Coolify
Self-hosted Vercel alternative. Deploy anything to your own server with a nice UI.
In plain English
Like buying a house instead of renting an apartment. There's more setup work upfront, but you own it, you control it, and there's no landlord raising your rent when you get more visitors.
Real-world example
You have 5 side projects each costing $20/month on Vercel. With Coolify on a $5 server, you host all 5 for that $5 total. You push code and it deploys automatically, just like Vercel — but it's yours.
Where this fits in your project
This is your hosting layer — where your app lives and runs on the internet.
When to use this
When you want your own Vercel/Netlify on a $5/month server. Full deploy platform with a nice UI, SSL, and Docker support.
The situation
You want to self-host to save money or keep full control, but you still want push-to-deploy convenience.
Good for
- + Side projects you want to host cheaply
- + Apps that outgrow free tiers
- + Full control over infrastructure
Not ideal for
- - When Vercel's free tier is enough
- - When you don't want to manage a server at all
Getting started
Get a VPS ($5/mo from Hetzner or DigitalOcean), run the Coolify install script, push your first app.