Free-labeled VMs have different end conditions. Oracle A1’s monthly 1,500 OCPU-hours and 9,000 GB-hours are always free in the home region; one 2-OCPU, 4-GB VM for 730 hours fits. Google e2-micro has an always-free equivalent of one VM’s monthly hours in us-west1, us-central1, or us-east1, but Seoul is excluded.
Azure B1s offers 750 hours monthly for 12 months to eligible US accounts. The demo shows $0 through month 12 only if those account terms apply, then charges the East US $0.0104 hourly rate from month 13. DigitalOcean’s smallest Basic VM has no always-free tier; it costs $0.00595/hour, capped at $4/month.
AWS EC2 depends on account creation date. Eligible micro usage is free for 12 months for accounts created before 2025-07-15; later accounts have new-customer credits for up to six months or until depleted. Without the credit balance, the demo does not draw an AWS $0 line. Disk, IP, and network can add charges even to free VMs, and Oracle has capacity and idle-reclaim conditions. As of 2026-10.
When to use
Check duration, region, and account eligibility before relying on a long-lived free dev VM. Do not treat signup credits as a permanent allowance.