# Free Heroku, Render and Railway Alternative: Own Server

> Free hosting tiers sleep, cap hours or meter usage. Run Next.js on a $4-6 server that stays awake, with one-command deploys and an undo button.

Source: https://boringpush.com/blog/free-heroku-render-railway-alternative

## Your demo link opens to a spinner

You send a customer your app link. It sits there for a minute, then loads. That's the free-tier handshake: the host put your app to sleep because nobody visited for a while.

Render's docs say it plainly: a free web service "spins down" after 15 minutes without traffic, and waking it "takes about one minute." Heroku's Eco dyno "sleeps after 30 minutes of inactivity." Both are fair deals for a hobby. Neither is what you want when a real person is clicking your link.

The usual fix is a paid plan. This post is about the other fix: a small server that you rent once, that never sleeps, and that one command deploys to.

## Free, cheap and metered, side by side

Prices are from each company's own pages, checked on 2026-10-20. They change, so check again before you commit.

| | Heroku | Render Free | Railway | Your own server |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Entry price | Eco $5/mo (0.5 GB), Basic $7/mo | $0 | Free $0 (with $1 monthly credit), Hobby $5/mo (with $5 credit) | $4/mo (512 MiB) or $6/mo (1 GiB), DigitalOcean |
| Sleeps when idle | Eco: after 30 min | After 15 min, about 1 min to wake | Not stated on the pricing page | No |
| Limits to know | Standard-1X is $25/mo | 750 free hours a month, one instance, no persistent disk | Usage billed per resource | Your server's memory and disk |
| How it's billed | Flat per dyno | Free | Credit, then usage: $10 per GB of RAM and $20 per vCPU (monthly rates on the page), $0.05 per GB egress | Flat monthly price |
| Your files survive | Dyno disk is ephemeral | Lost on spin-down | Depends on volumes | Yes, it's your disk |

The last row matters for a database file. Render's docs say free services lose local filesystem changes when they spin down and don't support persistent disks. On your own server, your database simply stays on disk.

## What a $4-6 server gets you

A server that's awake all day, a flat monthly price, and a place where your files stay put. BoringPush turns it into something that feels like a platform.

One setup script prepares a fresh server: web server, firewall, free SSL and your scheduled jobs. After that, shipping is one command.

## Deploying is one command

```bash
bp deploy
```

It checks your code, builds the new version on your own computer, puts it live and confirms the site answers. Your server never has to build anything, so a small one is enough.

If the new version doesn't come up, the last good one is put back on its own. You can also undo a release by hand with `bp rollback --yes`. For more, see [Free Vercel Alternative: Host Next.js on a $6 VPS](/blog/free-vercel-alternative-nextjs-vps) and the [deploy section on the homepage](/#deploy).

## Background jobs and the database come with it

Scheduled jobs run on the same server: every minute, hourly, daily, weekly or monthly. Add one by dropping a script in a folder. The [jobs section on the homepage](/#jobs) shows how.

Your data lives in a database file by default, snapshotted every day. If you outgrow one server, the same app runs on Supabase or MongoDB with one setting.

## Know this first

A platform host runs the machine so you don't have to. On your own server you look after it yourself, including updates and the disk.

BoringPush's setup script and one-command deploys make that small. For an app that has to be awake all day for the price of a coffee, a small server is hard to beat.

## Why BoringPush is the way to do this

Free tiers sleep, cap your hours or meter your usage, so the bill depends on how well you're doing. A small server doesn't.

BoringPush gives you that server with the platform parts already built: one setup script, one deploy command, an undo button, scheduled jobs and a database. It's the calm way to run a real app.

## FAQ

### Is there a truly free hosting tier that doesn't sleep?

Not among these three, going by their own pricing pages and docs on 2026-10-20. Render's free tier spins down after 15 minutes idle, Heroku's cheapest dyno (Eco, $5) sleeps after 30 minutes, and Railway's free plan comes with a $1 monthly usage credit. The cheapest always-on option is a small server at $4-6 a month.

### Does BoringPush work on Render or Railway too?

It's a standard Next.js app, so it can run anywhere Node runs. The one-command deploy, undo and scheduled jobs are built for your own Linux server, so on a platform host you'd use that platform's own deploy flow.

### Will SQLite work on a platform host?

Only where there's a persistent disk. Render's docs say free web services don't support persistent disks and lose local filesystem changes on spin-down, so use a paid disk there or a hosted database. On your own server the file stays on disk.

### What does it cost per month, really?

The server is the bill: $4 or $6 a month on DigitalOcean at the time of writing. The Docker image, if you choose that route, is about 285 MB per the README. Domain and email are on top, as they would be anywhere.

### How do I get the app back if a release goes wrong?

The previous version is kept, and it's put back automatically if the new one doesn't answer. `bp rollback --yes` does the same by hand.

## Keep reading

- [Free Vercel Alternative: Host Next.js on a $6 VPS](/blog/free-vercel-alternative-nextjs-vps) — the same path compared with Vercel's plans
- [Deploy Next.js on Hetzner $5 by Dinner Tonight](/blog/deploy-nextjs-hetzner-vps) — the setup, step by step
- [Free Vercel Cron Alternative: Jobs Every Minute](/blog/free-vercel-cron-alternative-every-minute) — scheduled jobs on the same box

[Get BoringPush →](/#get)