DigitalOcean App Platform vs Heroku
DigitalOcean App Platform and Heroku cannot be scored on the same axes — one of them does not publish a rate for everything application platforms bills on.
List prices checked
Rate cards side by side
Only the axes at least one of them bills on. A dash means that provider does not charge for it.
| Billing axis | DigitalOcean App Platform | Heroku | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry plan | $5.00/mo | $5.00/mo | Same |
| Data transfer out | $0.020/GB | — | — |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes | — |
Source: DigitalOcean pricing (May 2026) · Heroku pricing (May 2026). Published list prices only — committed-use discounts, regional variation, and per-request charges are not included. Not yet independently re-checked against the vendor’s page.
Monthly cost for three real workloads
The rate cards applied to identical usage. This is where the winner changes.
| Workload | DigitalOcean App Platform | Heroku | Cheaper |
|---|---|---|---|
| Side projectA personal site or small app with modest traffic, a few gigabytes of assets, and one small always-on process. | $5.00 | — | Not comparable |
| Growing SaaSA funded product serving a few thousand daily users, with an image-heavy frontend and two application servers. | $23 | — | Not comparable |
| Media-heavy siteA publisher or video product where delivery dominates the bill and compute is almost an afterthought. | $203 | — | Not comparable |
Workload definitions are identical on every comparison page, so figures here can be read against any other pair in the same category.
What each one is for
DigitalOcean App Platform
by DigitalOcean
Managed application hosting on DigitalOcean's infrastructure, with flat per-container pricing and bandwidth an order of magnitude cheaper than the frontend-focused platforms.
Free tier: Three free static sites
Heroku
by Heroku
The platform that defined the category, now priced well above alternatives that offer the same workflow. Chosen today mostly for inertia and add-on ecosystem rather than for economics.
Free tier: None; the free dyno tier ended in November 2022
Common questions
- Is DigitalOcean App Platform or Heroku cheaper in 2026?
- Neither can be scored across all three workloads, because at least one of them does not publish a rate for every axis this category bills on.
- Which has the better free tier, DigitalOcean App Platform or Heroku?
- Both publish one. DigitalOcean App Platform: Three free static sites. Heroku: None; the free dyno tier ended in November 2022.
- What do these estimates not include?
- Committed-use and reserved discounts, regional price variation, per-request API charges, support plans, and minimum retention periods. All of those move real invoices, sometimes by a lot. These figures compare published list prices for the same workload, which is the comparison the rate cards alone cannot give you.