A detailed comparison of Heroku and AWS for application hosting, covering deployment workflows, pricing models, scaling approaches, and operational overhead. Heroku offers Git-push simplicity and managed infrastructure as a PaaS, while AWS provides granular control via EC2, ECS Fargate, Lambda, and Elastic Beanstalk. Includes concrete cost breakdowns for a sample Node.js/React app (~$140/month on Heroku vs ~$93-97/month on AWS), scaling configuration examples, migration steps from Heroku to AWS, and guidance on when to use each platform or a hybrid approach.
Table of contents
Heroku vs AWS: things to considerDeployment workflows: Git-push simplicity vs infrastructure configurationCost models and pricing analysisDeployment features comparisonScaling AWS vs Heroku: performance and operational tradeoffsWhen to choose Heroku, when to choose AWS, and when to use bothMigration considerations and common pitfallsChoosing the right platform for your team594 Impressions