AWS and GCP Free Tier Guide: How to Use Free Cloud Credits Safely

AWS and Google Cloud both provide free usage options for new users, but the rules are different. If you treat "free tier" as unlimited free cloud, you may receive unexpected bills.

This guide compares AWS and GCP free usage and explains how to use them safely.

AWS Free Tier

AWS Free Tier usually includes:

• 12-month free tier for selected services.
• Always-free limited usage for some services.
• Short-term trials for specific products.

Common beginner services:

• EC2 small instances within limits.
• S3 small storage.
• Lambda free requests.
• DynamoDB limited usage.
• CloudWatch with limited logs and metrics.

Common traps:

• EC2 hours add up across instances.
• EBS volumes and snapshots continue billing.
• Data transfer out may cost money.
• NAT Gateway is not free.
• Resources in unused regions are easy to forget.

GCP Free Tier

Google Cloud commonly offers:

• Trial credits for new accounts.
• Always-free usage for selected products.
• Free usage limits on services such as Cloud Functions, Cloud Run, and BigQuery sandbox-style usage.

Common traps:

• Trial credits expire.
• Some resources continue billing after credits are used.
• External IPs and persistent disks may cost money.
• Network egress can generate charges.

AWS vs GCP for Beginners

Item	AWS	GCP
Learning ecosystem	Very large	Strong developer experience
Free tier model	12-month plus always-free	Trial credits plus always-free
Risk of surprise charges	Medium if no budgets	Medium if credits expire
Best for	AWS ecosystem learning	Cloud-native and data tools

Safety Rules for Both Platforms

1. Enable billing alerts immediately.
2. Delete resources after experiments.
3. Check all regions.
4. Avoid managed databases unless needed.
5. Avoid NAT gateways and large egress traffic.
6. Set log retention.
7. Use labels or tags for every test resource.

Suggested Learning Projects

Beginner-friendly projects:

• Static website on object storage and CDN.
• Small API with serverless functions.
• Simple VM with SSH.
• Small database test with strict cleanup.
• Log collection with retention limits.

Avoid as first projects:

• Multi-region Kubernetes.
• Big data clusters.
• High-traffic public download services.
• Always-on GPU machines.

What to Do Before the Trial Ends

• Export billing reports.
• Delete unused resources.
• Snapshot only what you need.
• Confirm whether paid billing will start automatically.
• Decide whether to keep the account.

Conclusion

AWS and GCP free tiers are excellent for learning, but they require discipline. Add budgets, watch regions, and delete resources after testing. Free cloud is safe only when you treat it like a real bill from day one.