Neon vs PlanetScale
Pricing
Neon: Free tier, Pro from $19/mo
PlanetScale: Postgres from $5/mo, Vitess (MySQL) from $39/mo, no free tier
Description
Neon: Serverless Postgres that scales to zero: you only pay when your database is actually being used
PlanetScale: Managed Postgres and Vitess (MySQL) databases with git-like branching for safe schema changes
Pros
- Scales to zero on the free tier: no cost when your app has no traffic
- Database branching for safe schema changes and testing
- Generous free tier with 0.5 GB storage and autoscaling
- Database branching lets you test schema changes without touching production
- Non-blocking schema migrations on Vitess: no downtime during changes
- Postgres starts at $5/mo for a single node, or $15/mo with high availability
Cons
- Cold starts on free tier add 1-2 seconds to the first query after inactivity
- Newer service than established options like RDS or Supabase
- Compute limits on free tier can bottleneck during traffic spikes
- No free tier, and Vitess (MySQL) databases start at $39/mo
- The $5 Postgres node is tiny (1/16 vCPU, 512 MiB of memory), so production apps usually need more
- Foreign keys on Vitess must be turned on per database and work only on unsharded databases
Details
Neon is Postgres that disappears when you are not using it. On the free tier, your database scales to zero during quiet periods and wakes up when a request comes in. This means a side project that gets occasional traffic costs nothing, not $39/month like PlanetScale.
The tradeoff is cold starts: that first query after a period of inactivity takes a second or two while the database wakes up. For APIs and web apps, this is usually fine. For real-time applications, it might matter. The branching feature is great for testing migrations safely. If you want Postgres without paying for idle time, Neon is the best option right now.
PlanetScale brings git workflows to your database. Create a branch, change your schema, test it, then merge it into production with zero downtime. No more scary migration scripts run against your live database at 2 AM.
The big hit was losing the free tier in 2024, which pushed many indie developers to alternatives like Neon and Supabase. PlanetScale now sells managed Postgres as well as Vitess, its MySQL-compatible option built on the technology that powers YouTube. A single-node Postgres database starts at $5 a month and a three-node high-availability cluster at $15, while Vitess starts at $39. That brings a small database within reach of side projects, but Neon (Postgres, free tier) and Supabase (Postgres plus extras, free tier) are still the cheaper places to start.
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