Fly.io review

Fly.io ranks sixth and has the lowest entry price for a running machine: a shared-cpu-1x Machine with 256 MB costs $0.0030 an hour, or $2.19 a month, billed by the second while it runs. Apps run as Fly Machines, fast-booting VMs available in 18 regions, which makes Fly a natural fit for apps that should sit close to users on several continents. The platform adds autoscaling, zero-downtime deploys, monitoring, Managed Postgres from $38 a month and Fly Sprites, isolated sandboxes that scale to zero when idle. Fly waives invoices under $5, so very small apps can cost nothing in practice, though there is no permanent free plan, only $1 free to start. Storage and egress are priced separately, and support is a separate subscription starting at $29 a month. Fly scores lower on ease of use because working with Machines and regions involves more configuration than the Git-push flows of Vercel, Render or Railway.

Who it is for

Developers who want containers running close to users in many regions at low per-machine prices.

Price

Pay as you go; smallest shared-cpu-1x Machine with 256 MB from $2.19 per month.

shared-cpu-1x · 256MB $0.0030 $2.19
Quoted from the vendor pricing page on November 9, 2026.

Key features

• Fly Machines, fast-booting VMs for production apps in 18 regions
• Compute billed by the second while a Machine runs
• Managed Postgres plans from Basic at $38 a month
• Fly Sprites, hardware-isolated sandboxes that scale to zero when idle
• Autoscaling, zero-downtime deploys, monitoring and an MCP server

Strengths and weaknesses

• Strength: Lowest entry price per running machine in this list
• Strength: Many regions for running apps near users
• Strength: Invoices under $5 are waived
• Weakness: No permanent free plan, only $1 free to start
• Weakness: Command line and VM concepts take more setup than Git-push platforms
• Weakness: Storage and egress are priced separately

Key facts

• Free plan: No, $1 free to start with no credit card
• Smallest Machine: shared-cpu-1x with 256 MB, $2.19 per month
• Regions: 18
• Paid support: Standard $29, Premium $199 per month

Where it ranks

Fly.io is No. 6 in our Best App Hosting Platforms verdict.