Why we priced SnapDeploy at $1/day instead of $5/month — and where I'm still uncertain

Hey everyone — Somdip here, founder of SnapDeploy.
We're launching here on June 23.

Quick context: SnapDeploy is a PaaS where you deploy Docker apps for $1 per 24 hours,

with no subscription.
Every other PaaS I looked at — Heroku, Railway, Render, Fly — charges a $5–7/month minimum just to keep your container running.

The pricing decision that surprised me:

I expected most founders to want subscriptions. They don't. Every indie dev I talked to said the same thing: "I have 6 side projects, I want 5 of them off most of the time, and to spin them up on demand." Heroku's free tier going away in 2022 left a hole that nobody filled with the right shape.

So we went with:

- $0 — Deploy free, sleeps when idle

- $1 — Stays on for 24 hours

- $12 — Always-on monthly

Where I'm still uncertain (and would love thoughts):

1. Is "$1 per 24h" too low to signal quality? A few people have said it sounds too cheap to be production-grade.

2. Should I show USD or INR pricing first to a US visitor? We support both.

3. The 24-hour timer starts at deploy, not at first request. Some users have asked for "24h of actual usage" — but that's much harder to bill cleanly. Worth the complexity?

If you've thought about pricing for dev infra or indie tools — would genuinely appreciate any pushback before launch day.

(Demo, if useful: snapdeploy.dev)