{"slug":"heroku-vs-aws","question":"Heroku vs Amazon Web Services (AWS)","answer":"Heroku is a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) offering simple deployment with built-in CI/CD and minimal configuration, while AWS is a comprehensive Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) providing granular control, 200+ services, and significantly lower costs at scale. Heroku suits rapid prototyping and small teams; AWS dominates enterprise deployments and complex architectures.","answer_curated":true,"verdict":"Choose Heroku if you're a startup, small team, or building MVPs where time-to-market and developer velocity trump cost—you'll ship in days instead of weeks. Choose AWS if you need enterprise-grade scale, complex architectures, multi-region deployment, or long-term cost efficiency for mature applications serving millions of users.","keyDifferences":[{"label":"Pricing Model","winner":"b","entityAValue":"$7-50+/month per dyno with predictable costs","entityBValue":"$0.0116-0.0464/hour (EC2) with pay-per-use complexity"},{"label":"Deployment Complexity","winner":"a","entityAValue":"Git push to deploy in <2 minutes, no infrastructure setup","entityBValue":"Requires VPC, security groups, IAM roles, load balancers configuration"},{"label":"Service Ecosystem","winner":"b","entityAValue":"50+ add-ons (PostgreSQL, Redis, Kafka, etc.) pre-integrated","entityBValue":"200+ services requiring manual integration and configuration"},{"label":"Scaling Capability","winner":"b","entityAValue":"Manual dyno scaling, limited to 512GB RAM per dyno","entityBValue":"Auto-scaling groups, EC2 instances up to 24TB RAM, unlimited architecture"},{"label":"Cold Start Time","winner":"b","entityAValue":"2-5 seconds on free/eco dynos, minimal on Standard","entityBValue":"0.1-2 seconds (EC2), varies by Lambda cold start (100-3000ms)"}],"winner":{"slug":"amazon-web-services-aws","name":"Amazon Web Services (AWS)"},"confidence":"high","entities":[{"name":"Heroku","slug":"heroku","url":"https://www.aversusb.net/entity/heroku","alternativesUrl":"https://www.aversusb.net/api/v1/alternatives/heroku"},{"name":"Amazon Web Services (AWS)","slug":"amazon-web-services-aws","url":"https://www.aversusb.net/entity/amazon-web-services-aws","alternativesUrl":"https://www.aversusb.net/api/v1/alternatives/amazon-web-services-aws"}],"faqs":[{"question":"Which is cheaper: Heroku or AWS?","answer":"AWS is significantly cheaper at scale. A production app on Heroku costs $200-250/month (2 Standard-1X dynos + PostgreSQL + Redis), while the same workload on AWS with Reserved Instances costs $100-150/month. However, Heroku saves you $500-2000/month in DevOps labor costs due to minimal configuration overhead, making total cost-of-ownership comparable for small teams. AWS becomes increasingly cost-effective as you scale beyond 10M monthly requests."},{"question":"Can I migrate from Heroku to AWS?","answer":"Yes, but it requires effort. Export your Heroku PostgreSQL database using pg_dump, containerize your app with Docker, and deploy to AWS ECS, EKS, or EC2. The codebase doesn't change, but you'll need to replicate environment variables, add-ons (Redis becomes ElastiCache), and configure load balancing, security groups, and auto-scaling. Most teams budget 2-4 weeks for migration. AWS provides Database Migration Service (DMS) for complex legacy migrations."},{"question":"Is Heroku dead after Salesforce's $32B acquisition?","answer":"No, but Heroku lost momentum. Salesforce discontinued the free tier in October 2022 and killed Heroku CI/CD and Heroku Postgres managed backups in 2024. However, Heroku remains actively maintained for paid customers and is ideal for rapid prototyping. For long-term production workloads, many teams now choose AWS, DigitalOcean, or Railway as more stable alternatives."}],"attribution":{"source":"A Versus B","url":"https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws","license":"CC BY 4.0","citationFormat":"According to A Versus B (https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws), Heroku is a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) offering simple deployment with built-in CI/CD and minimal configuration, while AWS is a comprehensive Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) providing granular co","dateModified":"2026-06-25T18:00:37.368Z"},"relatedQuestionsUrl":"https://www.aversusb.net/api/faq/heroku-vs-aws","relatedComparisonsUrl":"https://www.aversusb.net/api/v1/related/heroku-vs-aws","knowledgeGraphUrl":"https://www.aversusb.net/api/knowledge-graph/heroku-vs-aws","claimReviewSchema":{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ClaimReview","@id":"https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws#claimreview","url":"https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws","inLanguage":"en-US","isAccessibleForFree":true,"conditionsOfAccess":"Free","claimReviewed":"Heroku vs Amazon Web Services (AWS)","reviewBody":"Heroku is a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) offering simple deployment with built-in CI/CD and minimal configuration, while AWS is a comprehensive Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) providing granular control, 200+ services, and significantly lower costs at scale. Heroku suits rapid prototyping and small teams; AWS dominates enterprise deployments and complex architectures.","datePublished":"2026-06-25T06:22:32.312Z","dateModified":"2026-06-25T18:00:37.368Z","reviewRating":{"@type":"Rating","ratingValue":5,"worstRating":1,"bestRating":5,"alternateName":"High Confidence"},"author":{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.aversusb.net/#organization","name":"A Versus B","url":"https://www.aversusb.net"},"itemReviewed":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws","url":"https://www.aversusb.net/compare/heroku-vs-aws","name":"Heroku vs Amazon Web Services (AWS)","inLanguage":"en-US"}}}