Heroku vs Railway Pricing (2026)
How do these two stack up on price? Here's what each one costs, what you get, and where the value sits.
Eco
- Deploy with Git and Docker
- Custom domains
- Unified logs
- 2 process types
- Container orchestration
- Automatic OS patching
- Automated certificate management
- Personal accounts only
- Sleeps after 30 minutes of inactivity
Basic
- Includes all Eco features
- Free SSL
- 10 process types
- Always on
- 0.28 Dyno Units / Month
Standard-1X
- Includes all Basic features
- Simple horizontal scalability
- App metrics and threshold alerts
- Preboot and zero-downtime deploys
- Unlimited process types
- Unlimited background workers
- Can combine with Performance dynos
- 1 Dyno Units / Month
Standard-2X
- Includes all Basic features
- Simple horizontal scalability
- App metrics and threshold alerts
- Preboot and zero-downtime deploys
- Unlimited process types
- Unlimited background workers
- Can combine with Performance dynos
- 2 Dyno Units / Month
Performance-M
- Includes all Standard features
- Predictable performance for your highest traffic applications
- Dedicated compute resources
- Autoscaling
- Can mix with Standard dynos
- 8 Dyno Units / Month
Performance-L
- Includes all Standard features
- Predictable performance for your highest traffic applications
- Dedicated compute resources
- Autoscaling
- Can mix with Standard dynos
- 16 Dyno Units / Month
Performance-L-RAM
- Includes all Standard features
- Predictable performance for your highest traffic applications
- Dedicated compute resources
- Autoscaling
- Can mix with Standard dynos
- 16 Dyno Units / Month
Performance-XL
- Includes all Standard features
- Predictable performance for your highest traffic applications
- Dedicated compute resources
- Autoscaling
- Can mix with Standard dynos
- 30 Dyno Units / Month
Performance-2XL
- Includes all Standard features
- Predictable performance for your highest traffic applications
- Dedicated compute resources
- Autoscaling
- Can mix with Standard dynos
- 60 Dyno Units / Month
Free
- Start with a 30-day free trial with $5 credits, then $1 per month
- Up to 1 vCPU / 0.5 GB RAM per service
- 0.5 GB of volume storage
- Community support
Hobby
- Includes $5 of monthly usage credits
- After credits are used, you'll only be charged for extra resource usage
- Up to 48 vCPU / 48 GB RAM per service
- Up to 5 replicas, at 8 vCPU / 8 GB RAM per replica
- Up to 5 GB storage
- Single developer workspace
- Community support
- 99.9% Availability Target
- 7-Day Log History
- Global regions
Pro
- Includes $20 of monthly usage credits
- After credits are used, you'll only be charged for extra resource usage
- Up to 1,000 vCPU / 1 TB RAM per service
- Up to 42 replicas, at 24 vCPU / 24 GB RAM per replica
- Up to 1 TB storage
- Unlimited workspace seats included
- Railway Support
- 99.99% Availability Target
- 30-Day Log History
- Concurrent global regions
Enterprise
- 90-Day Log History
- Single Sign-On
- 18-Month Audit Log Retention
- Role-Based Access Control
- HIPAA BAAs
- Support SLOs
- 99.999% Availability Target
- Highest compute limits
- Dedicated VMs
- Bring your own cloud
- Up to 2,400 vCPU / 2,4 TB RAM per service
- Up to 50 replicas, at 48 vCPU / 48 GB RAM per service
Heroku vs Railway FAQ
- Which one is cheaper?
- One or both use custom pricing, so it depends on your specific needs.
- Can I use either one for free?
- Railway has a free plan. Heroku doesn't — you'll need to pay from day one.
- How do they charge?
- Both use a usage-based model, so the comparison is straightforward — it comes down to features and limits at each price point.
- Which one is a better deal?
- Depends on what you need. Heroku: Premium pricing in the PaaS space - they're 3-4x more expensive than alternatives like Railway or Render for equivalent resources. They're betting on developer experience and ecosystem maturity over cost competitiveness. Railway: Railway sits mid-to-premium versus raw cloud (AWS/GCP) but undercuts Heroku-style PaaS simplicity with more transparent, granular billing. They're chasing developers who want Heroku's ease without Heroku's flat markup, and who'd rather pay for exact usage than provision fixed dynos they don't fully use.
Still deciding? See the best Heroku alternatives or the best Railway alternatives, ranked with verified pricing.
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