Free VPS: what actually exists and the alternatives
Trial, sign-up credit, always-free tier: what a free VPS really involves, the catches to check and the free alternatives for your project.
A free VPS with no time limit is rare: most of the time it is a trial of a few days, a sign-up credit or a small free machine from a large cloud provider, with a credit card required and reduced resources. Depending on your project, a specialized free plan, for a bot or a domain name, or an entry-level VPS is often simpler.
- A free VPS is usually a trial, a sign-up credit or a small always-free tier.
- Check whether a credit card is required, the billing after the trial and whether idle machines are reclaimed.
- For a Discord bot or a domain name, a specialized free plan is often enough.
- ACLClouds does not offer a free VPS, but it does offer a free Discord bot and a free subdomain.
The three kinds of free VPS
Behind "free VPS" there are three different offers. A time-limited trial gives you a real machine for a few days. A sign-up credit pays for a machine until an amount or a period runs out. The always-free tier of some large clouds provides a small machine with no end date, with strict quotas.
- Trial: full-featured, but stopped at the end of the period.
- Credit: normal billing once the credit is used up.
- Free tier: little RAM and CPU, traffic and storage quotas.
The catches to check
A free machine is still a cost for the provider, who makes up for it in other ways. Read the terms before installing a project on it: a credit card is often required to verify your identity, an idle machine can be reclaimed, and going over a quota can be billed.
- Credit card required at sign-up?
- Automatic billing after the trial or the credit?
- Idle machines reclaimed?
- Can you export your data before the end?
A free plan that fits the project
You do not always need a full VPS. For a Discord bot, ACLClouds free bot hosting runs a bot 24/7 without a credit card. To give a name to a website or a server, a free subdomain is enough. For a static site, static page hosts also have free plans.
- Discord bot: the Free plan, 315 MB of RAM, free renewal every 4 days.
- Name for a website or a server: a free aclclouds.online subdomain.
- Static site: GitHub Pages, Netlify or Cloudflare Pages, connected with a CNAME.
When to pay for a small VPS
As soon as the project has to stay online without renewals, keep its data from one month to the next or run several services, an entry-level VPS becomes simpler than a string of trials. You keep root access, a fixed IPv4 and the same server over time. Our article on the VPS under €5 explains what such a machine can run.
- Several services on one machine: website, database, bots.
- A stable IPv4 address for DNS and firewalls.
- Monthly billing, with no commitment.
Why choose ACLClouds to get started
ACLClouds does not offer a free VPS, and says so: the free plans cover Discord bots and subdomains, without a credit card. When you need a VPS, the price including VAT is shown before payment, monthly billing has no commitment, and the VPS includes a public IPv4, root access, the noVNC console and DDoS protection.
- Free Discord bot and free subdomain, without a credit card.
- KVM VPS with isolated resources, from 8 to 64 GB of RAM.
- Plan changes available when the project grows.
Frequently asked questions
Does ACLClouds offer a free VPS?
No. The free plans cover Discord bot hosting and an aclclouds.online subdomain. VPS plans are paid, with the price including VAT shown before you order.
Is a free VPS suitable for a game server?
Rarely. Free machines have little RAM and CPU, and a game server needs a lot of both. A dedicated game plan or a VPS with enough RAM is a better fit.
Why a credit card for a free VPS?
Providers use it to verify identity and limit abuse. Check whether billing starts automatically after the trial or the credit.
Which free plan for a Discord bot?
The ACLClouds Free plan hosts a Node.js or Python bot 24/7, without a credit card, with 315 MB of RAM and a free renewal every 4 days.