Shlink Pricing: Managed vs Self-Hosted
The cheapest managed Shlink starts at about $5/month. Self-hosted, this stack measures 1.5 GiB across 2 services, which fits a $13/month flat plan with room left over.
#the numbers
Managed prices as of June 2026, each linked to its source. The self-hosted row is not an estimate: the RAM figure is what this stack allocates in its compose file, and the plan is the smallest one that holds it.
| Option | Plan | Monthly | What you get |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-hosted on Miget ★ | 2 GiB, 1 vCPU | $13 | the whole stack, flat - no per-user or per-request metering, and the plan holds your other apps too |
| Dub | Business | ~$75 | $75/mo |
| Bitly | Core | ~$10 | $10/mo for just 100 branded links |
| Short.io | Hobby | ~$5 | $5/mo; paid tiers scale with clicks |
Shorteners cap links and clicks aggressively; Shlink is unlimited on your own domain.
#what it costs on other platforms
Same stack, published rates elsewhere - estimates from each platform's own pricing page, not quotes. Per-service platforms are the expensive case here, because every container in this stack is its own paid service.
| Platform | Estimated monthly | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Miget ★ | $13 | flat plan, 2 GiB - databases included, no meters |
| Heroku | ~$75 | no volumes; nothing between 1 GB ($50) and 2.5 GB ($250) dynos - 2 GB containers cost far more than shown |
| DO App Platform | ~$23 | no persistent volumes - stateful containers need managed DBs/Spaces (base $5 Spaces included here) |
| Render | ~$20 | per-service instances (0.5 GB $7, 2 GB $25) - every container is its own paid service |
| Railway | ~$16 | usage-based ($10/GB RAM-mo); vCPU billed separately at $20/vCPU-mo on top |
| Fly.io | ~$10 | cheapest sticker price - but burstable shared CPUs (1/16 core; dedicated vCPUs cost ~2-3×), no compose deploys (one app per container, manual wiring), managed DBs billed extra |
#sizing, if you outgrow the small plan
The $13 plan is the smallest that fits. For production traffic you generally want the next tier up, and dedicated vCPU if the workload is CPU-bound rather than idle-waiting.
| Use case | Plan | Monthly |
|---|---|---|
| Fits the stack | 2 GiB, 1 vCPU shared | $13 |
| Comfortable, room for your own apps | 2 GiB, 2 vCPU shared | $19 |
| Dedicated vCPU (production) | 2 GiB, 1 vCPU dedicated | $22 |
The RoadRunner-based server is happy in 512 MiB. Postgres holds links and visit rows, so size disk to your click volume and retention.
Run Shlink yourself
The compose file is open source and runs locally with docker compose up. One step to deploy it to
Miget on the $13/month plan, databases included.