explaingit

ripienaar/free-for-dev

Analysis updated 2026-06-20

121,237HTMLAudience · developerComplexity · 1/5Setup · easy

TLDR

A community-curated list of online services with permanent free tiers across dozens of categories, so developers can build and run projects without spending money on infrastructure.

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((free-for-dev))
    What it is
      Curated list
      Permanent free tiers
      Community-built
    Categories
      Cloud and hosting
      Databases
      CI and deployment
      Monitoring and logs
    Inclusion rules
      Permanent tier only
      No trial-only offers
    Audience
      Indie developers
      Startups
      Side projects
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Code map

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What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Find a free database, hosting, or CI service for a side project without signing up for paid trials.

USE CASE 2

Evaluate permanent free tiers of cloud platforms before committing to a paid plan.

USE CASE 3

Discover no-cost options for email delivery, error tracking, monitoring, or search for a new startup.

USE CASE 4

Contribute a free-tier service you found that isn't listed yet, helping the 1600-person contributor community keep the index current.

What is it built with?

HTMLMarkdown

How does it compare?

ripienaar/free-for-devdigitalplatdev/freedomainf/prompts.chat
Stars121,237160,522161,705
LanguageHTMLHTMLHTML
Setup difficultyeasyeasyeasy
Complexity1/51/51/5
Audiencedevelopergeneralgeneral

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · easy Time to first run · 5min

In plain English

This repository, called free-for.dev, is a curated reference list of online services with permanent free tiers useful to developers, especially people working on infrastructure, system administration, and DevOps. The README explains the purpose: many companies offer free starter plans, but discovering them and comparing them takes time, so this list collects them in one place so a developer can make an informed choice without trial-and-error signup. Practically, the repository is the source for a long Markdown document grouped into sections. The table of contents shows the breadth, with categories including major cloud providers' always-free limits, cloud management, analytics, APIs and machine learning, artifact repositories, backend-as-a-service and low-code platforms, content delivery, continuous integration and deployment, content management, code quality, error tracking, managed databases, design tools, DNS and domain services, email, feature flags, generative AI, infrastructure-as-a-service, IDEs, log management, monitoring, payments, search, security, source code hosting, storage and media, testing, web hosting, remote desktop, and more. The README defines the inclusion rules: only as-a-service offerings, the free tier must be permanent rather than a trial, and services that limit security features such as TLS to paid plans are excluded. You would use this repository when you are starting a side project, evaluating tools, or trying to keep your stack costs at zero, and you want a single index of credible free options. Contributions arrive through pull requests, the README notes the list has been built by 1600+ people. The site is delivered as HTML.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1
I'm building a side project and need free tiers for hosting, a database, and email sending. Using the free-for-dev list as a reference, what are the best options for each category?
Prompt 2
I need a free CDN and a free DNS provider for my open-source project. Which entries in free-for-dev cover these and what are the key usage limits?
Prompt 3
I'm starting a SaaS and want to keep my stack at zero cost until I hit 100 users. Suggest a full free stack covering backend, auth, database, and monitoring based on free-for-dev.
Prompt 4
How do I contribute a new service to free-for-dev? Walk me through forking the repo, editing the Markdown file correctly, and submitting a pull request.

Frequently asked questions

What is free-for-dev?

A community-curated list of online services with permanent free tiers across dozens of categories, so developers can build and run projects without spending money on infrastructure.

What language is free-for-dev written in?

Mainly HTML. The stack also includes HTML, Markdown.

How hard is free-for-dev to set up?

Setup difficulty is rated easy, with roughly 5min to a first successful run.

Who is free-for-dev for?

Mainly developer.

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