Railway vs VPS: The Hidden Cost of Convenience
Railway's $5/mo entry point seems perfect—until your usage spikes. See real pricing scenarios and learn when that "cheap" PaaS becomes more expensive than a VPS.
The Verdict
Railway is great for prototyping and small projects. But its usage-based pricing means costs scale unpredictably. For steady-state production workloads, a VPS is typically 60-80% cheaper with predictable billing.
How Railway Pricing Actually Works
Railway uses resource-based pricing. You pay for what you use—CPU, RAM, and egress. Sounds fair, but it adds up quickly.
CPU
$0.0001
per vCPU-minute
Memory
$0.0001
per GB-minute
Egress
$0.10
per GB
Important: Railway requires a minimum $5/mo spend. Even if you use less, you pay $5. And if you exceed it, you pay the overage.
Real Pricing Scenarios
Scenario 1: Small Web App (Next.js + Postgres)
1,000 visits/month, basic CRUD app
Railway
- Web service (0.5 vCPU, 1GB RAM)$2.20/mo
- Postgres (0.25 vCPU, 512MB RAM)$1.10/mo
- Egress (~10GB)$1.00/mo
- Total$5.00/mo*
*Minimum spend applies
Hetzner VPS (CX22)
- 2 vCPU, 4GB RAM$4.15/mo
- 40GB NVMe SSDIncluded
- 20TB BandwidthIncluded
- Total$4.15/mo
Scenario 2: Growing SaaS (50k visits/month)
API server, Postgres, Redis, background workers
Railway
- API (1 vCPU, 2GB RAM)$4.40/mo
- Postgres (1 vCPU, 2GB RAM)$4.40/mo
- Redis (0.25 vCPU, 512MB RAM)$1.10/mo
- Workers (0.5 vCPU, 1GB RAM)$2.20/mo
- Egress (~200GB)$20.00/mo
- Total$32.10/mo
Hetzner VPS (CPX21)
- 4 vCPU, 8GB RAM$8.76/mo
- 160GB NVMe SSDIncluded
- 20TB BandwidthIncluded
- All services on one serverNo extra cost
- Total$8.76/mo
VPS Savings: $280/year (73% cheaper)
Scenario 3: High-Traffic App (500k visits/month)
Multiple services, high database load, heavy egress
Railway
- API (2 vCPU, 4GB RAM)$8.80/mo
- Postgres (2 vCPU, 4GB RAM)$8.80/mo
- Redis (0.5 vCPU, 1GB RAM)$2.20/mo
- Workers (1 vCPU, 2GB RAM)$4.40/mo
- Egress (~1TB)$100.00/mo
- Total$124.20/mo
Hetzner VPS (CPX31)
- 8 vCPU, 16GB RAM$17.52/mo
- 320GB NVMe SSDIncluded
- 20TB BandwidthIncluded
- All services on one serverNo extra cost
- Total$17.52/mo
VPS Savings: $1,280/year (86% cheaper)
Feature Comparison
| Feature | Railway | VPS (Hetzner) |
|---|---|---|
| Git-based Deployments | ||
| Automatic SSL | ||
| Managed Databases | ||
| Preview Environments | ||
| Predictable Pricing | ||
| Bandwidth Included | $0.10/GB | 20TB included |
| Custom Domains | ||
| Vendor Lock-in |
The Honest Trade-offs
Why VPS Wins
- 60-86% cheaperat scale
- Predictable bills—no usage surprises
- Massive bandwidthincluded (20TB)
- No egress fees—move data freely
- Full controlover your stack
Why Railway Wins
- Zero setup—deploy from Git in seconds
- Managed databases—backups included
- Auto-scaling—handles traffic spikes
- Great DX—beautiful dashboard, logs, metrics
- Perfect for prototypesand MVPs
When to Choose What
Choose Railway If...
- ✓You're building an MVP or prototype
- ✓You need managed Postgres/Redis without setup
- ✓Traffic is unpredictable (auto-scaling matters)
- ✓Your bill is under $20/month
Choose VPS If...
- ✓Your Railway bill exceeds $25/month
- ✓You have steady, predictable traffic
- ✓You need to minimize hosting costs
- ✓You want to learn server management
Get Railway's DX with VPS Pricing
Tools like ServerCompass give you Railway-like deployment experience without the usage-based pricing. Deploy to your own VPS with a beautiful desktop UI— no server dashboard needed.
Bottom Line
Railway is one of the best developer experiences in the PaaS space. Their pricing is fair for what you get—especially at small scale. But that usage-based model punishes growth in ways that fixed VPS pricing doesn't.
The breaking point is typically around $25-30/month on Railway. Above that, a VPS with ServerCompass or Coolify gives you similar convenience at a fraction of the cost.
Start on Railway, migrate to VPS when costs justify the move.