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Solutions · Self-hosted PaaS

A VPS for Coolify

Coolify is the open-source Heroku you run yourself: push a repository, get a deployed app with a domain and a certificate. Its own minimum is 2 cores, 2 GB and 10 GB of disk — for Coolify. The apps and databases you deploy on top are what size the machine. BD-8 at $12.90 gives Coolify and a handful of apps room; C2-4-80 at $36.90 arrives with Coolify installed.

Deploy BD-8Deploy C2-4-80 with Coolify installed

What it needs

Software from the docs, sizes labelled by source

The software and the security posture come from the project's own documentation. Where the project publishes no hardware figure, the sizes say whose they are.

From coolify.io/docs

  • Minimum: 2 CPU cores, 2 GB RAM, 10 GB free disk, amd64 or arm64. Debian and Ubuntu LTS are the mainstream choice.
  • Install as root: curl -fsSL https://cdn.coollabs.io/coolify/install.sh | bash. It installs Docker itself.
  • Then open http://your-ip:8000 and create the admin account immediately — whoever registers first owns the instance.
  • Back up /data/coolify/source/.env: it holds the encryption keys. Ports: 8000 dashboard, 6001 realtime, 6002 terminal, 80/443 for your apps.

Sizes (Coolify's minimum, then what apps add)

Sizing by workload
WorkloadvCPURAM
Coolify alone (official minimum)The dashboard, its database and proxy. Nothing deployed yet.22 GB
Coolify + two or three small apps and a PostgresEach Node/Python app is 200–500 MB; a database wants a gigabyte.48 GB
A team's staging and production appsBuilds run on the same box: CPU and RAM spikes while compiling.824 GB

The plans that fit

4 machines, priced live

Cheapest fitting machine first. Prices are today's, per month, read from the catalogue.

  • BD-8$12.90/mo

    4 vCPU · 8 GB · 100 GB disk · 32 TB

    Cheapest with real room for apps. 4 vCPU, 8 GB, 100 GB and 32 TB of transfer: Coolify plus several apps and a database. Its supplier does not run start-up scripts, so the install is one pasted line.

    Deploy
  • C2-4-80$36.90/mo

    2 vCPU · 4 GB · 80 GB disk · 3 TB

    Arrives with Coolify installed. Coolify's minimum doubled in RAM, in over thirty cities, dashboard waiting on port 8000.

    Deploy installed
  • C4-8-160$72.90/mo

    4 vCPU · 8 GB · 160 GB disk · 4 TB

    Arrives installed, with room. 4 vCPU / 8 GB and 160 GB of disk: builds, databases and images add up on disk faster than you expect.

    Deploy installed
  • BD-24$31.90/mo

    8 vCPU · 24 GB · 300 GB disk · 32 TB

    8 vCPU / 24 GB for a team. Staging and production side by side, with builds that do not starve the running apps.

    Deploy

“Deploy installed” opens the configurator with our Coolify start-up script already in the start-up box, in full, before you buy. It runs once, as root, while the server is built, and only on suppliers whose platform runs start-up scripts; on the other rows the install is the same commands, pasted by you.

The install

Three steps, from Coolify's docs

With the preset, step 1 is done when the server arrives. Do step 2 the minute you get the IP.

  1. Install. curl -fsSL https://cdn.coollabs.io/coolify/install.sh | bash Docker, the proxy and Coolify itself; a few minutes.
  2. Create the admin now. Open http://your-ip:8000 and register. Coolify's docs are blunt about it: the first person to register is the instance admin.
  3. Put a domain on the dashboard, then close 8000. Settings → instance domain gives it HTTPS; afterwards ufw delete allow 8000/tcp. Back up /data/coolify/source/.env.

Honestly

What we would actually buy

Coolify's minimum is for Coolify. Buy for the apps.

For Coolify and a few apps

BD-8 · $12.90/mo

4 vCPU, 8 GB and 100 GB at $12.90: Coolify, a Postgres, a Redis and three or four small apps, with disk left for images and backups. It costs less than the 4 GB machines on this page; the only thing it lacks is our preset, so the install is one line you paste. C2-4-80 at $36.90 arrives with Coolify installed if that line is the difference.

Deploy BD-8C2-4-80 with Coolify installed

Questions

What people ask before they buy one.

What are Coolify's minimum requirements?
From its installation docs: 2 CPU cores, 2 GB of RAM and 10 GB of free disk, on amd64 or arm64, with Debian, Ubuntu LTS and several other distributions supported. That is the platform alone. Every application, database and build you add runs on the same machine, so size for those: an 8 GB machine is where Coolify stops being cramped.
Is the preset safe if the dashboard is public on port 8000?
It is how Coolify installs everywhere: the dashboard must be reachable once so that you can create the admin account, and Coolify's docs tell you to do it immediately for exactly this reason. The preset opens 8000 and leaves /root/COOLIFY-NEXT-STEPS.txt telling you to register first thing, give the dashboard a domain (HTTPS), and then close 8000 with one ufw command. Do that within minutes of delivery, not days.
Which ports does Coolify need?
22 for SSH, 8000 for the dashboard until it has a domain, 6001 and 6002 for its realtime and terminal features, and 80/443 for the proxy in front of the apps you deploy. The preset opens exactly those.
Can Coolify manage other servers from this one?
Yes. Coolify runs on one machine and can deploy to others over SSH, which is the usual shape for a team: a small Coolify box and bigger workers. Any plan here can be either; the workers are sized by their apps.
What must I back up?
/data/coolify/source/.env above everything: it contains the keys that encrypt every secret Coolify stores, and a restore without it is a reinstall. Then the databases you deploy, which Coolify can back up on a schedule to S3-compatible storage.
Coolify or Dokploy?
Both are self-hosted PaaS on Docker with a web dashboard, Git deployments and automatic HTTPS. Coolify is older and broader (more services, multi-server, a bigger community); Dokploy is lighter and closer to Docker Compose and Swarm. Both install with one line and run on the same machines; we have a page for each.

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