This table puts the platforms Hangar is most often compared with side by side. Each row links to a full comparison with the details, the trade-offs and how to move.
Facts about other platforms come from their public pricing pages and documentation as of October 2026, and each comparison links to its sources. Prices and features change: check each provider for the current state.
At a glance
| Platform | Runtime | Who runs the servers | Pricing model | Managed databases | Preview per pull request |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hangar | Long-running containers | Hangar | Subscription that becomes usage credit, then metered CPU, memory, storage and egress | PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, MongoDB, Redis, libSQL | Yes, on GitHub |
| Railway | Long-running containers | Railway | Subscription that becomes usage credit, then metered usage | PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, Redis | Yes |
| Heroku | Dynos | Heroku | Fixed monthly price per dyno | Heroku Postgres and Key-Value Store, more through add-ons | Review Apps, on Pipelines |
| Render | Long-running containers | Render | Fixed monthly price per instance type | Postgres and Key Value | Yes |
| Fly.io | Machines, deployed from the CLI | Fly.io | Per second, on the machine size provisioned | Managed Postgres | Through your own CI |
| Vercel | Functions and edge network | Vercel | Per seat, then metered active CPU, memory and transfer | Through marketplace integrations | Yes |
| Coolify | Containers on your servers | You | Free to self-host; you pay for your servers. Coolify Cloud adds a fee for the hosted panel | PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, MongoDB, Redis, Dragonfly, KeyDB, ClickHouse | Yes |
| Dokploy | Containers on your servers | You | Free to self-host; you pay for your servers. Dokploy Cloud adds a fee per server | PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, MongoDB, Redis, libSQL | Yes, on GitHub |
How to read it
Managed or self-hosted. The biggest split is the third column. Railway, Heroku, Render, Fly.io, Vercel and Hangar run the servers for you. Coolify and Dokploy are software you install on servers you rent; their cloud plans host the dashboard, and your apps still run on machines you patch and size.
Usage or capacity. Hangar and Railway bill for what your services use, so quiet services and staging environments cost little. Heroku and Render sell fixed sizes, which is simple to predict and means paying for headroom. On self-hosted platforms you pay for servers sized for your peak, plus your own time.
Containers or functions. Vercel is built around functions and a global edge network, which suits front ends. Long-running processes such as APIs with WebSockets, workers, queues and databases fit the container platforms.
Where Hangar fits
Hangar is a managed platform with usage billing, for teams that want to deploy from Git without operating servers. Beyond what the table shows, it offers spend limits per organization and per project, point-in-time recovery for PostgreSQL, MySQL and MariaDB on plans that include it, and logs, metrics, traces and alerts for every service. The quickstart takes you from a repository to a live URL, and the pricing page has an estimator for your workload.