# Side project hosting

Source: https://www.fortrabbit.com/use-cases/side-project-hosting
Created: 2026-07-20
Reviewed: 2026-07-27

> Hosting for the Saturday idea that should be on a real URL by Sunday — a one-week free trial, billing by the day after that, and nothing left behind if it flops.


**A hobby project should cost hobby money.**

An idea on a Saturday that should be on a real URL by Sunday evening. It might become something. It probably won't. Both outcomes are fine, and the hosting shouldn't punish either.

## From repo to URL in an evening

What a hack needs on day one is small: PHP, a database, and an address. Each new app starts as a free trial — seven days, no credit card — and answers on a test domain with TLS already in place, so there is no domain to buy and no certificate to wire up before anyone can look at it.

Connect the GitHub repo and push; the deploy service runs Composer and the app is live. Software templates pre-configure the build settings per framework, so the first push works without tuning anything first.

## Kill it or grow it

Plenty of these go nowhere, and the platform is built for that. A trial app with no payment method deletes itself when the week ends, and a paid app stops billing the day it's deleted — nothing survives except the Git repo. No subscription quietly running in the background, no server to remember to cancel.

The few that grow scale a component at a time, on the same host, without a migration. That asymmetry is the point: the downside is cheap and the upside doesn't require moving.

## Why fortrabbit?

Because this is where fortrabbit came from. Hosting ran for years as a side gig next to agency work, on servers we bought ourselves, long before it was a company — nobody here needs convincing that most weekend ideas die and the odd one changes everything. Push to deploy on a free trial, share the link on Sunday, and delete it on Monday for the price of a weekend. When it doesn't die, it stays where it is and grows a component at a time.

## FAQ

### How long does the first deploy take?

**Minutes** — Create an app in the dashboard, connect the repo through the fortrabbit GitHub app, push. The deploy service runs Composer and the app answers on its test domain over HTTPS. Software templates pre-configure the build settings, so nothing has to be tuned before that first push works.

### What does a side project cost?

**Cents per day** — Only PHP, storage, and traffic are required components; MySQL gets booked when the project needs it. Everything starts on the smallest plan, a day costs 1/30th of the monthly price, and billing is postpaid — see [pricing](/pricing) for the numbers.

### What happens when the project is abandoned?

**Nothing** — A trial app without a payment method deletes itself when the week ends — no forgotten subscription billing away in the background. With a payment method attached, deleting the app stops the billing that same day. Either way the experiment leaves nothing behind except the Git repo.

### Is a custom domain needed on day one?

**No** — Every environment comes with a test domain like `en-34fdsa.frbit.app`, TLS certificate pre-installed, always served over HTTPS. That's enough to share a link, collect a first reaction, and decide whether the idea deserves a real domain later.

### What if the hack actually takes off?

**Scale a component** — Components scale individually, so a project that gets attention usually needs a bigger PHP plan and nothing else. Plan changes take immediate effect and are prorated by the day — no migration, no re-platforming, the same app grows.

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- [Free trial](/benefits/try-free)
- [Test domain](/features/test-domain)
- [Agent ready](/workflows/agentic-engineering)