Is Coolify or Strapi better?

Neither clearly leads. Coolify starts at Free and Strapi at $35/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, Coolify or Strapi?

Coolify has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Coolify and $35/month for Strapi.

Does Coolify or Strapi run on more platforms?

Coolify runs on Web, Linux, Docker, Self-hosted. Strapi runs on Node.js, Cloud, Self-hosted, Docker.

Can I use Coolify for free?

Yes. Coolify has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Strapi starts at $35/month.

What is Coolify best used for?

Coolify is most often used for replacing a managed platform bill with a single hetzner or digitalocean instance running a dozen small applications, an agency hosting many low-traffic client sites on shared servers with certificates handled automatically, self-hosting analytics, databases and internal tools from the one-click catalogue without writing compose files, deploying inside a country or jurisdiction where no managed platform operates a region. Of those, replacing a managed platform bill with a single hetzner or digitalocean instance running a dozen small applications and an agency hosting many low-traffic client sites on shared servers with certificates handled automatically are not what Strapi is typically brought in for.

What can Coolify do that Strapi cannot?

Coolify covers Git push deployments, One-click services, Automatic certificates, Managed databases. Strapi covers REST API, GraphQL API, Content management, PostgreSQL.

Cloud · head to head

Coolify vs Strapi

Coolify

Cloud

Open source self-hosted platform that deploys applications and databases to servers you already own

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

Strapi

APIs

Headless CMS with REST and GraphQL APIs

From: $35/month
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Only Coolify has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
Each has a real cost: Coolify commit history since June 2026 shows one maintainer at 73 commits and a second at 15 with nobody else above one, and the same two people also ship four other coolLabs products, so the project depends on a very small number of individuals.; Strapi cloud pricing is per project, not per account, so a second project doubles the bill
They diverge on capability: Coolify covers Git push deployments, Strapi covers REST API.
Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Coolify and Strapi actually diverge.

Attributes where Coolify and Strapi differ
Attribute	Coolify	Strapi
Starting price	Free	$35/month
Pricing model	Open source, no licence fee	subscription
Free tier	Yes	No
Platforms	Web, Linux, Docker, Self-hosted	Node.js, Cloud, Self-hosted, Docker
Category	Cloud	APIs
Founded	Unknown	2015

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Coolify

Git push deployments
One-click services
Automatic certificates
Managed databases
Docker Compose support
Notifications

Only in Strapi

REST API
GraphQL API
Content management
PostgreSQL
MySQL
MongoDB
AWS
Webhooks

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Coolify

Replacing a managed platform bill with a single Hetzner or DigitalOcean instance running a dozen small applicationsnot Strapi
An agency hosting many low-traffic client sites on shared servers with certificates handled automaticallynot Strapi
Self-hosting analytics, databases and internal tools from the one-click catalogue without writing Compose filesnot Strapi
Deploying inside a country or jurisdiction where no managed platform operates a regionnot Strapi

Strapi

Running a self hosted headless CMS with a REST or GraphQL APInot Coolify
Giving editors a content admin panel over a custom content modelnot Coolify

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Coolify

Commit history since June 2026 shows one maintainer at 73 commits and a second at 15 with nobody else above one, and the same two people also ship four other coolLabs products, so the project depends on a very small number of individuals.
Multi-server support is documented as experimental, load balancer configuration is manual, every server must share the same CPU architecture, and moving images between hosts requires you to run your own Docker registry.
In self-hosted mode the Coolify machine holds every SSH key and secret with no documented high availability, so the dashboard host is a single point of failure that the paid Cloud tier fixes and self-hosting does not.
Scheduled S3 backups cover PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB and MongoDB only, so application persistent volumes are your responsibility and a restore is untested unless you test it yourself.
Release cadence is fast enough that six patch versions shipped inside ten days in August 2026 against several hundred open issues, and because instances can update themselves a regression can reach a production host before you have read the changelog.

Strapi

Cloud pricing is per project, not per account, so a second project doubles the bill
Starter at $35 a month allows 100,000 API requests, and overage is $1.50 per 25,000
Extra bandwidth is $30 per 100 GB and extra asset storage $0.60 per GB
Backups start at the Pro plan, weekly, and only become daily at Business
An uptime SLA is Business only, at $450 a month per project
Additional environments cost $60 a month on Pro and $300 a month on Business

Pricing, plan by plan

Coolify

Free

Self-hostedFree
- Apache-2.0, no features held back
- Unlimited servers, applications and users
- You run, update and back up the dashboard yourself
Cloud$5/month
- Connects 2 servers, then 3 US dollars a month per extra server
- Managed and updated Coolify dashboard with high availability
- Managed backups of the Coolify instance itself

Strapi

$35/month

Starter$35/month
- 100k API requests
- 50 GB asset storage
- 50 GB asset bandwidth
Pro$90/month
- 1M API requests
- 250 GB asset storage
- 500 GB asset bandwidth
Business$450/month
- 10M API requests
- 1000 GB asset storage
- 1000 GB asset bandwidth

Which should you pick?

Choose Coolify if

You need git push deployments.
You want to start without paying.
You work on Web, Linux, Docker, Self-hosted.
You also want one-click services.

Coolify review

Choose Strapi if

You need rest api.
You work on Node.js, Cloud, Self-hosted, Docker.
You also want graphql api.

Strapi review

Questions people ask

Is Coolify or Strapi better?: Neither clearly leads. Coolify starts at Free and Strapi at $35/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Coolify or Strapi?: Coolify has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Coolify and $35/month for Strapi.
Does Coolify or Strapi run on more platforms?: Coolify runs on Web, Linux, Docker, Self-hosted. Strapi runs on Node.js, Cloud, Self-hosted, Docker.
Can I use Coolify for free?: Yes. Coolify has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Strapi starts at $35/month.
What is Coolify best used for?: Coolify is most often used for replacing a managed platform bill with a single hetzner or digitalocean instance running a dozen small applications, an agency hosting many low-traffic client sites on shared servers with certificates handled automatically, self-hosting analytics, databases and internal tools from the one-click catalogue without writing compose files, deploying inside a country or jurisdiction where no managed platform operates a region. Of those, replacing a managed platform bill with a single hetzner or digitalocean instance running a dozen small applications and an agency hosting many low-traffic client sites on shared servers with certificates handled automatically are not what Strapi is typically brought in for.
What can Coolify do that Strapi cannot?: Coolify covers Git push deployments, One-click services, Automatic certificates, Managed databases. Strapi covers REST API, GraphQL API, Content management, PostgreSQL.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Coolify: Is anything held back for the paid tier?

No. Coolify Cloud hosts, updates and backs up the dashboard and gives it high availability. Every feature that touches your applications is in the Apache-2.0 build you can run yourself.

Strapi: How much do API request overages cost?

Additional API requests beyond the plan limit cost $1.50 per 25000 requests. Extra asset storage costs $0.60 per GB, and additional bandwidth costs $30 per 100 GB.

Source

Coolify: What does Coolify Cloud cost?

Five US dollars a month connects two servers, and each additional server is three dollars a month, with 20 per cent off for annual billing. You still supply and pay for the servers themselves.

Strapi: Is yearly billing available?

Yes, yearly billing saves up to 17% compared to monthly billing on Strapi Cloud plans.

Source

Coolify: Does it back up my application data?

It backs up PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB and MongoDB to S3 on a schedule. Application persistent volumes are not covered, so anything stored outside a managed database needs your own backup plan.

Strapi: What is included with the Pro plan?

The Pro plan costs $90 per month per project and includes 1M API requests, 250 GB asset storage, 500 GB bandwidth, multi-environment support, weekly backups, and manual backups.

Source

Coolify: Can I run it across several servers?

Yes, but the documentation calls multi-server experimental. Load balancing is not configured for you, all nodes must share a CPU architecture, and you need to run your own Docker registry.

Coolify vs Strapi

Coolify

Strapi

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in Coolify

Only in Strapi

What people use each for

Coolify

Strapi

Where each one falls short

Coolify

Strapi

Pricing, plan by plan

Coolify

Strapi

Which should you pick?

Choose Coolify if

Choose Strapi if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on Coolify

More on Strapi

Keep looking

Other head to heads