Is it right for your job?
It is, if you can say when the job will be over. Paying by the second rewards machines that live briefly and are then let go. A few examples:
- You want a clean copy of your app to test a change against, for one afternoon.
- Your builds pile up before a release, and a self-hosted GitHub Actions runner would clear the queue for a few days.
- You are about to load test your site and need the traffic to come from somewhere else; our load testing server guide shows how big that machine should be.
- You have one big import, conversion or report to run once.
- You want to try Docker, GitLab, Coolify or another app before you build anything around it. On a Cloud VPS you can pick it as a one-click app and it installs itself on the machine's first start; larger apps need a larger size.
If the honest answer is "it will run for as long as the business does", skip ahead to the last section.
What you pay for, and when
Three things are counted, and only one of them cares whether the machine is on.
- Running time. While it is switched on, you pay for it by the second. The price list shows it as an hourly figure, but the counting is finer than that.
- Disk and IPv4 address. These cost a little each hour that the machine exists, whether it is on or off.
- Traffic you send. Charged per GB, with no monthly limit and no slowdown. Traffic you receive is free.
Switching a machine off is not the same as getting rid of it. Its disk and address keep costing money for as long as it exists.
Keeping a long job alive after you log out
A job started straight from your SSH window dies when the window closes or your Wi-Fi drops. Run it inside tmux, a program that keeps your session going on the server after you disconnect. On Ubuntu or Debian:
sudo apt install -y tmux
# start a named session and run your job inside it
tmux new -s myjob
./run.sh
# press Ctrl-b then d to detach; the job keeps running
# later, from a fresh SSH login, look in on it
tmux attach -t myjobWhen it finishes, copy what you need back to your own computer before you release the machine. From your computer, scp -r copies a whole folder:
scp -r root@your-vm.example.com:/root/results ./resultsOur tip: treat the release as the end of that disk, and assume anything left on it is gone.
Switch it off, or let it go?
| You want to | Do this | What you keep paying for |
|---|---|---|
| Come back tomorrow to the same setup | Switch it off | Disk and IP address |
| Finish for good | Release it | Its last usage, on a final invoice |
| Start again from scratch on the same machine | Reinstall it (this wipes the disk) | Same as before, while it exists |
All three are buttons in the Virtual Machines tab of your dashboard, next to the console and the root password, so none of them needs a message to us.
Paying without paying up front
There is nothing to pay on the day you order. You add a card, we hold seven days' worth of running time on it at checkout, and we let that hold go after your first payment. You get an invoice for what you used when each month ends, or earlier if your usage gets past a small threshold, and when you release a machine the last of its usage is put on a final invoice, all on the same account as everything else you have with us.
What the machine itself is
An elastic machine is one of our Cloud VPS sizes, from 1 vCPU and 1 GB of memory up to 8 vCPUs and 16 GB, on a server in New York that it shares with other customers' virtual machines. It runs nowhere else. You get root access, one IPv4 address plus an IPv6 /96, a console in your browser, and Ubuntu, Debian, AlmaLinux or Rocky Linux from each project's own image. Windows is not offered on it.
Because the processor is shared and each size caps its disk speed and connection, a short job will not always run at the pace the same work would on hardware of your own. For a few hours of work that is usually a fair trade; for a job that has to be fast every minute, read on.
When monthly is the better deal
Here is our advice: paying by the second stops making sense once the machine stays switched on most of the month. On the Cloud VPS page, the elastic price table has an "on all month" figure for each size, which leaves out traffic and tax. Set it beside the monthly plan of the same size, and keep in mind that the monthly plan includes an allowance for the traffic you send (past it, sending slows to 10 Mbit/s), while an elastic machine pays for every GB it sends.
And some jobs are not VPS jobs at all. If the processor is busy all day, a database needs more disk speed than the biggest size allows, you need Windows or a graphics card, or your machine sends heavy traffic month in, month out, rent a whole dedicated server. Every core is yours, nobody counts the traffic, and there is no long contract: it runs month to month. A racked machine goes live about half an hour after your order is approved.
Questions people ask
- Do I still pay when my VPS is switched off?
- Yes, a little. The running-time charge stops, but you keep paying for the disk and IPv4 address each hour that the machine exists. Releasing it from your dashboard is what should stop those too, and the last of its usage is put on a final invoice.
- How is a pay-as-you-go VPS billed here?
- While the machine is on, its running time is metered to the second; while it is off, that meter stands still. The disk and address are billed hourly as long as it exists, and traffic you send is billed per GB. You get an invoice when each month ends, or earlier if your usage gets past a small threshold.
- Do I need to pay anything to get started?
- No. Just add a card: seven days of running time is put on hold and released after your first payment. From then on, you get an invoice when each month ends, or earlier if your usage gets past a small threshold.
- Is there a traffic limit?
- Not on elastic machines. Everything you send is charged per GB and is never slowed down, and everything you receive is free.
- Where is the server, and can I use Windows?
- New York is the only place the Cloud VPS runs. You can pick Ubuntu, Debian, AlmaLinux or Rocky Linux; Windows comes on dedicated servers, not on a VPS.