Heroku Alternatives 2026: 5 Options, 4 Free
Heroku alternatives: Coolify, Dokku, CapRover, Render and 1 more. Prices and licenses checked October 25, 2026.
•3 min read•Web Hosting & Cloud Platforms
Verdict:Heroku suits small teams that want a managed platform, with buildpacks, managed databases and a single command to deploy. Leave it when the dyno and add-on bills outgrow the app, or when you need to host the data where you choose. Heroku's cheapest paid dyno is listed at $5 a month, and the costs grow with each database and add-on, so compare the total before you move. Coolify and Dokku are the free routes. Coolify runs as a dashboard on a server you own, and Dokku gives you a git push workflow in the same spirit as Heroku, both with no platform fee. The price is that you patch the server and back up the data yourself. CapRover is the middle option, a self-hosted container platform with a web dashboard, which suits a team already working in containers. Render keeps the hosted model: its free web services suit a hobby app, but they spin down when idle and have no persistent disk, so a production app needs a paid plan. Fly.io suits an app that needs machines in several regions, with paid pricing from about $2.19 a month for a small machine. The trade-off is plain: self-hosting removes the bill and adds server work, while the hosted options keep the operations light and charge for the convenience.
Quick comparison
| Tool | Price | Platforms | Best for | Tested |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coolify | Free (self-hosted is free forever); paid from $5 per month, Coolify Cloud base (includes 2 servers) | Self-hosted, Coolify Cloud | Teams hosting apps on their own VPS | Docs only |
| Dokku | Free | Ubuntu 22.04/24.04/26.04, Debian 11+ | A git-push deploy workflow on your own box | Docs only |
| CapRover | Free | Self-hosted (Docker) | Container apps with a dashboard, self-hosted | Docs only |
| Render | 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) | Web, Cloud | Managed hosting for hobby apps | Docs only |
| Fly.io | Paid from $2.19 per month for a shared-cpu-1x 256MB machine, 30 days continuous, usage-based | Web, Cloud | Global apps needing machines near users | Docs only |
| Railway | Free (Free plan includes $1 of usage per month; free trial gives a one-time $5 credit valid 30 days); paid from $5 per month (Hobby, includes $5 of usage) | Web browser | Hosting / PaaS | Docs only |
| Vercel | 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) | Web | Hosting / CDN | Docs only |
Independent comparison. Paid placements are labelled separately; editorial links earn no affiliate commissions. Learn more.
Good fit if
- You want a free self-hosted platform with a dashboard (Coolify is the pick)
- You want git push deploys on a server you control (Dokku is the pick)
- You want managed hosting for a hobby app at no cost (Render is the pick)
- You need machines close to users in several regions (Fly.io is the pick)
Not ideal if
- You rely on Heroku features or integrations that these tools do not replicate
Heroku today: Paid from $5 per month (Eco dyno, 0.5 GB RAM) (Heroku pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Why people look for Heroku alternatives
Heroku no longer has a free dyno. The cheapest option listed is Eco at $5 a month, and Eco dynos sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity and are limited to personal accounts. Always-on Basic costs $7, Standard-1X $25 and Standard-2X $50, each with 0.5 to 1 GB of RAM. The newer Fir dynos run $25 to $1,200 and all require a Private Space. Add-on prices are not on the pricing page: direct customers find them in the Elements Marketplace, and Enterprise customers pay in add-on credits. Costs climb quickly once an app needs more memory.
Coolify
Compared with Heroku: Free and self-hosted, Apache-2.0 deployment tool for apps on your own server. Against Heroku you pay nothing for the platform and manage the server yourself, which means you lose Heroku's managed add-on marketplace and its one-command deploys.
Price: Free (self-hosted is free forever); paid from $5 per month, Coolify Cloud base (includes 2 servers) (Coolify pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Self-hosted, Coolify Cloud. Apache-2.0 (open source).
Project activity: 65.1k GitHub stars · latest release v4.5.1 (Oct 27, 2026) · last commit Oct 27, 2026
Best for: Teams hosting apps on their own VPS.
Worth knowing: Deploys over SSH using Docker, Compose or Nixpacks.
Dokku
Compared with Heroku: MIT-licensed, self-hosted mini-Heroku that deploys with git push. Compared with Heroku it is free software on your hardware, so you gain full control and lose the managed databases and add-ons.
Price: Free (Dokku pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Ubuntu 22.04/24.04/26.04, Debian 11+. MIT (open source).
Project activity: 32.2k GitHub stars · latest release v0.38.32 (Oct 25, 2026) · last commit Oct 27, 2026
Best for: A git-push deploy workflow on your own box.
Worth knowing: Single-host Docker PaaS driven by git push.
CapRover
Compared with Heroku: Apache-2.0 self-hosted platform for running containers with a web dashboard. Against Heroku you run the host and its upgrades yourself, in exchange for no per-dyno charge and a dashboard that stays on your server.
Price: Free (CapRover pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Self-hosted (Docker). Apache-2.0 (open source).
Project activity: 15.2k GitHub stars · latest release v1.15.5 (Oct 23, 2026) · last commit Oct 26, 2026
Best for: Container apps with a dashboard, self-hosted.
Worth knowing: Docker plus nginx PaaS with a web UI.
Render
Compared with Heroku: Free web services get 750 instance hours a month, but they spin down after 15 minutes of inactivity and have no persistent disk. Compared with Heroku's paid Eco dyno at $5 a month, it offers managed hosting for hobby projects with fewer always-on guarantees.
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: Managed hosting for hobby apps.
Fly.io
Compared with Heroku: Paid machines from about $2.19 a month for a shared-cpu-1x 256 MB instance, with no free plan. Against Heroku it runs your containers close to users in many regions, so you gain placement control and lose the simple buildpack flow.
Price: Paid from $2.19 per month for a shared-cpu-1x 256MB machine, 30 days continuous, usage-based (Fly.io pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Web, Cloud. Proprietary.
Best for: Global apps needing machines near users.
Worth knowing: New organizations have no free tier or monthly allowance. New accounts get a trial of up to 2 hours of machine runtime or 7 days. Outbound data from $0.02/GB.
Other popular options (paid)
Railway
Compared with Heroku: Usage-based hosting: Hobby is $5 a month with $5 of usage, Pro $20 per workspace with unlimited seats. Memory is about $10 per GB and CPU $20 per vCPU monthly. No dyno tiers and no sleeping app plans.
Price: Free (Free plan includes $1 of usage per month; free trial gives a one-time $5 credit valid 30 days); paid from $5 per month (Hobby, includes $5 of usage) (Railway pricing, checked 2026-10-25).
Vercel
Compared with Heroku: Better for front-end and serverless apps than Heroku's long-running workers. Hobby is free; Pro is $20 a month plus $20 per developer seat, which can exceed Heroku's flat dyno prices for larger teams.
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).
Which one to pick
- You want a free self-hosted platform with a dashboard: Coolify
- You want git push deploys on a server you control: Dokku
- You want managed hosting for a hobby app at no cost: Render
- You need machines close to users in several regions: Fly.io
Limits of this review
Docs-only for Coolify, Dokku, CapRover, Render, Fly.io: we did not install or run them, so feature claims come from vendor pages and we did not test import from Heroku. Vendor prices and free limits change; confirm on the linked pricing page before you buy or migrate.
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Kevin Fan
Kevin Fan is a SaaS founder. He runs Free Instead Of, which tracks free and open-source alternatives to paid software and checks each price and free-plan limit against the vendor's own pages.
Methodology
Based on official pricing and product pages checked between 2026-10-22 and 2026-10-25: Heroku, Coolify, Dokku, CapRover, Render, Fly.io, Railway, Vercel. Prices, free limits and licenses are the figures shown on those pages on those dates. No tool on this page was installed or run. No accounts were created.