NOTE: GOOGLE HAVE CHANGED THEIR FREE TIER FROM F1-MICRO TO E2-MICRO. PLEASE USE E2-MICRO TO GET A FREE SERVER. YOU CAN UPGRADE YOUR CURRENT INSTANCE LIKE THIS.
I first heard you could get a free Virtual Private Server instance on the Google Compute Engine from a random person on Twitter.
Cheers to the random dude who suggested rather snarkily over twitter that I should simply use a Google Compute f1-micro instance to periodically ping my scripts etc no I won't be dignifying that suggestion with a reply but yes I will be using that free service thank you09:05 AM - 18 Jul 2020
So here's how to do it.
- Go to the Google Cloud Platform Console and sign up/in if you have to and go to the Compute Engine section using the hamburger menu top left.
- Enable Compute Engine if it's not already enabled and then set up billing (you need to add a credit card or PayPal but don't worry you won't be charged).
- Create a new instance in one of the free tier locations (Iowa, Oregon, or South Carolina) with machine type
f1-micro.
Finish the server config (make sure you add the max 30GB free disk space) and spin up the server.
Click the Connect via SSH button to log in.
And that's about it for now. Enjoy your free server forever!
If this post helped you please consider sponsoring my open source projects on GitHub for $1.
NOTE: Even though you can run this server for free, Google may charge if you go over certain "free tier" limits etc so just keep a lookout for that in the terms and conditions...
Update: The free offering from Oracle Cloud is almost certainly better than Google Cloud. See this article 👇
Oldest comments (47)
Nice one mate, very handy.
Any idea why your screenshot shows a $4.28 estimate for the month? It says the first 744 hours are free (aka 31 days), so it's odd it would show that estimate.
Yeah I'm assuming that's just how much it would cost if it wasn't on the free tier 🤷 but it's definitely free. I've been running it for a few months.
744 hours is for every month :)
for exaple you can have 10 instances funning 74,4 hours each. fore every next hour you'll pay
About showing the amount charged this is how Google billing works it shows you much resources you used and then subsidizes it at the end of billing period so you would know using same resources after consuming your free tier you have an idea how much you will be charged.
Likewise, Azure and AWS give also give you some free instances for 12 months (I know, it's not forever but it's something). From Azure you get a B1S instance, from a AWS a t2.micro or a t3.micro.
Yeah that's true. It's for 90 days $300 not forever. This post is confusing the people by using the word forever.
Nope this is not a trial period. Google Cloud free tier is indeed forever (or at least until they shut it down).
Like Google Photos :)
Nothing lasts forever 😔
thenextweb.com/plugged/2020/11/12/...
Actually AWS charges you like hell without any notice if you consume your free tier.
You can usually negotiate with them. They charged me for not terminating the instances. But when I told them that I didn't know I needed to terminate unused instances, I got a full refund.
AWS also charged me without notice about my db excess and didn't know we can negotiate with them. Thanks for this.
The issue I have with GCP is it requires a CC, prepaid doesn't work, and it seems Privacy cards make them want to ask you to verify your identity, which normally i'd do but I need to get a replacement ID.
For those curious about billing and pricing, GCP has a pretty good page here:
cloud.google.com/free/docs/gcp-fre...
Awesome, thanks a lot. ✌️
Good article!
By the way, heroku also provides 500mb?
Is this server better?
Heroku is for runtimes, not offer ssh and custom scripts if needed
You should mention that you get only 1GB of free egress bandwith, you will be charged for additional egress traffic.
Thanks this is great information.
When I signed up, I had to accept the $300 credit offer.
Series F2 is not available in my account. E2 is the smallest.
Will that still be free forever?
Only the f1-micro is free I believe. Good luck!
Try Heroku. it's easiest and free forever with 5 apps per 1 account without any credit cards or debit cards. Tho it will not give you database hosting for free but you can find other free services online where you can host your small DBs for personal projects.
You mentioned adding 30GB of disk. Where can I do that? Is that done in the Management Security Disk Networking Sole Tenancy section?
I'm just trying to avoid paying for something I don't really need.
Thanks
You'll find the setting under boot disk (if I remember correctly). Change the size (GB) from 10 to 30.
It would be great to have this explanation in the article.
Thanks for the post will look out for the more detailed guide. Maybe it would be an option.
I know it's more work. But why not to consider the raspberry pi. It's perfect for small scripts/personal project or even some prototyping/testing work. Been using it for a while it's not perfect but helps to get things done.
Yeah actually I have a raspberry for that purpose but it's not for everything. I'm used to set up everything with docker containers and some images are not available for ARM. Never had this problem with AMD64 VPS.
$4.28 monthly estimate as written in your screenshot does not mean "free forever"...
dev.to/phocks/comment/17lo9
Oracle also gives free VDS instances.
oracle.com/cloud/free/#always-free
Each have 1Gb RAM, 1/8 of CPU core and 50 Gb of storage (witch is rather cool). The biggest limitation of those is bandwidth limit of 10 Mbps,still suitable for lots of tasks. I host some demo web sites and proxy on those.
Thanks. I didn't know this! Seems better specs than Google Cloud too! Will try it out.
Seems like they've updated the bandwidth throttle to 50 Mbps. Awesome! Maybe I'll have to write up another DEV article :)
Yeah, That's true. But I never got into any trouble because of that (unless you want to run a server 24X7 ). When you ping to the server it will wake up in few seconds. At least that's what you can expect from free web hosting. No one will give you a full-featured server free of cost. All free hostings have their own limitations. I hosted a Telegram Bot on Heroku so far it's going well without any troubles and at 0$ cost :)
i see. thank you
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