Who each one suits
Choose Codara Cloud if
- Your app needs processes that keep running: a server, WebSockets, queue workers or tasks longer than Vercel’s Function limits (300 seconds by default).
- You want the database in the same place and on the same bill, without adding a Marketplace provider.
- It is a commercial project on a small budget. Vercel’s free Hobby plan is for non-commercial use only; Codara Cloud’s Starter is €5 and Standard includes up to 25 members with no per-seat fee.
- You want cron jobs at any interval on the entry plan, and everything stored in the EU.
Choose Vercel if
- Your app is mostly a frontend or static site with short API functions, and global delivery matters. Vercel has 19 compute regions and a CDN; Codara Cloud serves from Helsinki behind Cloudflare.
- You want a free plan for a personal, non-commercial project.
- Your code is on GitLab, Bitbucket or Azure DevOps. Codara Cloud builds from GitHub only.
- You need a generally available platform today rather than an invitation-only beta.
Side by side
| Feature | Codara Cloud | Vercel |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Fixed monthly price per organization: Starter €5, Standard €20, Pro €50, Scale €100, before tax. Several projects share one plan’s capacity. | Hobby is free for non-commercial personal use. Pro is $20/month, including 1 deploying seat and $20 of usage credit; more deploying seats are $20/month each. Usage beyond the credit is billed on demand, e.g. Active CPU from $0.128/hour. |
| Small app: web service + Postgres + daily cron | €5/month on Starter if the web service and job fit in its shared 0.5 vCPU / 512 MiB and one shared Postgres database is enough (it reserves 10 GiB, all of Starter’s storage). €20/month on Standard for 1 vCPU / 2 GiB and 20 GiB. | About $20/month on Pro with one seat, if usage stays within the $20 credit, plus a Postgres database from a Marketplace provider. Neon’s free plan (0.5 GB, pauses after 5 minutes idle) can cover a small one. |
| Usage above the plan | No automatic usage overage. An action past a plan limit is refused, not billed. Outgoing transfer is included under fair use. | Billed on demand once the credit is used. Spend Management can alert and, if you turn it on, pause production deployments; it does not cover seats or Marketplace integrations. |
| Free tier or trial | No free tier. Beta by invitation: the first month is free on any plan, or the first 3 months if you join our Discord (card required); Starter adds a 7-day trial first. | Hobby is free for personal, non-commercial use. When it hits a limit you usually wait 30 days. Pro has a trial. |
| Databases | Managed PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, Redis and MongoDB inside the plan. Supported backups are kept for up to 7 days. | No Vercel-run Postgres since December 2024. Postgres from Neon, Supabase or AWS Aurora and Redis from Upstash through the Marketplace, billed through your Vercel account. |
| Cron and background work | Scheduled (any cron expression) and one-off jobs, plus always-on workers. They use the plan’s capacity. | Cron jobs that call a Function: 100 per project. Hobby runs them once a day (±59 minutes); Pro once a minute. No always-on workers; Functions run up to 300 s by default, 800 s configurable on Pro. |
| Regions and data location | One region: Helsinki, Finland (Hetzner Cloud). Apps, databases and backups are stored in the EU. | 19 compute regions, including Stockholm, Paris, Dublin, Frankfurt and London. Functions default to Washington, D.C. (iad1). |
| Deploy from | GitHub repository, container image, or a folder, ZIP or HTML file through the MCP tools. Dockerfile, Railpack, Nixpacks or static builds. | GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket and Azure DevOps Pipelines, plus the Vercel CLI and deploy hooks. |
| CLI, MCP and AI agents | codaracloud CLI, HTTP API and a local MCP server for Claude Code, Cursor, Codex and other MCP clients. Agent tokens are development-only by default. | Vercel CLI and an official MCP server at mcp.vercel.com (beta). |
| Team members | Starter: 1 member. Standard up to 25, Pro up to 50, Scale up to 100, with no per-seat fee. | Pro includes 1 deploying seat; more are $20/month each. Viewer seats are free. |
| Availability | Beta, by invitation. A new product from Codara Solutions SL (Madrid). | Generally available, open sign-up. |
What a small app costs
Take a small commercial app: a web service that answers requests all month, a small Postgres database and a cron job that runs a few minutes a day.
On Codara Cloud it costs €5 a month on Starter if the service and job fit within Starter’s shared 0.5 vCPU and 512 MiB and one shared Postgres database (which reserves all 10 GiB of Starter’s storage) is enough, or €20 on Standard for more headroom. The web service is an always-on container, and the database is part of the plan.
On Vercel, Hobby is free but limited to non-commercial personal use, and its cron jobs run at most once a day. Pro costs $20 a month for one deploying seat and includes $20 of usage credit. If the app’s Functions, data transfer and other usage stay inside that credit, the bill is $20. Postgres comes from a Marketplace provider: Neon’s free plan (0.5 GB, 100 compute-hours per project, pauses after 5 minutes idle) can cover a small database. A database that must stay awake moves to a paid plan billed by compute-hour and storage; Neon lists $0.106 per compute-hour and $0.35 per GB-month on its own site. Each additional deploying teammate is $20 a month.
Codara Cloud prices are in euros before tax. Vercel and Neon publish US dollars, which we have not converted.
How to move a project over
You do not have to move everything. A common split is to keep the frontend on Vercel and move the API, database and background jobs to Codara Cloud. Vercel Functions become one always-on web service, and vercel.json cron entries become Codara jobs with the same cron expression.
- Write down what runs today: each service with its start command and port, the database, cron schedules, volumes and environment variables. The deployment inventory in our guide is a good template. Full steps in the docs
- Get access. Codara Cloud is in beta: request an invitation, then create a project; it comes with a production environment. Full steps in the docs
- Create the app from the same GitHub repository or container image. A root Dockerfile is used as written; otherwise Codara detects Railpack, Nixpacks or a static build. Full steps in the docs
- Copy runtime environment variables and secrets. Build arguments are never for secrets. Full steps in the docs
- Create the database, export your data with pg_dump (or your engine’s dump tool) and import the dump from an HTTPS URL through the API or MCP tools. Postgres and MariaDB imports are supported. Full steps in the docs
- Recreate scheduled tasks as Codara jobs with the same cron expression, usually running the same image as the app. Full steps in the docs
- Test on a staging environment with test data, then point your custom domain at Codara. Keep the old service running until the new one is verified. Full steps in the docs
Questions
- Is Codara Cloud an alternative to Vercel?
- For full-stack apps with a server, database and jobs, yes. For a frontend that relies on Vercel’s global network and framework integration, Vercel remains the better fit; you can pair it with an API on Codara Cloud.
- Does Vercel include a database?
- Not its own. Vercel Postgres was moved to Neon in December 2024; databases now come from Marketplace providers such as Neon, Supabase and Upstash, billed through Vercel.
- Can I run background workers on Vercel?
- Not as always-on processes. Functions have a maximum duration (300 seconds by default). Codara Cloud runs workers as ordinary always-on services.
Sources
Prices checked on 26 September 2026.
Vercel
- Vercel Pro planvercel.com/docs/plans/pro-plan
- Vercel Hobby planvercel.com/docs/plans/hobby
- Vercel fair use guidelinesvercel.com/docs/limits/fair-use-guidelines
- Vercel Functions usage and pricingvercel.com/docs/functions/usage-and-pricing
- Vercel Functions limitationsvercel.com/docs/functions/limitations
- Vercel spend managementvercel.com/docs/spend-management
- Postgres on Vercelvercel.com/docs/postgres
- Vercel Marketplace storagevercel.com/docs/marketplace-storage
- Vercel cron jobs usage and pricingvercel.com/docs/cron-jobs/usage-and-pricing
- Vercel regionsvercel.com/docs/regions
- Vercel Git integrationsvercel.com/docs/git
- Vercel MCP serververcel.com/docs/agent-resources/vercel-mcp
- Neon pricingneon.com/pricing