Rails hosting
Rails hosting on servers you own
Pick Hetzner, DigitalOcean, AWS, or any Ubuntu server. Hatchbox turns it into a production Rails server — Ruby, Postgres, Redis, SSL, background workers, and git-push deploys with zero downtime — for $15 a month, however many apps you run on it.
Includes a 7 day free trial. $15 per server per month after that — unlimited apps.
There are two ways to host a Rails app. A platform like Heroku or Render rents you compute by the dyno, service, and gigabyte, and the bill climbs as the app grows. Or you rent a plain server from a cloud provider for a flat monthly price and put the Rails stack on it yourself — which is cheaper by a wide margin, and a lot of work.
Hatchbox is the second option without the work. Connect a cloud account, and Hatchbox creates the server, installs Ruby, your database, Caddy for SSL, and a deploy pipeline, then deploys on every push to your main branch. The server stays in your account, the provider bills you at list price, and you keep root access. Hatchbox has hosted Rails apps this way since 2016 — more than 24,000 of them.
Which host should you pick?
Hatchbox works the same on each. The differences are price, regions, managed databases, and how much paperwork the provider asks for. Each guide has current prices, setup details, and the things to know before you commit.
- Cheapest Rails hosting on Hetzner The best servers for the money, with 20TB of traffic included in Europe. A 2 vCPU / 4GB server is about $7 a month. US locations cost more and offer fewer server types, and sign-up can involve an ID check. See Hetzner prices and setup →
- Simplest Rails hosting on DigitalOcean Predictable Droplet pricing that doesn't move, regions on every continent, managed Postgres if you want it, and a sign-up that takes a minute. A 2 vCPU / 4GB Droplet is $24 a month. See DigitalOcean prices and setup →
- When you have to Rails hosting on AWS For credits, compliance, or a company already on AWS. Hatchbox builds the VPC and EC2 instances so there's no Terraform or ECS to learn. Bandwidth and IPv4 cost extra, and Graviton instances are the better deal. See AWS prices and setup →
Already have a server? Hatchbox also sets up any existing Ubuntu LTS server over SSH — Vultr, Linode, OVH, a Hetzner dedicated box, or a machine in your own rack — and creates servers on Vultr and Linode from the dashboard, too.
What Rails hosting costs
A typical production app — Puma, a Solid Queue or Sidekiq worker, Postgres, and Redis — fits on a 2 vCPU / 4GB server. Here is what that server costs on each host, plus $15 for Hatchbox. Every additional app on the server is free.
| Host | Server | Server / month | Hatchbox | Total / month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hetzner | CX23 — 2 vCPU / 4GB, 40GB disk Germany and Finland, June 2026 prices, IPv4 included | $7.09 | $15.00 | $22.09 |
| DigitalOcean | Basic Droplet — 2 vCPU / 4GB, 80GB disk Any region, September 2026 prices | $24.00 | $15.00 | $39.00 |
| AWS | t4g.medium — 2 vCPU / 4GB, 50GB gp3 us-east-1 on-demand, September 2026, IPv4 and storage included | $32.18 | $15.00 | $47.18 |
The same app on Heroku — a Standard-2X web dyno, a Standard-2X worker, Postgres, and Redis — is about $135 a month, and every extra app is another set of dynos. See the full Heroku comparison.
Prices change. Hatchbox shows the current price for every server type and region when you create a server, and each provider guide says when its table was last verified.
What Hatchbox sets up on every host
Ruby from your repo
The Ruby version comes from your .ruby-version, .tool-versions,
or Gemfile.lock. New releases are available within days, and upgrading
is a one-line change and a deploy.
Databases, your choice
Postgres, MySQL, Redis, or SQLite, installed on the app server or on a dedicated database server in the same private network. Use a managed database instead if your host offers one.
SSL and routing via Caddy
Point a domain at the server and Caddy fetches and renews the certificate. Several apps share one server, each on its own domains, with load balancing when you add web servers.
Zero-downtime deploys
Push to main and Hatchbox builds a fresh release, runs migrations once, and phases Puma over to it. A failed build never takes the site down, and rollbacks are one click.
Workers and cron jobs
Solid Queue and Sidekiq are detected on the first deploy and run as supervised processes that restart on deploy and on crash. Cron jobs are set from the dashboard.
Backups, patches, and root access
Scheduled database backups to S3-compatible storage, security updates applied for you, and full SSH access to a plain Ubuntu server. Cancel Hatchbox and the server keeps running exactly as it is.
Curious what a deploy actually does? See how Rails deployment works on Hatchbox.
Coming from a platform?
Most Rails apps arrive on Hatchbox from Heroku, Render, or Fly.io, usually because the
bill outgrew the app. The code doesn't change: a Procfile, environment
variables, and a Postgres dump are the whole migration.
What customers say
I run 15+ Rails apps and static sites with Hatchbox. My bill went from $400/month on Heroku to $28/mo with Hatchbox & DigitalOcean combined.
Donn Felker
Software Professional
If you want the most bang for your buck, Hatchbox / Hetzner / DigitalOcean is the killer combo. You can throw sooo much at this and it's crazy how inexpensive it is.
Josh Pigford
Serial Entrepreneur
- Applications deployed
- 24,000+
- Deployments run
- 2 million+
- Deploying since
- 2016
Rails hosting questions
Still stuck? Ask us directly — a real person who has hosted a lot of Rails apps will answer.
What is the cheapest way to host a Rails app?
Do I need a separate hosting provider?
How big a server does a Rails app need?
Is this managed Rails hosting?
How does this compare to Heroku or Render?
What if I already have a server?
Simple, predictable pricing.
We charge per server, not per app. Run one application or twenty on the same box — the bill doesn't change.
$15
- Unlimited applications
- Deploy anywhere
- Zero downtime deployments
- Custom domains & free SSL
- Databases, cron jobs & background workers
- Full SSH access to your servers
- Real, human support
- 7 day free trial
Ready to deploy your Rails app?
Hatchbox has run more than 2 million deploys across 24,000+ applications since 2016. Start a 7 day free trial and put yours on a server you own.