Free Website Hosting in 2026: 8 Platforms Compared

Last updated: 11 September 2026. Every quota below was checked against the platform's own documentation that day.

Short answer: Cloudflare Pages is the best free host for a static site, and the only one here with no bandwidth cap at all. GitHub Pages suits anything already living in a repo. For an app that runs real code, Render's free tier works if it is allowed to sleep. Netlify and Vercel cap monthly usage and pause the site when you exceed it.

You can host a real website for free in 2026, and not just a parked placeholder. Cloudflare Pages and GitHub Pages run unlimited static sites at $0 with free SSL and a custom domain, while Vercel, Netlify, and Render add serverless functions and full app hosting on their free tiers. This guide maps the eight platforms worth using, the exact free quota each one gives, where each one bites, and which to pick for a static site versus a full application. If you want the wider list instead, including classic PHP hosts with a control panel and the well-known names that have shut down, see the catalogue of 30 free hosting providers.

How do the free hosting tiers compare?

Platform	Type	Free quota	Custom domain + SSL	Best for
Cloudflare Pages	Static + edge functions	100 projects, unlimited bandwidth, 500 builds/mo	Yes, free	Production static sites at any traffic
GitHub Pages	Static only	1GB storage, 100GB/mo soft bandwidth	Yes, free	Docs, portfolios, project sites
Netlify	Static + functions	New accounts: 300 credits/mo. Legacy: 100GB bandwidth + 300 build min/mo	Yes, free	Jamstack sites with forms and functions
Vercel	Static + serverless	1M edge requests, 1M function invocations, 4 CPU-hrs/mo, non-commercial	Yes, free	Next.js and frontend frameworks
Render	Static + app	750 instance hours/mo; web service sleeps after 15 min idle	Yes, free	Running a small backend for free
Firebase Hosting	Static + functions	10GB storage, 360MB per day transfer	Yes, free	Google-stack apps and quick deploys
Cloudflare Workers	Serverless	100,000 requests/day, 10ms CPU per request	Yes, free	APIs and dynamic edge logic
Surge.sh	Static only	Unlimited static publishes	Subdomain SSL free; custom-domain SSL is paid	One-command CLI static deploys

The same table, walked through in 80 seconds: what each free tier actually gives you, and the ceiling it does not advertise. The platform-by-platform detail is below.

Cloudflare Pages

Type: Static sites plus optional edge functions (Pages Functions, backed by Workers)
Free quota: Unlimited requests and unlimited bandwidth, 500 builds per month, and up to 100 projects per account. This is the key difference from every other host here: there is no traffic cap on the free plan. The caps that do exist are structural rather than about traffic: 20,000 files per site and 25 MiB per file.
Custom domain: Up to 100 custom domains with free, automatic SSL
How to start: Connect a Git repo at pages.cloudflare.com, pick a framework preset, deploy
Catch: Build minutes and concurrent builds are limited, and heavy dynamic logic pushes you into Workers paid limits. The 20,000-file ceiling is the one that surprises people, because an image-heavy or per-page-asset build can reach it while the site is still small. For a static or mostly-static site it is effectively unlimited.
Best for: Any static site you expect real traffic on, because a viral post will not blow a bandwidth quota.

Cloudflare Pages is the default recommendation for a free static site in 2026. Unlimited bandwidth on a global CDN at $0 is something neither Netlify nor Vercel match on their free tiers.

GitHub Pages

Type: Static hosting straight from a GitHub repository
Free quota: 1GB site size, a soft 100GB per month bandwidth limit, and 10 builds per hour
Custom domain: Yes, with free HTTPS through an automatically provisioned certificate
How to start: Push static files (or a Jekyll/Hugo/Astro build) to a repo, enable Pages in settings
Catch: Static only, no server-side code, and the bandwidth and storage limits are aimed at project sites rather than high-traffic apps. Private-repo Pages need a paid plan.
Best for: Documentation, portfolios, open-source project sites, and anything already living in a GitHub repo.

Netlify

Type: Static sites plus serverless functions and forms
Free quota: As of September 2025, new accounts are on a credit-based free plan: 300 credits per month that cover bandwidth, builds, and functions together. Accounts created before then keep the legacy ceilings of 100GB bandwidth and 300 build minutes per month. Both include deploy previews and instant rollbacks.
Custom domain: Yes, free SSL via Let's Encrypt
How to start: Connect a repo at netlify.com, or drag and drop a build folder
Catch: The free allowance (300 credits on new accounts, or the legacy 100GB and 300 build minutes) is a real ceiling on a busy site, and exceeding it suspends the site for the rest of the month rather than auto-charging. Netlify Functions draw from the same budget.
Best for: Jamstack sites that need forms, redirects, and a few serverless functions without standing up a backend.

Vercel

Type: Static and frontend frameworks plus serverless and edge functions
Free quota: Vercel no longer states the Hobby plan in bandwidth. As of 2026 it is a usage table: up to 1,000,000 edge requests, 1,000,000 function invocations, 4 CPU-hours of active compute and 360 GB-hours of provisioned memory per month, plus 5,000 image transformations, 200 projects and 100 deployments a day. Any guide still quoting "100GB bandwidth" is describing the old plan
Custom domain: Yes, free SSL
How to start: Import a repo at vercel.com, zero-config deploy for most frameworks
Catch: The Hobby plan is for non-commercial use under Vercel's fair-use rules; a site that makes money is supposed to be on a paid plan. Exceeding a limit does not bill you, it pauses the feature, and in most cases you wait out the remainder of a 30-day window before it works again.
Best for: Personal Next.js apps, framework demos, and frontends where you want the tightest framework integration.

Render

Type: Static sites and full web services (backends, APIs, cron jobs)
Free quota: Free static sites with a global CDN, plus 750 free instance hours per workspace per calendar month for web services that run real server code
Custom domain: Yes, free SSL
How to start: Connect a repo at render.com, choose static site or web service
Catch: The free web service spins down after 15 minutes without inbound traffic and cold-starts on the next request, which Render's own documentation puts at about a minute, so the first visitor after a quiet spell waits. Free instance hours are capped at 750 per workspace per month. The sharper trap is the database: a free Render Postgres holds 1GB and expires 30 days after creation, with a 14-day grace period to upgrade before Render deletes it. Free hosting for the app does not mean free storage for its data.
Best for: Hosting a small backend or full-stack app for free when you can tolerate cold starts.

Firebase Hosting

Type: Static and dynamic content with a global CDN, paired with Cloud Functions
Free quota: The Spark plan gives 10GB of stored content and 360MB of transfer per day, with free SSL. Note the unit: it is a daily cap, not a monthly one, and guides that convert it to roughly 10GB a month describe the same allowance while hiding the part that actually bites
Custom domain: Yes, free certificate
How to start: firebase init hosting then firebase deploy from the CLI
Catch: Because the cap is per day, one good day on Hacker News exhausts it and the site stops serving until the counter resets, where a monthly cap would have absorbed the same spike. Anything dynamic pushes you into Cloud Functions, whose free tier is separate and metered, and Firebase App Hosting, the newer product, has no free tier at all and requires the paid Blaze plan. Best when you already use Firebase auth or Firestore.
Best for: Google-stack apps and quick CLI deploys where the rest of your backend is already Firebase.

Static site or full app: which free host fits?

The split that matters is static versus dynamic. A static site (HTML, CSS, JS, or any framework that builds to static files) is fully solved on free tiers: Cloudflare Pages for unlimited bandwidth, GitHub Pages if it already lives in a repo, Netlify or Vercel if you want framework niceties and a few functions. None of these will cost you anything at real traffic, except Netlify and Vercel, whose free tiers cap monthly usage (Vercel at 1,000,000 edge requests and 4 CPU-hours, Netlify at 300 credits), so a traffic spike can pause the site until the next cycle.

A dynamic app that needs a long-running server is harder. Render free web services and Cloudflare Workers are the two honest free options: Render runs a normal backend but sleeps on idle, while Workers run stateless edge functions with a 100,000 request per day budget. For anything that needs a persistent process with no cold start, a free VPS is usually the better answer than a free app host. See the companion guide on a free VPS in 2026.

What does free hosting not cover?

Free website hosting covers the web server and CDN, not the rest of a stack. None of these plans include email hosting, so a mailbox at your domain is a separate service. A managed database is also separate; free options exist (see the note on serverless Postgres), but they are not part of the hosting plan. Free app tiers sleep on idle and have no uptime guarantee, so they are for hobby and side projects, not revenue-critical production. For static sites, though, the free tiers here are genuinely production-grade.

Frequently asked questions

Can I host a website completely free in 2026?

Yes. Cloudflare Pages and GitHub Pages host static sites at $0 with free SSL and a custom domain, no credit card required. For a full app, Render and Cloudflare Workers have free tiers that run server code, with limits.

What is the best free hosting for a static site?

Cloudflare Pages. It serves up to 100 projects with unlimited bandwidth and requests on the free plan, free SSL, and up to 100 custom domains, which removes the traffic cap that limits the Netlify and Vercel free tiers.

Can I host a full backend app for free?

Yes, with caveats. Render free web services run real backends but sleep after 15 minutes of inactivity and cold-start on the next request. Cloudflare Workers give 100,000 requests per day with 10ms of CPU per request. Firebase Hosting covers light dynamic logic on the Spark plan, though its newer App Hosting product is paid-only.

Is a custom domain free on these hosts?

Hosting and SSL are free, but you still buy the domain name itself (about $10 to $15 a year from a registrar). Every host here connects a custom domain at no extra cost and issues a free certificate, with one exception: Surge.sh gives free SSL only on its own subdomain and charges (Surge Plus, $30/mo) for SSL on your own domain. You also get a free subdomain if you do not want to pay for a name.

What is the catch with free website hosting?

Three common ones: app hosts sleep on idle and cold-start slowly, Vercel and Netlify free tiers are non-commercial or usage-capped, and none include email hosting or a managed database, which you add separately, and where a free database may itself expire. For static sites the free tiers are genuinely production-ready.

Which free host are you on right now? I keep this list current as platforms change their free tiers. Reply if a quota has shifted or a host belongs on the table.