Is AWS (EC2 compute) free? What it actually costs in 2026
AWS's Free plan is a credit, not a free tier: $100 at sign-up and up to $100 more for trying services, spendable for 6 months on 90+ services with no charges possible — then the account closes unless you move to the Paid plan.
New accounts choose Free or Paid. Free cannot be charged: usage draws down the credit, and the account closes when it runs out or at 6 months, whichever is first. 30+ services are 'always free' within monthly limits on both plans; compute is paid from the credit, by the hour.
What the free tier actually includes
- Up to $200 in credits ($100 immediately, $100 earned), 6 months
- Free plan: select services only; the account auto-closes at 6 months or at $0 credit
- Always-free: 30+ named services within monthly limits — read the list before assuming a server is on it
Where the wall is
Month seven, or the day the credit hits zero. An instance running around the clock is charged by the hour against the balance, so 'free' here is a budget with an expiry date, not an allowance that renews.
After that: The Paid plan is pay as you go; new customers on it get the same up-to-$200 credit. EC2 is priced per instance-hour — the per-chip and VPS pages on this site carry current rates.
Can you self-host AWS (EC2 compute)? No — cloud only
AWS is the cloud. Hetzner Cloud, DigitalOcean and Vultr are the VPS providers compared here; a small always-on box is a fixed monthly price rather than a metered one.
When paying is still the right call
If your architecture genuinely leans on managed services — RDS, Lambda, SQS, fine-grained IAM — or compliance requires AWS's certifications, the premium buys real things. Startup credits change the math too; spend them before you optimize.
What you are locked into
Compute itself is portable — a Linux VM is a Linux VM. The real lock-in lives in managed services (RDS, Lambda, S3-coupled designs) and in egress pricing that taxes the way out. The earlier you keep the stack portable, the cheaper the door stays.
If you would rather not pay: Hetzner Cloud
Hetzner Cloud
Two to four times the hardware per dollar, 20 TB of traffic included.
From ~€4.50/mo (2 vCPU / 4 GB, 20 TB EU traffic); US locations slightly higher
See all 5 AWS (EC2 compute) alternatives comparedCompare the free options head-to-head
Read from Amazon Web Services's own pricing and documentation on 2026-09-26 — 4 days ago. Vendors change prices without notice; confirm before you commit.