Long-running containers, one per service and any number of services per project, in regions across the Americas, Europe and Asia-Pacific. Services stay awake; an optional serverless mode puts a service to sleep after about 10 minutes without outbound traffic.
- **Free plan:** $1 of usage a month, with up to 0.5 GB of RAM, 1 vCPU and a 0.5 GB volume per service.
- **Paid plans from:** Hobby, $5 a month including $5 of usage. Beyond that, $10 per GB of RAM and $20 per vCPU a month, and $0.05 per GB of outbound data. Pro is $20 a month including $20 of usage.
- **Watch out for:** Usage-based billing means the bill moves with traffic and memory use.
- **Website:** https://railway.com

### Fly.io

- **Why switch from Heroku:** Regions. Heroku's Common Runtime is the US and Europe; Fly.io lists 17 regions on six continents, and machines are billed by the second with no plan fee.
- **Best for:** Running a container close to users in many regions, with direct control over machines, volumes and networking.
- **How it runs your app:** Your container runs on Fly Machines in the regions you choose; the pricing page lists 17 regions on six continents. Machines are billed by the second while they run. Antideploy itself runs its users' apps on Fly.io machines.
- **Free plan:** None is listed on Fly.io's pricing page; usage is billed from the first machine.
- **Paid plans from:** There is no plan fee. The smallest machine (shared-cpu-1x with 256 MB) is listed at $1.94 a month if it runs all month. Managed Postgres starts at $38 a month.
- **Watch out for:** Fly.io gives you machines rather than an opinionated app platform, so there is more to set up and run yourself. Outbound data from machines in India and Africa costs $0.12 per GB, against $0.02 in North America and Europe.
- **Website:** https://fly.io

### Northflank

- **Why switch from Heroku:** A free tier that stays on. The Developer Sandbox runs 2 services, 1 database and 2 cron jobs on compute that does not sleep, and paid use is billed by the hour. It can later run in your own AWS, GCP or Azure account.
- **Best for:** Teams that want always-on services, databases and jobs on a managed platform, with the option of running it all in their own AWS, GCP or Azure account.
- **How it runs your app:** Services, databases and cron jobs on Northflank's cloud, or in your own cloud account, billed by the hour.
- **Free plan:** The Developer Sandbox: 2 services, 1 database and 2 cron jobs, on always-on compute that does not sleep.
- **Paid plans from:** Pay as you go at $0.01667 per vCPU and $0.00833 per GB of memory an hour. The smallest instance (0.1 shared vCPU, 256 MB) is $2.70 a month. Outbound data is $0.06 per GB.
- **Watch out for:** Outbound data at $0.06 per GB costs more than on Railway ($0.05) or DigitalOcean ($0.02).
- **Website:** https://northflank.com

### Koyeb

- **Why switch from Heroku:** A plan with no monthly fee and one free instance, where Heroku starts at $5 a month. Instances can scale to zero when there is no traffic.
- **Best for:** Small services that can sleep when idle, and GPU workloads, on a pay-as-you-go plan with no monthly fee.
- **How it runs your app:** Containers on instances that can scale to zero, including GPU instances.
- **Free plan:** One free instance per organization (0.1 vCPU, 512 MB, 2 GB SSD) in Frankfurt or Washington, D.C., which scales to zero after an hour without traffic.
- **Paid plans from:** The Starter plan has no monthly fee, and instances start at $1.61 a month (0.1 vCPU, 256 MB). Pro is $29 a month and includes $10 of compute.
- **Watch out for:** The free instance is limited to two regions and to one per organization.
- **Website:** https://www.koyeb.com

### DigitalOcean App Platform

- **Why switch from Heroku:** Fixed monthly instance prices starting at $5, the same as a Heroku Eco dyno, next to DigitalOcean's databases and the rest of its cloud.
- **Best for:** A managed app platform with fixed monthly instance prices, next to the rest of DigitalOcean's cloud.
- **How it runs your app:** Containers on fixed-size instances, plus static sites.
- **Free plan:** Up to 3 apps that contain only static sites, with 1 GiB of outbound data per app.
- **Paid plans from:** $5 a month for a container with 1 shared vCPU and 512 MiB. Development databases are $7 a month per 512 MB. Extra outbound data is $0.02 per GiB.
- **Watch out for:** The free tier covers static sites only; an app with a server is paid from its first month.
- **Website:** https://www.digitalocean.com/products/app-platform

### Google Cloud Run

- **Why switch from Heroku:** A large free allowance each month and a service that scales with its traffic, for teams comfortable setting things up on Google Cloud.
- **Best for:** Containers that should scale with traffic on Google Cloud, with a generous monthly free allowance.
- **How it runs your app:** Runs any container image on Google Cloud, billed by the requests it serves and the CPU and memory it uses.
- **Free plan:** Each month, 2 million requests, 180,000 vCPU-seconds, 360,000 GB-seconds of memory and 1 GB of outbound data from North America, with request-based billing. A Google Cloud billing account is required.
- **Paid plans from:** Usage-based beyond the free allowance.
- **Watch out for:** A billing account is needed even for the free tier, and the rest of what an app needs (a database, secrets, a domain) is set up separately on Google Cloud.
- **Website:** https://cloud.google.com/run

### Antideploy (this site)

- **Why switch from Heroku:** A web app your coding agent wrote deploys without a Dockerfile: Antideploy reads the code, uses the `web:` line of a Procfile if there is one, and creates the Postgres database during the deploy. The free plan runs 2 apps with a server. It does not run separate worker processes, so an app that needs a `worker:` dyno is better served by Render, Railway or Northflank.
- **Best for:** Full-stack and backend apps written by a coding agent such as Claude Code, Codex, Cursor or Antigravity, deployed by the agent itself, with Postgres created automatically and prices in Indian rupees.
- **How it runs your app:** Reads the code to find the stack, start command, port and database, then runs your start command as one long-running process in a container on a Fly.io machine in Singapore. It sets no time limit of its own on a request or a WebSocket.
- **Free plan:** Unlimited static sites, 2 live apps with a server, 10 successful deploys a month and 1 Postgres database. The terms allow commercial use.
- **Paid plans from:** Pro, ₹799 a month (₹159 for the first month): 15 live apps, unlimited deploys, 3 databases and 5 custom domains. ₹799 is a founding price for the first 25 Pro accounts; the standard price is ₹1,699 a month.
- **Watch out for:** One region (Singapore) and one instance per app. Everything sleeps when idle on every plan, static sites included, and the first request after sleeping took 2.9 to 13.9 seconds in our measurements. No preview deployments, no instant rollback and no team accounts. The full list is under [Antideploy's limits](#antideploy-s-limits).
- **Website:** https://antideploy.com

### Coolify (self-hosted)

- **Why switch from Heroku:** A Heroku-style dashboard on a server you own, with no platform limits beyond that server's and no dependence on a vendor's roadmap.
- **Best for:** Developers who want a Heroku- or Vercel-style dashboard on servers they own.
- **How it runs your app:** Open-source software you install on your own server, which then builds and runs your apps on it.
- **Free plan:** The self-hosted version is free, with every feature and no limits of its own.
- **Paid plans from:** Coolify Cloud, where Coolify runs the control panel for you, is $5 a month for 2 servers plus $3 for each additional server. Either way, you pay your server provider separately.
- **Watch out for:** You run the server, so its updates, security, backups and uptime are yours.
- **Website:** https://coolify.io

## At a glance

| Platform | How your app runs | Free plan | Paid plans from | Database |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Heroku | Dynos from a Procfile; 30 s to answer a request | None | $5 a month (Eco, sleeps) | Heroku Postgres from $5 a month |
| Render | Long-running server | Sleeps after 15 min, about 1 min to wake; not for production | $7 a month per instance | Managed Postgres from $6 a month; the free one expires after 30 days |
| Railway | Long-running container | $1 of usage a month | $5 a month, including $5 of usage | Postgres, MySQL, Redis or MongoDB in one click |
| Fly.io | Machines in many regions, billed per second | None listed | About $2 a month for the smallest machine | Managed Postgres from $38 a month |
| Northflank | Always-on services; your own cloud optional | 2 services and 1 database, no sleeping | $2.70 a month for the smallest instance | Managed databases, one in the free sandbox |
| Koyeb | Container that can scale to zero | 1 instance; sleeps after an hour idle | $1.61 a month per instance | Managed Postgres, billed by the second |
| DigitalOcean App Platform | Container on a fixed-size instance | 3 static sites | $5 a month | Development database $7 a month |
| Google Cloud Run | Any container, billed by use | 2 million requests a month; billing account required | Usage-based | Set up separately on Google Cloud |
| Antideploy | Long-running process in Singapore; sleeps when idle | 2 apps with a server; commercial use allowed | ₹799 a month | Postgres created automatically |
| Coolify | Your own server | Self-hosted and free | $5 a month (Cloud), plus your server | Whatever you run on your server |

## How to choose

1. **Do you run worker dynos?** Render, Railway and Northflank run a worker as a separate service. Antideploy does not run separate worker processes.
2. **Does it need to stay on without paying?** Northflank's Developer Sandbox is always on. Free tiers on Render, Koyeb and Antideploy put idle apps to sleep.
3. **Where are your users?** Render has five regions, Fly.io lists 17, Koyeb's free instance runs in Frankfurt or Washington, D.C., and Antideploy runs in Singapore only.
4. **How much do you want to run yourself?** Render, Railway, Northflank, Koyeb, DigitalOcean and Antideploy are managed. Fly.io gives you machines to configure. Coolify gives you the whole server.
5. **Do you want a predictable bill?** Render, DigitalOcean and Antideploy price by instance or plan. Railway, Northflank, Fly.io, Koyeb and Cloud Run bill by use.

## Antideploy's limits

Read these before choosing Antideploy:

- **One region.** Apps run in Singapore, with Mumbai, Tokyo and Sydney used only when Singapore has no room. The database is in Singapore. Users far from Asia will see slower responses.
- **One instance per app,** with 1 shared vCPU and 1 GB of memory. No autoscaling.
- **Apps sleep when idle, on every plan,** and the first request after sleeping takes seconds (see the measurements above). There is no always-on option today.
- **Releases are not zero-downtime.** The new version replaces the old one on the app's single machine. If the new version does not start, the app is down until a working version is deployed.
- **No preview deployments, no instant rollback and no team accounts.**
- **Only Postgres** is provisioned. No file storage, Redis, MySQL or MongoDB today.
- **No separate worker processes.** Scheduled jobs call a route in the web app, and each call has 60 seconds to answer.
- **Your own Dockerfile** can be deployed once your account is 7 days old. Everything Antideploy detects and builds itself works from the first minute.
- **Folder uploads** are limited to 28 MB. Larger projects deploy from GitHub.
- **PHP** runs only through your own Dockerfile.
- **Every request passes through Cloudflare's network,** which applies its own limits, such as a 100 MB request body.
- **Prices are in Indian rupees,** charged through Razorpay by UPI or card.
- **Antideploy is a young platform** run by a small team.

## Frequently asked questions

### Is Heroku shutting down?

No. In "An Update on Heroku" on 6 February 2026, Heroku said it is "transitioning to a sustaining engineering model focused on stability, security, reliability, and support", that "Enterprise Account contracts will no longer be offered to new customers", and that "There is no change for customers using Heroku today."

### What is the closest alternative to Heroku?

Render. It deploys from Git, runs web services, background workers and cron jobs as separate service types, and manages Postgres, which is the same shape as a Heroku app with its dynos and add-ons. An always-on instance starts at $7 a month, the same as a Heroku Basic dyno.

### Is there a free alternative to Heroku?

Several, each with a catch. Northflank's Developer Sandbox runs 2 services and a database on compute that does not sleep. Render's free web service sleeps after 15 minutes and Render says not to use it in production. Koyeb gives one free instance that sleeps after an hour idle. Railway's free plan is $1 of usage a month. Google Cloud Run's free tier covers 2 million requests a month but needs a billing account. Antideploy's free plan runs 2 apps with a server that sleep when idle, and allows commercial use.

### Can I use my Procfile on another platform?

Antideploy reads the `web:` line of a Procfile and uses it as the start command. On most other platforms you enter the start command in the service's settings or configuration file instead, and give each process type its own service.

### How do I move a Heroku Postgres database?

Export it with `pg_dump`, then load it into the new database with `pg_restore` or `psql`, and set the new connection string as the app's `DATABASE_URL`. Do it during a quiet period, because writes made between the export and the switch are not copied.

## Sources

Every price is as listed on the date shown. Prices change, so check the platform's own page before you commit.

- Heroku pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://www.heroku.com/pricing
- An Update on Heroku, 6 February 2026 (checked 19 September 2026): https://www.heroku.com/blog/an-update-on-heroku/
- Heroku request timeout (checked 19 September 2026): https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/request-timeout
- Render free tier (checked 21 September 2026): https://render.com/docs/free
- Render compute plans (checked 21 September 2026): https://render.com/docs/compute-plans
- Render pricing (checked 19 September 2026): https://render.com/pricing
- Render regions (checked 19 September 2026): https://render.com/docs/regions
- Railway plans (checked 21 September 2026): https://docs.railway.com/pricing/plans
- Railway app sleeping (checked 19 September 2026): https://docs.railway.com/reference/app-sleeping
- Railway regions (checked 19 September 2026): https://docs.railway.com/deployments/regions
- Fly.io pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://fly.io/pricing/
- Fly.io resource pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://fly.io/docs/about/pricing/
- Northflank pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://northflank.com/pricing
- Koyeb instances (checked 21 September 2026): https://www.koyeb.com/docs/reference/instances
- Koyeb pricing FAQ (checked 21 September 2026): https://www.koyeb.com/docs/faqs/pricing
- Koyeb pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://www.koyeb.com/pricing
- DigitalOcean App Platform pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://docs.digitalocean.com/products/app-platform/details/pricing/
- Google Cloud Free Tier, Cloud Run (checked 21 September 2026): https://docs.cloud.google.com/free/docs/free-cloud-features
- Antideploy pricing: https://antideploy.com/pricing
- Antideploy terms: https://antideploy.com/terms
- Antideploy agent instructions: https://antideploy.com/llms.txt
- How Antideploy's wake-up times were measured, 19 September 2026: https://antideploy.com/compare/vercel#how-we-measured
- Coolify pricing (checked 21 September 2026): https://coolify.io/pricing
- Heroku dyno tiers (checked 19 September 2026): https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/dyno-tiers
- Heroku regions (checked 19 September 2026): https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/regions