Compare Netlify and Render free tiers side by side. Pricing, limits, change history, and risk assessment for developers.

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Netlify vs Render

Side-by-side free tier comparison. Catalogue dates here run to 2026-09-22.

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Verdict

Both Netlify and Render offer free tiers. Netlify provides "Free" while Render offers "Hobby".

A verdict here is not a fixed property of the vendor. A one-off pricing event demotes a vendor while its recorded date falls in the last 180 days and then lapses on its own, with nothing about the vendor having changed; a standing condition — a free tier withdrawn, a product retired — does not lapse with time. A badge carrying a date states the record it rests on; a badge with no date rests on no record in force.

Netlify profile → Render profile →

Netlify

Riskcaution 2026-04-14 model change
CategoryCloud Hosting
TierFree
Verified2026-09-22
Last read2026-09-22
Changes4 recorded
The Free plan is $0 with a limit of 300 credits per month, covering production deploys (15 credits each), compute (10 credits per GB-hour), bandwidth (20 credits per GB) and web requests (2 credits per 10k requests). Netlify says the Free plan is always free, with hard monthly limits that cannot be exceeded or incur costs; extra credits need a paid plan. Personal is $9 a month with 1,000 credits.

Render

Riskcaution 2026-04-23 restructured
CategoryCloud Hosting
TierHobby
Verified2026-08-15
Last read2026-09-16
Changes1 recorded
Hobby plan, $0 a month plus compute. Free web services (512 MB RAM, 0.1 CPU) spin down after 15 minutes without traffic, with 750 free instance hours per workspace a month. One free Postgres database (256 MB RAM, 1 GB storage, 30-day expiry) and one free Key Value instance (25 MB, not continuously persisted to disk) per workspace. 5 GB bandwidth/month included then $0.15/GB; without a payment method on file, Render suspends Free services for the rest of the month instead. 500 build minutes/month. Up to 25 services, unlimited projects with 2 environments each. Pro is $25 a month plus compute.

Pricing Change History

Netlify

model change effective 2026-04-14 medium impact
Netlify changed its credit rates: bandwidth went from 10 to 20 credits per GB and compute from 5 to 10 credits per GB-hour, while web requests went from 3 to 2 credits per 10,000. The Free plan keeps 300 credits a month, so each credit buys half as much bandwidth and compute. Source ↗
increased effective 2026-04-14 medium impact
Form submissions are now free across all Credit plans (including the Credit Free tier) — previously each form submission cost 1 credit. Credit Pro also gained unlimited team seats (was $20/seat per Git contributor), which effectively removes the prior CMS/Identity 'every committer becomes a $19 Pro seat' gotcha for free-tier users who ever upgrade. Source ↗
restricted effective 2026-03-01 high impact
No longer in force (2026-04-14). Every repo committer is now charged as a full Pro seat ($19/mo) when using Netlify CMS or Identity with a private repo. Previously only users who logged into the Netlify dashboard counted as seats Reversed 2026-04-14: Netlify's pricing page now states that as of April 14th, credit-based Pro plans no longer charge for any seat. The per-committer charge described here is no longer in force. Source ↗
restructured effective 2025-09-04 medium impact
Restructured to credit-based pricing; sites pause on credit exhaustion Source ↗

Render

restructured effective 2026-04-23 high impact
Render replaced its workspace plans. Bandwidth for the Hobby tier went from 100 GB to 5 GB included per month, then $0.15 per GB, and Hobby workspaces are now capped at 25 services. New workspaces got the new plans on 2026-04-23 and existing workspaces moved on 2026-08-01. Free web services, Postgres and Key Value kept their specs, and free web services draw on the workspace's included bandwidth. Source ↗

Watch Both Vendors for Pricing Changes

We do not push notifications. Every change we record is readable the moment it lands, and the JSON answer carries an ETag — send it back as If-None-Match and an unchanged answer costs one 304.

curl https://agentdeals.dev/api/changes?vendor=Netlify curl https://agentdeals.dev/pricing-changes/feed.xml?vendor=Netlify curl https://agentdeals.dev/api/changes?vendor=Render curl https://agentdeals.dev/pricing-changes/feed.xml?vendor=Render

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