Best Free Web Hosting 2026: 8 Options Compared

Free web hosting splits into two kinds, and picking the wrong kind is the most common mistake. The first kind is static or app hosting from developer platforms: Netlify, Vercel, Cloudflare Pages, GitHub Pages and Render. They are fast, reliable and genuinely free, but they expect you to push code from Git, and most do not run a classic PHP and MySQL site. The second kind is a free virtual machine, such as Oracle's Always Free tier, which gives you a real server to configure yourself but also gives you every maintenance chore. If you have a portfolio, documentation, a landing page or a front-end app, the first kind is the right answer and you can be live in minutes. If you need a database, a background worker or a custom stack, look at Render, Firebase or the free VM instead. Watch for three limits before you build on any of them: bandwidth caps, build minutes, and rules against commercial use. GitHub Pages, for example, says it is not meant to host a business or an online shop. Also remember that a free plan usually means a vendor subdomain, so budget a few dollars a year for your own domain. This list gives the actual free limits as the vendors publish them, so you can see which one fits before you move anything.

Netlify

Git-based static and front-end hosting with deploy previews. The free plan is metered in credits, 300 per month, not in a flat bandwidth number, so a busy site can use them up and force an upgrade.

Price: Free (Free plan: 300 credits per month); paid from $9 per month (Personal, 1,000 credits) (Netlify pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Web. Proprietary.

Best for: Static sites and Jamstack projects.

Worth knowing: Bandwidth is charged at 20 credits per GB.

Compare: Netlify alternatives

Vercel

The Hobby plan includes 100 GB of fast data transfer and 1M function invocations a month, which is generous for Next.js apps. Check Vercel's terms before using the Hobby tier for a business site.

Price: Free (Hobby: 100 GB Fast Data Transfer, 1M CDN requests, 1M function invocations per month); paid from $20 per month (Pro, plus $20 per developer seat) (Vercel pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Web. Proprietary.

Best for: Next.js and front-end apps.

Compare: Vercel alternatives

Cloudflare Pages

Free plan allows 500 builds a month, 20,000 files per site and 25 MiB per file, with up to 100 custom domains per project. It sits on Cloudflare's network, which suits sites with global visitors.

Price: Free (Free plan: 500 builds per month, one build at a time, 20,000 files per site, 25 MiB per file, 100 custom domains per project) (Cloudflare Pages pricing, checked 2026-10-24).

Platforms and license: Web browser. Proprietary service.

Best for: Fast static sites with custom domains.

GitHub Pages

Free static hosting straight from a repository: sites up to 1 GB, a soft cap of 100 GB bandwidth a month. GitHub says it is not intended for running a business or online store.

Price: Free (Free static hosting: one user or organization site per account, published sites up to 1 GB, soft bandwidth cap of 100 GB per month, soft cap of 10 builds per hour) (GitHub Pages pricing, checked 2026-10-24).

Platforms and license: Web browser. Proprietary service.

Best for: Documentation, portfolios and project pages.

Render

Free web services get 750 instance hours a month but spin down after 15 minutes idle and have no persistent disk. Free Postgres is 1 GB and expires after 30 days, so it suits demos, not production.

Price: Free (Free web services: 750 instance hours per month, spin down after 15 minutes idle, no persistent disk; free Postgres is 1 GB and expires after 30 days) (Render pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Web, Cloud. Proprietary.

Best for: Small back-end apps and APIs for testing.

Firebase

The Spark plan includes 10 GB of Hosting plus Firestore at 1 GiB stored and 50K monthly auth users. A good fit when your app already needs Google's database and sign-in.

Price: Free (Spark no-cost plan: Firestore 1 GiB stored, Auth 50K monthly active users, Hosting 10 GB) (Firebase pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Web, Cloud. Proprietary.

Best for: Web apps that need auth and a database.

Worth knowing: Blaze is pay as you go with no flat monthly fee; eligible users may get $300 free credit. Firestore is a document database, not Postgres.

Compare: Firebase alternatives

Oracle Cloud Free Tier

Always Free includes Arm A1 compute with 2 OCPUs and 12 GB total, two small AMD VMs and 10 TB of monthly egress. You get a full server, but you configure and patch it yourself.

Price: Free (Always Free: Arm A1 with 2 OCPUs and 12 GB total, 2 AMD micro VMs with 1 GB each, 200 GB block storage, 10 TB egress per month) (Oracle Cloud Free Tier pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Cloud. Proprietary.

Best for: Self-managed servers and custom stacks.

Worth knowing: Resources must be in the home region; idle instances can be reclaimed when CPU, network and A1 memory utilization stay below 20% over 7 days.

WordPress.com

The free plan gives 1 GB storage on a WordPress.com subdomain, shows ads and cannot install plugins. It is the easiest route to a hosted blog without touching a server.

Price: Free (Free plan: 1 GB storage, WordPress.com subdomain only, no plugin installation, WordPress.com ads shown); paid from $2.75 per month, billed every 3 years (Personal) (WordPress.com pricing, checked 2026-10-22).

Platforms and license: Web. Proprietary hosted service.

Best for: Simple blogs with no server work.

Worth knowing: The free plan has no custom domain.

Which one to pick

• You have a static site or portfolio: Cloudflare Pages
• You are building a Next.js app: Vercel
• You need a real server you control: Oracle Cloud Free Tier
• You want a blog with zero setup: WordPress.com
• You need a small API with a database for a demo: Render