tool / interactive · pick your stack

Stack calculator

Pick your hosting, database, auth, email, analytics, payments, and CMS. See the real monthly bill at hobby (free where possible), side-project (~5k MAU), or scale (~50k MAU). Prices verified May 2026 against vendor pages. Share your stack via the URL.

Updated May 2026

Hosting

Where the app lives. Pick one.$20/mo

Database

Where the data lives. Pick one.$25/mo

Auth

User authentication. Pick one.free

Transactional email

Receipts, password resets, alerts. Pick one or none.$20/mo

Marketing email

Newsletters, campaigns, drips. Pick one or none.$49/mo

Analytics

Pageviews, events, behavior. Pick one or none.$19/mo

Payments

Charge cards. Pick one or none.free

CMS

Content management. Pick one or none.free

Domain

Where you live on the web.$1/mo
Monthly total at side project scalepaying customers · ~5k MAU · always-on
$134/mo
method / how this works

How the math works

Three traffic scales, three price points per option. Hobby targets a weekend-project budget (free where possible, $5-10 VPS otherwise). Side-project assumes paying customers around 5k monthly active users — where free tiers usually end and you pay for the cheapest credible paid tier. Scale targets ~50k MAU production workloads.

Payment processors (Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Paddle, Polar) show as $0/mo because their fees are per-transaction, not subscription — see stripe-alternatives for the per-sale math that includes tax-compliance overhead.

Every price traces back to a public pricing page verified within the current month. When vendors change pricing, this calculator updates with the next commit. See methodology for the full pricing approach.