Introduction
Finding out cost-effective ways to deploy or host your project as a backend developer can be daunting. After successfully building and testing your application, you may face the challenge of deciding the best platform to deploy your project.
To assist with this, I have compiled a list of free cloud-based platforms that are backend focused, highlighting their unique features and benefits, also their limitations. The good news is that most of them can cater to personal projects as well as small startup projects, providing you with a practical solution to experiment with new technologies, test your ideas and launch small scale-projects.
Featured cloud-based hosting sites
Heroku
Render
PythonAnywhere
Railway
Koyeb
Heroku:
Heroku as a platform as a service offers cloud services to developers who want to deploy, manage, and scale their backend projects. In addition to a clean and intuitive user interface, Heroku offers flexible pricing plans and a wide range of features. It supports various programming languages like Python, Java, Ruby, Go, Node. js, Scala.
Heroku does not offer a free tier plan any longer. However, if you're a verified GitHub student, you can receive platform credits worth $13 per month for 12 months (total of $156/yr) that can be used on Heroku. Check out GitHub Student Developer Pack and Heroku-GitHub's offer.
Features
Scalability
Add-ons
PostgreSQL as a service
Continuous delivery
GitHub Integration - Regularly push updates to your deployed web application using git
Enhanced security
Offers a powerful Command Line Interface(CLI) for use in any terminal
Customizable domain name
Render
Render as a cloud-based platform offers a variety of cool features on its free-tier plan including but not limited to the deployment of docker containers, web applications, static websites, and Postgres databases. If you're new to Render and planning to deploy your application, referring to Docs will be helpful in navigating your first deployment, especially since the Docs are tailored to each programming language and framework.
However, because Render uses a “sleep when inactive” method which is set to 15 minutes, I would not advise deploying production-ready web applications. It is best used for personal projects.
Features
Automatic deployment on Git
Lightning-fast CDN
Supports Postgres database
Deploy docker containers
Custom domain with full SSL functionality
PythonAnywhere
PythonAnywhere comes across as one of the easiest platforms to deploy Python projects. It is very flexible and easy to use due to its simple interface. PythonAnywhere provides a browser-based code editor and also a browser-based bash terminal for running Command Line Arguments.
Apart from its support for developing and serving Python apps, it is also a recommended way of deploying machine learning-based apps.
Features
Browser-based code editor with syntax highlighting
Python web development environment
Supports Ipython, Jupiter, PyPy, and CPython
WSGI-based web hosting
Cron-like scheduled tasks for automation and support for tasks
Powerful servers hosted by Amazon EC2
Railway
Railway is another cloud-based platform that helps developers deploy their apps. It creates room for building and deploying large and small-scale projects.
Railway offers a range of features that make it easy to build, test, and deploy applications, including built-in support for popular databases, version control, and continuous deployment.
It is flexible enough to accommodate both small personal projects and complex projects. With the Migrate from Heroku feature, you can seamlessly move your existing projects from Heroku to Railway with a few easy steps.
Also, it supports languages such as Node.js, Deno, Python, Deno, Ruby, PHP, Java, Rust, .NET, and Elixir, amongst other languages.
Features
Migrate from Heroku to Railway
Available templates to deploy instantly
Multiple Environments
Automatic Builds
Infrastructure as Legos
Deployment Rollbacks
Railway CLI
Secrets Management
Autoscaling
Koyeb
Just like every other platform listed above, Koyeb is a cloud-native serverless platform that allows you to deploy full web applications, APIs, event-driven serverless functions, background workers, and Cron jobs. On Koyeb, you deploy applications using docker containers or from GitHub repositories. Koyeb supports a wide range of programming languages and frameworks such as Ruby, Node. js, Python, Clojure, Scala, Go, Rust, Php.
Features
Easy-to-use interface
Supports all kinds of services
Add-ons
Full support of docker containers
Git-driven deployment
A Koyeb CLI to manage resources and automate directly from the terminal
Easy to use REST API
For security purposes, Each app is deployed in Firecracker microVMs, isolated from the computer’s host operating system
Fly.io
Fly.io as a cloud-based platform offers a clean UI and UX designed to make deployment easy. Both static and complex applications can be deployed It provides amazing features including Fly Launch. You can easily scan your source code and configure it for deployment without touching your docker
Features
Supports these languages Crystal, Redwoodjs, Django, Rust, Go, docker, Rails, Remix, Phoenix
Uses Firecrackers MicroVMs
Fly Launch
FlyCTL helps manage deployment regions’ scaling and secrets.
I hope that I have provided you with enough information to help you choose the best platform to host or deploy your backend projects. Remember that while some platforms offer free plans or tiers, they may not be suitable for production-ready web applications. It's important to carefully consider the features and benefits of each platform and choose the one that best fits your needs. If you have any further questions, feel free to reach out to me on Twitter. You can always check out my GitHub, Hashnode, and Medium to see what my curious mind is building this time.