Railway vs AWS for Solo Developers

Quick Comparison

Railway Overview

Railway makes backend deployment feel like it should have always been this easy. Connect a Git repo, Railway detects your framework, and your app is running. Add Postgres, Redis, or any other service from the dashboard. Environment variables are shared between services automatically. The visual canvas shows how your services connect. Logs stream in real time.

I use Railway when I want a backend running without spending time on infrastructure. The whole process from repo to production takes less than 10 minutes. The usage-based pricing means I'm not paying for idle resources during development. And the deploy experience is consistent whether I'm running Node, Python, Go, or a custom Dockerfile.

Railway's limitations show at scale. Resource limits, limited region selection, and less granular control over networking and security compared to raw infrastructure. For solo developer projects, these rarely matter.

AWS Overview

AWS is the dominant cloud platform with over 200 services covering every conceivable infrastructure need. EC2 for compute, RDS for managed databases, S3 for storage, Lambda for serverless, ECS/EKS for containers, SQS for queues, CloudFront for CDN. If you can imagine the infrastructure, AWS has a service for it.

I'll be direct. AWS is not designed for solo developers. It's designed for teams of cloud engineers managing enterprise workloads. The console is overwhelming, the documentation is encyclopedic, and the pricing model requires a calculator to understand. I've personally spent more time debugging IAM permissions than actually building features on projects where I used AWS.

The 12-month free tier is generous and gives you a taste of the platform without cost. But once it expires, billing surprises are common. A misconfigured NAT gateway, a forgotten EC2 instance, an unexpectedly large S3 bill. These are real risks for solo developers who don't monitor their AWS spending daily.

Key Differences

Complexity. This is the fundamental divide. Deploying a backend with Postgres on Railway takes 10 minutes and requires no infrastructure knowledge. The equivalent on AWS involves EC2 or ECS for compute, RDS for the database, VPC for networking, security groups for firewall rules, IAM for permissions, and Route 53 for DNS. That's 6+ services to configure for a basic backend.

Time to production. Railway gets you from zero to deployed in minutes. AWS gets you from zero to deployed in hours or days, depending on your familiarity with the platform. For solo developers shipping products, this time difference is significant.

Control and flexibility. AWS gives you granular control over every aspect of your infrastructure. Network topology, instance types, auto-scaling rules, IAM policies, custom VPCs. Railway abstracts all of this away. If you need specific infrastructure configurations, AWS provides them. If you don't, Railway saves you from having to think about them.

Pricing predictability. Railway's usage-based pricing is straightforward. You can estimate your monthly bill by looking at your resource consumption in the dashboard. AWS pricing involves per-service rates that vary by region, request count, data transfer direction, instance type, and billing mode (on-demand vs reserved vs spot). Solo developers regularly get caught by unexpected AWS charges.

Ecosystem breadth. AWS has services for machine learning, IoT, media transcoding, game server hosting, satellite communication, and hundreds of other specialized use cases. Railway handles web services, databases, and background workers. If your project needs something exotic, AWS probably has a managed service for it. Railway doesn't compete in these niches.

Vendor lock-in. Railway has minimal lock-in. Your app is a Docker container or a standard runtime app. Move to any other platform easily. AWS services like DynamoDB, SQS, Lambda, and Step Functions create deep lock-in. Once your architecture relies on AWS-specific services, migrating is a substantial project.

When to Choose Railway

• You want a backend running in minutes, not hours
• Your project is a standard web app with a database and optional background workers
• Predictable, straightforward pricing matters to you
• You'd rather build features than configure infrastructure
• You're a solo developer without a dedicated DevOps person

When to Choose AWS

• Your project needs specific services that only AWS provides (SageMaker, SQS, DynamoDB)
• You're building for enterprise clients who require AWS compliance certifications
• You want to invest in cloud infrastructure skills for your career
• Your application has complex scaling requirements with specific instance types
• You've outgrown managed platforms and need granular infrastructure control

The Verdict

For solo developers building web applications, Railway is the better choice. The deploy experience is faster, the pricing is simpler, and you avoid the operational overhead of managing AWS infrastructure. The time you save not configuring VPCs and IAM policies is time you can spend building your product.

AWS makes sense when you have genuinely complex infrastructure needs or when you're building for clients who require it. Enterprise compliance, specialized AI/ML services, or multi-region architectures with specific failover requirements. These are real use cases, but they're not typical solo developer problems.

My honest advice for solo developers. Start with Railway (or Render, or Fly.io). Ship your product. Grow your user base. If you eventually hit the limits of managed platforms, that's a good problem to have, and you can migrate to AWS with actual revenue to justify the complexity. Don't start on AWS because it seems "more professional." Start where you can ship the fastest.