Credits burn fast on hyperscalers
$100k of AWS credit is very soon spent as a "panic" project to migrate to the Hyperscaler before the bills actually start to arrive.
BuyVPS Builder Program
Infrastructure credits for serious builders.
Early-stage SaaS, API and developer-tool teams get infrastructure credits, architecture guidance and predictable production hardware to build on. No long-term lock-in, no contract that punishes you when you grow up.
The honest version of "startup cloud credits".
Hyperscaler credit programs are designed to allow fast growing companies to spend thousands of dollars in infrastructure as their company rapidly expands and then 'burn up' the credits just in time for them to realize that the only way out is to leave a suboptimal architecture behind.
Architecture becomes the trap
By the time your credits have run out your workload will depend on 20 managed services. And that is going to be a rebuild not a migration.
Operations get more complex, not less
As managed services are added to existing workloads, the complexity of your control planes, SLAs and your billing dimensions increases. Few startups date realize that the simplification of workloads that these credit programs promise, rarely materializes.
What this program does instead
And when those credits run out, you can continue to run your same workloads on your same architecture on our VPS plans that you can sign up for and pay for on a month to month basis at the same price that you were locked into with the credits. No lock-in architecture. No huge, complex stack to try and get out of. No dilution of equity for your company.
Three credit tiers across the build journey.
These credits are designed to scale with the team and match the stage of the company. As the company grows and the team becomes more proficient the amount of credit provided will also grow. These credits can be used for VPS's, IP addresses, for taking snapshots and for scaling up additional power when needed. The credits also come with technical support for Architecture review and planning, for VPS sizing, for scaling advice and for full infrastructure planning and design for the team.
- Low-density
- Hard-capped. Low-density. Unsold Headroom. Memory and vCPU are sold per node by node and are hard-capped below physical maximum. Thus, always low-density and unsold headroom on every single node.
- NVMe RAID10
- Local storage, not network attached storage. 122,959 IOPS measured median on D-4.
- KVM isolation
- KVM isolation: Hypervisor-grade. Each VPS has its own kernel, and thus there is no shared kernel surface as found with OpenVZ style containers.
- Published benchmarks
- We actually publish numbers to compare performance between plans and data centers around the world. You can see the numbers from our own internal testing that we use to size out plans (Geekbench, fio, iperf3 and pgbench results for each plan in each region where we have data centers as well as the full raw log files for each test.
This will work for some companies, not for others.
SaaS startups
Multi-tenant platforms (e.g. SaaS companies) with paid customers or paid customers in the pipeline. Production workloads which benefit from fixed per-core latency.
API platforms
API platforms. Backend infrastructure for developer-facing APIs. Pinned cores on Dedicated CPU plans match the deterministic-latency requirement.
Developer tools and CLIs
Teams shipping developer tools with a hosted backend (auth, telemetry, package registries, CI runners) where predictable infrastructure cost matters.
AI inference services
Small to medium size LLM hosts and supporting services (vector stores, large embedding caches) for AI inference services running on Dedicated CPU or High Memory hardware.
Agencies building SaaS products
Agencies building SaaS products. Agencies productising client work as SaaS products. The model fits with the agencies' business model of recurring credit from clients for work. The model also fits with the transition that agencies are going through of selling agency style work as SaaS products.
Not a fit
Short-term experiments, crypto mining, traffic arbitrage, mass-email infrastructure, content piracy or affiliate-spam operations.
Clear criteria, no guesswork.
- Working product or MVP
- You have a working product or even an MVP that real users can use today (it doesn't have to be perfect).
- Public website
- A public facing website for your product, no coming soon pages.
- Registered company
- Any jurisdiction. A sole proprietorship, LLC, BV, GmbH, Ltd. company, it does not matter.
- Technology product
- Note: Even if a service company offers technology products on the side, these would be judged on a case by case basis, since they are not technology products in themselves.
Apply to the Builder Program.
Three-step review, no decks required.
The application process involves a short note (200-300 words approx.) for us about the team, product and workload and we do 3 step review (no decks) and you can apply to the program immediately afterwards. Architecture review and credit sizing is done during the technical call and the credits are approved and active straight away after that.
FAQ
Common questions
What credit amounts are available?
The amount of credit for the startup grants is split into three tiers, Early Builder, MVP Stage and Growth Stage, and is adapted to the team. In a technical review the amount of credit for granted projects is determined by the workload for the different stages of the team.
How long are credits valid for?
Credits are good for the duration stated in the program that the founder signed up for during the approval process. Unused credits expire at the end of that program and you receive notifications prior to that time.
What can credits be used for?
VPS plans (Standard, Dedicated CPU, High Memory) as well as additional IPv4 addresses, backup snapshots and scaling upgrades for existing servers. Credits cannot be redeemed for cash, transferred to a third party or applied to previous invoices.
What happens when credits are used up?
After all of the credits have been used, you will continue to pay for your infrastructure at the price of the plan you were using when you ran out of credits. There is no automatic promotion to a higher price plan after credits are used up, and there will be no renewal price hike. The price of the plan you are currently using will freeze at that rate.
What technical support is included?
Architecture review, VPS sizing, scaling advice and infrastructure planning support from real engineers, including founders. Tickets land with engineers, not a tier-1 layer.
Can my agency or fund partner apply on our behalf?
Many applications are introduced to us by partners. However, we require the founding team to be present on the technical call with our engineers to properly size a VPS for their needs. Your agency or fund partner can apply on your behalf but cannot substitute for the founding team.
Do you take equity in exchange for credits?
No. This is an infrastructure program, not an investor program. No equity, no convertible notes, no warrants and no exclusivity clauses on future infrastructure spend.
How is this different from AWS Activate or Google for Startups?
Hyperscaler credit programs are designed to convert credits into long-term lock-in via managed services. The BuyVPS startups program focuses on plain VPS infrastructure that you can keep using at the same price, without architectural traps.
What is the application review process?
The application process consists of three steps: an online application (approximately 10 minutes) for the founder to fill in information about the startup; a technical review call with the founder (15-30 minutes) to review architecture, do a rough sizing and discuss the stage the company is in; and activation of the awarded credits, which typically happens within five business days after the technical call.
Can we use credits across both Amsterdam and New York?
Yes. Our credits are not tied to a specific region. You can use them all in Amsterdam, or split them between Amsterdam and New York, or move workloads between regions via snapshot without affecting your credit balance.
Ready to deploy
Deploy a measured VPS
From $18.40/mo on a 2-year term. KVM on AMD EPYC, NVMe RAID10, ECC memory. Your price is fixed for the lifetime of the service.