PlanetScale Offering $5 Databases

Use cases and technical details of the $5 tier

• Many argue a single-node database is sufficient for a large share of line‑of‑business and hobby apps; 5‑nines HA is often unnecessary and expensive.
• Others note uptime expectations and potential global audiences make “business‑hours only” availability impractical outside niche cases (e.g. some government sites, specialty retailers).
• For the single-node plan, durability is said to be preserved via replication plus EBS backing; it’s not just “one box and you’re on your own.”
• Local NVMe disks vs EBS is a recurring thread: some are surprised local NVMe isn’t standard; others explain that doing metal + synchronous replication reliably is operationally very hard (node lifecycle, resizing, never terminating incorrectly).
• Questions arise on Postgres specifics (synchronous commit settings, Timescale support in progress) and the fact that this exists only for Postgres, not Vitess/MySQL, due to architectural differences.
• Latency concerns: advice is to place PlanetScale in the same region/city as compute (Render, Fly.io, etc.) to avoid large performance penalties.

Pricing, free-tier history, and “rug pull” risk

• A large portion of the thread centers on mistrust from the prior “free forever” hobby tier being removed and replaced with a ~$40 minimum plan, causing some users to abandon or shut down projects.
• Multiple commenters warn: don’t build anything you care about on this $5 tier if a future price hike would be painful. Others counter that at $5 it’s already gross‑margin positive and compute/storage trends should only improve profitability.
• Some view the $5 offering as a funnel to higher tiers; critics point out that even profitable low tiers can be killed if upgrade rates or support costs disappoint, or if strategy/leadership changes.
• Others argue this plan is fundamentally different from a loss‑making free tier and therefore less likely to disappear.

Free tiers vs paid low-end plans (broader debate)

• One camp says “free forever” should never have been promised; free tiers are effectively marketing/VC burn or subsidies from paying customers and are inherently fragile.
• Another camp calls the original language a bait‑and‑switch: if sustainability is uncertain, don’t say “forever.” The archived pricing page showing “Free forever for hobby use” is repeatedly cited.
• There’s comparison to other providers (Neon, Supabase, etc.) that still run free tiers, plus discussion that “scale to zero” doesn’t eliminate underlying costs; someone must pay.

Founder presence, tone, and reputational impact

• The CEO participates extensively, defending the decision to kill the free tier as necessary for profitability and long‑term survival, and emphasizing that all plans are now gross‑margin positive.
• Some readers appreciate the candid, non‑PR voice and agreement from ex‑employees that layoffs were painful but necessary. Others find several responses thin‑skinned or dismissive, especially statements along the lines of not caring what critics think.
• The “we never said forever” claim followed by being shown archived “free forever” wording, and then acknowledging it, is viewed by some as denial or gaslighting, by others as an honest memory lapse.
• Several commenters say that, regardless of technical quality, this exchange alone makes them hesitant to trust the company with future projects; others remain enthusiastic about the product and welcome a transparent low‑cost option.