Render Alternative: 5x More Compute for the Same Price

Render made cloud hosting simple. But their pricing is a 5x markup over what the hardware actually costs. Here's the math.

Render's Pricing Breakdown

• Starter: 0.5 CPU, 512 MB — $7/mo
• Standard: 1 CPU, 2 GB — $25/mo
• Pro: 2 CPU, 4 GB — $85/mo
• Pro Plus: 4 CPU, 8 GB — $175/mo
• Databases: extra $7-95/mo
• Bandwidth: 100 GB free, then $0.10/GB

RAW's Pricing

• raw-2 ARM: 2 vCPU, 4 GB, 40 GB NVMe — $6/mo
• raw-4 ARM: 4 vCPU, 8 GB, 80 GB NVMe — $11/mo
• raw-8 ARM: 8 vCPU, 16 GB, 160 GB NVMe — $21/mo
• Database: Install on same server — $0 extra
• Bandwidth: 20 TB included

Direct Comparison

At Render's "Pro Plus" pricing ($175/mo), you get 4 CPU and 8 GB. For $11/mo on RAW, you get the same specs. That's a 94% savings.

What Render Does Better

• Zero-config git push deploys
• Built-in CI/CD pipeline
• Managed SSL and load balancing
• Blueprint infrastructure-as-code

What RAW Does Better

• 94% cheaper for same specs
• Full root access (install anything)
• 20 TB bandwidth (vs 100 GB)
• Run databases on same server ($0 extra)
• No vendor lock-in (it's just a Linux server)

Try RAW Free

npx rawhq deploy

7-day free trial. 13 seconds to deploy. No credit card.