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Railway pricing in 2026: plans, usage rates and what an app really costs
Railway's plan fee is a minimum usage commitment, not a ceiling. Hobby is $5 per month with $5 of included usage, and Pro is $20 per workspace per month with $20 of included usage. CPU, memory, and volumes are then billed per second for what a running service uses. Figures below were read from Railway on October 26, 2026.
Reviewed October 26, 2026
Railway plans at a glance
Railway publishes five plans. Free Trial and Free have a $0 fee, Hobby is $5 per month, Pro is $20 per workspace per month, and Enterprise is custom. The fee includes a usage credit of the same amount on Hobby and Pro. Usage past that credit is billed at the rates in the next section.
Railway describes Hobby for solo developers and side projects. The limits table still allows 3 members per project on Hobby, and unlimited members on Pro. Seats on Pro are included in the workspace fee. Included usage resets each billing cycle and does not roll over. Railway's plan reference also says a small set of builders may have the Hobby fee waived by an automated check. This page does not assume that waiver.
| Plan | Monthly fee | Included usage | Max per service | Replicas | Log history |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free Trial | $0 | $5 one-time credit, 30 days | 2 vCPU / 1 GB | 2 | 7 days |
| Free | $0 | $1 per month | 1 vCPU / 0.5 GB | 1 | 3 days |
| Hobby | $5 | $5 per month | 48 vCPU / 48 GB | 6 | 7 days |
| Pro | $20 per workspace | $20 per month | 1,000 vCPU / 1 TB | 42 | 30 days |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Custom | Custom | Custom |
How Railway usage billing works
Railway bills CPU, memory, and volume disk per second for what a running service uses. Stopped services do not accrue that compute charge. Egress is a per-GB charge, and object storage is a per-GB-month charge with free egress.
The monthly column is Railway's own constant for a resource held for the whole billing month. It is there so the per-second rate can be compared. The invoice is still per second, so a service that runs for part of the month costs less than that constant. Railway's plan reference says service builds are free. A running service with no requests still consumes CPU and memory. Railway's billing guide says serverless mode can stop an inactive service, and that each pull-request environment is another running copy.
The subscription is a minimum commitment. If Hobby usage is $5 or less, the bill for that usage is $5. If usage is higher, Railway charges the usage total, not the fee plus the full usage. The same pattern applies to Pro and its $20 credit. An invoice can also include next month's subscription in advance and last month's overage in arrears, and Railway says it may charge a partial amount earlier in the cycle. That is why a card charge can be higher than one period's usage.
| Resource | Published rate | Railway's monthly constant |
|---|---|---|
| Memory | $0.00000386 per GB-second | $10 per GB |
| CPU | $0.00000772 per vCPU-second | $20 per vCPU |
| Volumes | $6e-8 per GB-second | $0.15 per GB |
| Egress | $0.05 per GB | Billed per GB, not per second |
| Object storage | $0.015 per GB-month, egress free | Billed per GB-month |
| Plan | Projects | Services | Members per project | Max volume | Custom domains | Concurrent builds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free Trial | 2 | 5 | 3 | 500 MB | 1 | 3 |
| Free | 1 | 3 | 1 | 500 MB | 0 | 1 |
| Hobby | 50 | 50 | 3 | 5 GB | 2 | 3 |
| Pro | 100 | 100 | Unlimited | 1000 GB | 20 | 10 |
| Enterprise | By agreement | By agreement | By agreement | By agreement | By agreement | By agreement |
Worked examples for Railway with explicit assumptions
These two examples use Railway's published monthly constants. They are illustrations, not a quote, and they are not an Unbroker invoice. Both assume one replica, the resources stay allocated for the whole billing month, and egress is zero.
The side project is 0.5 vCPU ($10) plus 1 GB of memory ($10), which is $20 of usage. On Hobby, usage above $5 is charged as the usage total, so the bill for that usage is $20. The API plus Postgres example assumes the API is 1 vCPU and 1 GB ($30) and the database is also 1 vCPU and 1 GB ($30). Railway does not publish a default Postgres size, so that database size is an assumption. A 10 GB volume adds $1.50. Usage is $61.50. On Pro, that is above the $20 credit, so the bill for that usage is $61.50. Tax is not included. A real invoice can also show the next subscription period.
| Example | Assumption | Usage | Plan bill for that usage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Always-on side project | 0.5 vCPU and 1 GB RAM, no volume, no egress, running all month | $20 | Hobby: $20. Usage is above the $5 credit, so the usage total is the bill. |
| API and Postgres | API at 1 vCPU and 1 GB ($30), database at 1 vCPU and 1 GB ($30), 10 GB volume ($1.50), no egress | $61.50 | Pro: $61.50. Usage is above the $20 credit, so the usage total is the bill. |
Railway vs Render vs Unbroker pricing models
These three products do not bill the same thing, so a lower plan fee is not proof of a lower invoice. The table compares meters. It does not rank which one is cheaper.
Render's pricing page, as already cited on Railway vs Render, bills provisioned compute and prorates it to the second. Unbroker app CPU and memory follow the capacity you configure while replicas run, at $0.03 per vCPU-hour and $0.015 per GiB-hour in the current catalogue. Price a real shape on each pricing page before you treat any fee as the whole bill.
| Platform | Plan fee | What compute follows | What a traffic spike does |
|---|---|---|---|
| Railway | Hobby $5 with $5 of usage. Pro $20 per workspace with $20 of usage. | CPU, memory, and volume disk, per second of use. Egress per GB. | A running service still meters CPU and memory when idle. A stopped service does not. |
| Render | Listed on the Railway vs Render page. This page does not restate those prices. | Provisioned compute, prorated to the second. | You pay for the instance size you provision, not for a utilization reading. |
| Unbroker apps | Free is $0 with hard caps. Pro is $25 per month with $25 of credit. | Configured CPU at $0.03 per vCPU-hour and memory at $0.015 per GiB-hour, while replicas run. | The app CPU and memory line stays on the configuration. A spike does not change it. |
| Unbroker servers | A fixed monthly price for the size, on Pro. Traffic is unlimited under fair use. | The size you buy for the paid month. | Traffic is not a separate overage on the server price. |
When usage-based pricing is a good fit
Usage-based pricing fits work you can stop, or work whose average use sits far below a size you would otherwise leave reserved. It is a weak fit when the invoice has to stay put during a traffic spike.
Stay with a per-second meter if you will actually stop idle services, if pull-request copies are rare, and if you will read the CPU, memory, disk, and egress lines. Leave that model if an idle-but-running API and a busy API should cost the same CPU and memory line. Price the same shape on both meters before you decide. An idle running service and a busy service can produce different Railway usage totals, while the Unbroker CPU and memory line stays on the configuration.
How Unbroker prices apps, databases and servers
Unbroker Free is $0 with hard caps, including one project, two services, and a pause after days without qualifying traffic. Pro is $25 per month and includes $25 of usage credit that does not roll over. After that credit, you pay for the capacity you configured.
App CPU is $0.03 per vCPU-hour and memory is $0.015 per GiB-hour while replicas run. Those rates are the catalogue rates. This page does not turn them into a sample invoice. Open pricing for the current bill shape. Managed Postgres requires Pro and is not on Free. The smallest catalogue plan is 1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, and 10 GB of storage at $21.21 per month, separate from the Pro fee. Linux cloud servers are the fixed monthly price: you pay the size in full when it is created, Pro is required, deleting it does not prorate the month already paid, and traffic is unlimited under fair use. Free also excludes persistent volumes, Dockerfiles, and container images.
FAQ
How much does Railway cost per month?
There is no single monthly price. On October 26, 2026, Hobby was $5 per month with $5 of included usage, and Pro was $20 per workspace per month with $20 of included usage. If usage stays inside that credit, the bill for the usage is the plan fee. If usage is higher, Railway charges the usage total. CPU, memory, and volumes are metered per second.
Is Railway free?
Railway has a $0 Free plan with $1 of usage credit per month and tight caps, including one project, three services, and no custom domains. The Free Trial is separate: a one-time $5 credit for 30 days. Hobby is a paid plan.
What does Hobby include?
Hobby is $5 per month with $5 of included usage that resets each cycle. The pricing page lists up to 48 vCPU and 48 GB per service, 6 replicas, 7-day logs, 50 projects, 50 services, a 5 GB volume, 2 custom domains, and 3 concurrent builds. Usage above the included credit is billed at the per-second rates.
Why is my bill higher than expected?
A running service meters CPU and memory even with no traffic. Extra pull-request environments are extra running copies. Egress is $0.05 per GB, including public database traffic that could have stayed on a private URL. An invoice can also combine next month's subscription, billed in advance, with last month's overage. Included credit does not roll over.
Does Railway charge for idle services?
A service that is running and idle still consumes CPU and memory, and those are billed per second. A stopped service does not accrue that compute charge. Railway's billing guide says serverless mode can stop a service when it is inactive.
Is Railway cheaper than Render or Heroku?
Not as a blanket claim. Railway meters use per second. Render bills provisioned compute, prorated to the second. Heroku lists dyno sizes, including Eco at $5 per month and Basic at $7 per month on October 26, 2026. Compare the same workload on each pricing page. A lower plan fee is not the whole invoice.
Railway alternative with predictable pricing?
Unbroker prices an app from the CPU and memory you configure, so a traffic spike does not change that line while the settings stay the same. Pro is $25 per month with $25 of credit, then you pay for configured capacity. Linux servers are a fixed monthly price with unlimited traffic under fair use. That is a different meter, not a claim that the invoice is lower.