The European Fly.io alternative
A flat-priced EU PaaS for teams that want managed databases from €4 a month and an EU company on the contract.
By Michael, Founder of HostStack · Updated October 2026
Fly.io prices checked 12 October 2026 against its public pricing pages.
The short answer
Fly.io gives you machines in many regions and lets you build the platform you want on top of them. HostStack is the opposite trade: one region (Helsinki), an opinionated PaaS, and the operational pieces such as backups, version upgrades, cron and workers done for you.
The sharpest difference is the database. Fly Managed Postgres starts at $38/mo plus storage; HostStack’s managed Postgres starts at €4/mo with storage, daily backups and off-site copies included, next to MySQL, MongoDB and Redis. Fly’s raw compute can cost less per GB of RAM; HostStack’s flat per-resource prices are easier to forecast.
Fly is the better fit for multi-region apps that need low-latency reads everywhere, for GPU workloads, or for teams who want raw machines to orchestrate themselves.
Where HostStack differs from Fly.io
- Managed PostgreSQL from €4/mo with storage, daily backups and off-site copies included, and version upgrades handled for you. Fly Managed Postgres starts at $38/mo plus $0.28/GB storage, and Fly lists version upgrades as not yet included
- An EU company on the contract, with data in Helsinki and a DPA at signup. Fly has EU regions (Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Paris, Stockholm) but is a US company, so the US CLOUD Act reaches it
- Predictable per-resource pricing — Pico €1, Micro €5, Standard €20, DB Micro €4. Pay for what you provision, prorated to the hour. Fly bills per-machine + per-second usage, with separate line items for shared CPU, dedicated CPU, RAM, storage, and bandwidth
- Managed MySQL, MariaDB, MongoDB, and Redis alongside Postgres. Fly ships managed Postgres only; Redis is Upstash and object storage is Tigris (both third parties billed through Fly)
- TypeScript SDK and Terraform provider — first-party, not community-maintained
- Cron jobs, background workers, and queues bundled. Fly Machines can run them but you wire the scheduling yourself
Features: HostStack vs Fly.io
| Feature | HostStack | Fly.io |
|---|---|---|
| Web services | ||
| Background workers | DIY on Fly Machines | |
| Cron jobs | DIY scheduler | |
| Static sites | ||
| Managed PostgreSQL | From €4/mo | From $38/mo |
| Managed MySQL / MariaDB / MongoDB | ||
| Managed Redis | Upstash (3rd party) | |
| Object storage | Managed, S3-compatible | Tigris (3rd party) |
| Custom domains + SSL | ||
| GitHub auto-deploy | GitHub Actions setup required | |
| Docker runtime | ||
| CLI tool | ||
| TypeScript SDK | ||
| Multi-region apps | ||
| EU data residency | Helsinki, FI | EU regions, US-incorporated |
| DPA | At signup | On request (pre-signed) |
| Flat pricing | Per-machine + per-second |
Pricing: HostStack vs Fly.io
| Tier | HostStack | Fly.io |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | 1 Nano + 1 Starter Postgres — €0/mo, no card | No free tier for new signups (trial: 2 VM-hours or 7 days) |
| Cheapest always-on | €1/mo Pico (128 MB) | $2.19/mo shared-cpu-1x 256 MB (Ashburn; ~$2.53 Frankfurt) |
| 512 MB always-on service | €5/mo Micro | $3.69/mo shared-cpu-1x (Ashburn) |
| 2 GB service | €20/mo Standard | ~$12.70/mo shared-cpu-1x (1× shared vCPU, fewer guarantees) |
| Cheapest managed Postgres | €4/mo Micro (256 MB / 1 GB, managed) | $38/mo Managed Postgres Basic (1 GB, HA) + $0.28/GB storage |
| Bandwidth overage | 200 GB/team free, then €0.01/GB | $0.02/GB NA/EU, $0.04 APAC/SA, $0.12 AF/IN |
| Volume storage | €0.10/GB-month | $0.15/GB-month |
When NOT to choose HostStack
Fly.io is the better fit in some cases. Here's when we'd tell you so.
You actually need a multi-region app with low-latency reads everywhere. Fly's anycast routing across its 17 regions is purpose-built for that; we run single-region per project.
You want bare Fly Machines to script your own runtime / orchestrator on top. We're an opinionated PaaS; if you're looking for "raw VMs with TLS" Fly is closer.
You want your database in the same regions as your multi-region Fly app. Fly Managed Postgres runs in 13 regions; ours runs in Helsinki.
You depend on Fly's GPU machines. We don't offer GPU instances yet.
Migrate from Fly.io
The full walkthrough — price comparison, before/after config, and the gotchas worth knowing — is in the Fly.io migration guide.
Reference for the move: environment variables (including hoststack env import for a .env export), managed databases, the CLI and, to script the whole thing, the TypeScript SDK.
Frequently asked questions
Is HostStack cheaper than Fly.io?
For small always-on workloads and managed Postgres, yes. HostStack's cheapest persistent service is Pico at €1/month (128 MB), under Fly's smallest shared-cpu-1x at $2.19/month (256 MB, Ashburn; about $2.53 in Frankfurt). Managed Postgres starts at €4/month on HostStack against $38/month for Fly Managed Postgres Basic, plus storage. Bandwidth is 200 GB/team free, then €0.01/GB, versus Fly's $0.02/GB in North America and Europe. Fly's per-second machine billing can come out cheaper for bursty or scale-to-zero workloads, but it is harder to predict.
Does Fly.io offer fully-managed PostgreSQL?
Yes, now. Fly Managed Postgres starts at $38/month (Basic: shared-2x, 1 GB RAM) plus $0.28/GB of storage, and every plan includes a primary with a replica, automatic failover, PgBouncer and backups kept for ten days. Fly lists security patches and version upgrades as not yet included, and its older unmanaged Fly Postgres is archived and no longer supported. HostStack's managed PostgreSQL starts at €4/month with storage and off-site backups included and version upgrades handled for you; Standard (€15) and Pro (€50) can run as a 3-node Patroni HA cluster with automatic failover.
Is HostStack GDPR-compliant and Fly.io not?
Both can run in the EU, but Fly.io is US-incorporated and therefore exposed to the US CLOUD Act regardless of region — which is the core Schrems II problem for European procurement. HostStack is operated by the Danish company MICCI with data resident in Finland (Helsinki) today — with EU regions in Germany on the roadmap — and a DPA available at signup, so it gives a clean EU-incorporation answer that Fly cannot.
How hard is it to migrate from Fly.io to HostStack?
Most apps move in well under an hour. You connect your GitHub/GitLab/Bitbucket/Codeberg repo, push your Fly secrets as env vars with the HostStack CLI, stream a pg_dump from your Fly Postgres (managed or unmanaged) into a managed HostStack database, and cut over DNS once the Let's Encrypt certificate provisions. The [services] block in fly.toml maps to a single HostStack service.
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