Neon vs Turso: which free plan?
Turso has fewer strings attached on its free plan (score 92 vs 87). Neon can still be the better choice for the cases below.
Both checked against their official pricing pages on 1 Nov 2026.
| Type | Serverless Postgres | Edge SQLite |
|---|---|---|
| Free-tier score | 87 / 100 | 92 / 100 |
| Card to sign up | Not required | Not required |
| Free plan ends | Never | Never |
| Sleeps when idle | Compute scales to zero after 5 minutes idle (cold start on next query) | No |
| Commercial use | Allowed | Allowed |
| Own domain on free | Not stated | Not stated |
| Free subdomain | None | None |
| Free limits |
|
|
| The catch | Only 1 GB of storage per project. | Only one day of point-in-time restore on the free plan. |
| Paid from | Usage-based | $4.99/mo (Developer) |
| Source | Official pricing for Neon (opens in a new tab) | Official pricing for Turso (opens in a new tab) |
Which one should you pick?
Pick Neon if…
- your project is: serverless Postgres with branches
Pick Turso if…
- your app must not sleep when idle
- your project is: low-latency SQL per user or tenant
Questions
Which is better for free, Neon or Turso?
Turso has fewer strings attached on its free plan (score 92 vs 87). Neon can still be the better choice for the cases below.
Does Neon or Turso need a credit card?
Neon: no. Turso: no.
What is the catch with Neon and Turso?
Neon: Only 1 GB of storage per project. Turso: Only one day of point-in-time restore on the free plan.