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Amazon Web Services vs Fly.io

Two sides of the hosting decision: hyperscaler cloud and container platform. When each fits, what it costs, who moves from one to the other, and what makers who chose it say.

Amazon Web ServicesHyperscaler cloud
Fly.ioContainer platformllms.txt
Ask your AI about this, with this page as the source:ChatGPT ↗Claude ↗Perplexity ↗

Which fits you

Choose Amazon Web Services if
  • The widest catalog of building blocks — Lambda, containers, managed databases, queues — to assemble your own infrastructure.

Use it whenYou need a specific AWS service, enterprise customers ask for it, or you have credits to spend.

Trade-offYou wire up networking, permissions and deploys yourself; billing is per service and hard to predict.

Choose Fly.io if
  • Your users are spread across continents and the app runs in Docker

Use it whenYour app runs in Docker and should serve users in several regions.

Trade-offMore operations work than a PaaS.

At a glance

Amazon Web ServicesFly.io
Used by426 makers' products · 17 open-source projects66 makers' products · 52 open-source projects
Cost at default usagerequests 5 million requests, data transfer out 100 GB, serverless function compute 100 GB-hours$17/mo Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$15/mo Pay As You Go
Moved to it on GitHubpull requests since Oct 20246 from Fly.io4 from Amazon Web Services
Downloads4.2M/wk−39% vs npm
PricingPay-as-you-go per service; new accounts get up to $200 in Free Tier credits over 6 months. · paid from Pay as you goUsage-based. · paid from $1.94/mo (shared-cpu-1x)
Free tierYesNo
Open sourceNoNo
Incidents, 90 daysfrom its status pageno public status feed25+ (11 major)

Cost as you grow

At 100k requests Fly.io costs less ($13 vs $16); and still does at 500M requests ($213 vs $1,600). They're different kinds of tool — hyperscaler cloud and container platform — so the prices don't buy the same thing.

$0$50$200$500$1,0000.10.5151050100500
Fly.ioAmazon Web Servicesx: requests per month (million requests), other usage scaled with it; held at 1 server (always-on app servers) · cheapest usable plan at each point, list prices · try your own numbers
The numbers, plan by plan
Requests per monthAmazon Web ServicesFly.io
0.1$16 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$13 Pay As You Go
0.5$16 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$13 Pay As You Go
1$16 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$13 Pay As You Go
5$17 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$15 Pay As You Go
10$32 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$17 Pay As You Go
50$160 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$33 Pay As You Go
100$320 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$53 Pay As You Go
500$1,600 Pay as you go (Lambda + EC2 t4g.small)$213 Pay As You Go

From each vendor's pricing page: Amazon Web Services, Fly.io.

Who moves from one to the other

Public pull requests on GitHub since Oct 2024 whose title says "Amazon Web Services to Fly.io" or the reverse — real code changes, by developers in general rather than makers only.

Fly.io → Amazon Web Services6 PRs
All matching pull requests on GitHub ↗
Amazon Web Services → Fly.io4 PRs
All matching pull requests on GitHub ↗

What makers say

Makers on using it for hosting, from Product Hunt and Starter Story interviews, each linked to the source. Products with a page of their own and fuller notes first.

On Amazon Web Services
We are so excited to integrate with AWS Lambda. Look for our upcoming co-authored blog about how Fleak and AWS Lambda bring goodness to data teams and help them win their time back!
Fleak, the makerSep 2026 ↗
AWS provides the global infrastructure we need to deliver low-latency voice translation to users worldwide. Their reliable services ensure our calls connect seamlessly across regions.
The Banana App, the makerSep 2026 ↗
AWS Lambda's scalability is definitely a game-changer, especially for handling the traffic spikes from a Product Hunt launch. Shoutout to AWS Lambda for making it possible! 🚀
Gan.AI, the makerSep 2026 ↗
152 more on the Amazon Web Services page →
On Fly.io
Machines on Fly made it easy to build SSL-secured proxies and backends for keeping cross-internet Pig automations safe and encrypted.
Pig, the makerSep 2026 ↗
Shoutout to @flyDev - Deploying Mascotly globally was seamless thanks to Fly.io. It made it super easy to get our backend up and running close to users with minimal config. Fast, reliable, and developer-friendly - couldn’t ask for more! 🚀🌍
Mascotly, the makerSep 2026 ↗
Fly’s setup process was smooth and intuitive. Hosting APIs globally with minimal configuration was a huge time-saver.
Cure AI, the makerSep 2026 ↗
18 more on the Fly.io page →

Loved and watch-outs

Themes that recur in makers' words and Hacker News comments, each linked to what it summarises.

Amazon Web Services
Most loved
  • It offers a huge catalog of services in one place, from databases to queues to AI. PHPH 2PH 3PH 4
  • It scales up and down with bursty traffic without re-architecting. PHPH 2PH 3
  • Its reliability record is something teams are willing to bet a product on. PHPH 2PH 3PH 4
Watch-outs
  • Major outages, from long us-east incidents to struck data centers, have taken customer services down. HNHN 2HN 3HN 4
  • Its services can be tricky to configure. PH
On Product Hunt: 5.0★, 282 reviews · mentioned most: reliable cloud services, scalable infrastructure, extensive service offerings
Fly.io
Most loved
  • Apps deploy close to users around the world with minimal configuration. PH
  • The CLI makes deploys and scaling a single command. PH
  • Pricing is simple and predictable, with small containers costing very little. HNHN 2PH
Watch-outs
  • Its unmanaged Postgres needs manual recovery when nodes fail or run out of memory. HNHN 2
  • Repeated major outages undermine confidence in its stability. HN
On Product Hunt: 5.0★, 27 reviews · mentioned most: easy deployment, developer friendly, CLI

Who uses each

Amazon Web Services426 makers' products
Ada.imAgentMailAgentplace.ioAgentRAI Context FlowAlchemyzeAmplooAntiquotedAnythingAstridAstrioBackEngine MCP+414 more
Fly.io66 makers' products
Cure AIFlight FollowerFormcraftsGitHub Wrapped 2025InfiniDeskMascotlyOboeOpenchangelogPigPinchRemySailhouse+54 more
Used by both — often one replacing the other, or each for a different part of the product
BetterClawRemyBlink.newOpenchangelogStudioFillout

What makers pair each with

With Amazon Web Services
Transactional Email
Frontend Framework
LLM API
Payments
With Fly.io
Frontend Framework
Database
Transactional Email
Web Analytics

Neither quite right?

See the whole hosting decision →
VercelFrontend cloudNext.js apps — zero-config deploys and preview URLs.vs Amazon Web Services →vs Fly.io →
NetlifyFrontend cloudStatic sites and JAMstack apps on any framework.
CloudflareEdge platformCheap global hosting with Workers, plus database (D1) and storage (R2) on the same platform.vs Amazon Web Services →
RailwayPaaSServers, workers and databases deployed together, with almost no configuration.vs Amazon Web Services →vs Fly.io →
RenderPaaSA Heroku-style platform for web services, cron jobs and Postgres.vs Amazon Web Services →vs Fly.io →
Hetzner CloudYour own serverA lot of CPU and RAM per euro, in European, US and Singapore regions.vs Amazon Web Services →vs Fly.io →
CoolifyYour own serverA Heroku- or Vercel-style dashboard on your own server, with many one-click services.