Ownkube’s pricing is simple. Starter is free. Production adds a small platform fee on top of whatever you pay AWS for compute. No markup, no bundles, no per-app tax.
Starter
Free forever, no credit card required. Runs on one AWS instance.
Production
Usage-based, metered per second.
The cheapest path onto Ownkube. A single EC2 instance running lightweight Kubernetes with unlimited apps, workers, and databases on top, with no Ownkube platform fee on top.
| Your spend | Amount |
|---|---|
| Ownkube platform fee | $0 (free) |
| AWS EC2 (paid to AWS) | From ~$30 / month (t3.medium) |
Everything you run on that one instance is whatever AWS charges for the EC2 instance. Add a second app? $0 extra. A third? $0.
See the cluster creation guide for instance size options.
For production workloads on EKS (highly available across availability zones), the platform fee scales with your deployment’s requested resources.
| Component | Rate |
|---|---|
| vCPU requested | $5 / vCPU / month, prorated per second |
| Memory requested | $1 / GB / month, prorated per second |
| AWS EKS + EC2 + storage | Paid to AWS directly |
The meter ticks on requested resources, not capacity your app happens to use. Set honest requests and you know your bill.
A small production app on EKS: one web service (2 vCPU / 4 GiB) and a worker (1 vCPU / 2 GiB).
| Line | Monthly |
|---|---|
| Ownkube platform fee: 3 vCPU × $5 + 6 GB × $1 | ~$21 |
| EKS control plane (AWS) | ~$73 |
| Worker nodes (AWS, mixed spot + on-demand) | ~$100 |
| Total | ~$194 |
The same app on a Starter cluster (t3.large):
| Line | Monthly |
|---|---|
| Ownkube platform fee | $0 (free) |
EC2 t3.large (AWS) | ~$60 |
| Total | ~$60 |
Starter is a permanent free tier, not a trial. If you stay under the limits, you stay free.
For teams that need more than self-serve offers (volume discounts, dedicated support SLAs, advanced access controls, SSO, and a dedicated account manager), contact us to talk through an Enterprise plan.
Enterprise is set up by our team; it’s not self-serve.
Representative small team: 3 apps + 1 small Postgres.
| Platform | Monthly cost |
|---|---|
Ownkube Starter (t3.medium) | ~$30 |
Ownkube Starter (t3.large) | ~$60 |
| Heroku (Standard + Postgres Standard-0) | ~$100 |
| Render (Starter tier) | ~$21-35 |
| Railway (Hobby + usage) | ~$20-40 |
| Fly.io (small machines + managed Postgres) | ~$20-30 |
| Raw AWS self-managed | ~$30 + your time |
| Capability | Ownkube | Heroku | Render | Railway | Fly.io | Raw AWS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Runs in your own AWS account (BYOC) | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| SOC 2 scope stays on your account | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| HIPAA / BAA with AWS directly | ✅ | ⚠️ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| AWS Activate & startup credits apply | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| No compute markup | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| Flat, predictable platform fee | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | n/a |
| Unlimited apps on one cluster | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| Disconnect, apps keep running | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | n/a |
| Standard Kubernetes (no lock-in) | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| Git-push deploys | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Managed PostgreSQL with backups | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Automatic TLS | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Built-in autoscaling | ✅ | ⚠️ | ✅ | ⚠️ | ⚠️ | ❌ |
| No platform team required | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
Because every resource Ownkube provisions lives in your AWS account, every dollar of your AWS Activate, startup-program, or committed-use credits applies directly to your compute bill at wholesale rates. Credits expire in 12 to 24 months, redeem them against real EC2, S3, and bandwidth instead of letting them lapse. Starter has no Ownkube platform fee at all, so credits cover 100% of your bill until you outgrow one AWS instance.
Other developer platforms bundle compute into a per-app price and you have no way to apply your AWS credits. With Ownkube you pay AWS what AWS charges, and you pay Ownkube a usage-based platform fee on Production (free on Starter). Nothing more.
Per-second on Production, on the resources requested by your deployments. A deployment you pause to 0 replicas stops being metered.
No. Sign up, connect AWS, and stay on the Starter tier indefinitely. No card required.
Databases count against the same vCPU / RAM pool. A small Postgres (1 vCPU / 2 GiB) runs alongside your apps under the same limits.
