Our take
Pick DigitalOcean if app teams who will stay on Free at $0 (3 static-site apps, 1 GiB transfer each) while they open a first Insights tab, then buy a shared container at $5 / month (1 vCPU / 512 MiB) when they need a web service or worker. Pick Render if teams who will stay on Hobby at $0 / month + the free 512 MB web service while they deploy a first project, then buy Pro at $25 / month when they need unlimited
Best for
DigitalOcean CPU / memory you chart at a public $
Render Web services and a Postgres you start at $0
Free plan
DigitalOcean $0 · / month. 3 apps with static sites. 1 GiB transfer / app. GitHub / GitLab deploy. Automatic HTTPS. Extra static-only apps $3 / month
Render $0 · / month + compute. Deploy up to 25 services. 5 GB bandwidth. Single-service previews
Lowest paid
DigitalOcean Paid containers $5
Render Pro $25
Next step up
DigitalOcean Add-ons we fetched $25
Render Scale $499
Runs where
DigitalOcean Hosted
Render Hosted
Watch out
DigitalOcean Free is static sites only
Render Hobby $0 is the workspace tile, not unlimited RAM
Last checked
DigitalOcean 2026-10-23 · digitalocean.com/pricing/app-platform
Render 2026-10-23 · render.com/pricing
app teams who will stay on Free at $0 (3 static-site apps, 1 GiB transfer each) while they open a first Insights tab, then buy a shared container at $5 / month (1 vCPU / 512 MiB) when they need a web service or worker.
Read the DigitalOcean pageteams who will stay on Hobby at $0 / month + the free 512 MB web service while they deploy a first project, then buy Pro at $25 / month when they need unlimited seats and full-stack previews.
Read the Render page
