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PlanetScale for Startups

Focus on growing your company, not on managing database infrastructure. PlanetScale delivers fast, reliable database clusters that stay online — whether you're launching a brand new application or starting to scale.

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Why PlanetScale for startups?

Fast and reliable from day one

Affordable and transparent pricing

  • Clusters start at less than $40 per month
  • No hidden costs or surprise bills
  • Pay-as-you-go or annual commitment discounts

Scale as you grow

  • Easily scale up and down as your needs change
  • No downtime or complex migrations
  • From startup to enterprise without switching providers

Focus on your product

  • Built-in tools for better database operations and monitoring
  • Automated backups and point-in-time recovery
  • First-class support from database experts

PlanetScale didn't just provide a database; they provided a partnership. Costs dropped from $900/mo to $90/mo (90% reduction!) and QPS jumped from 20 to 1000 (50x improvement!).

— Dhravya Shah @Supermemory

The performance and uptime with PlanetScale has honestly been sublime. We have never had to worry about that. It's been incredibly reliable from day 1 and we cannot recommend it more.

— Steven Tey @Dub


Choose your database

PlanetScale supports both Postgres and Vitess (MySQL-compatible), giving you flexibility for your stack.

Postgres

Fully managed Postgres built for high availability, performance, and reliability. With sharded Postgres via Neki on the horizon, you can scale without limits.

Perfect for:

  • Modern applications on PostgreSQL
  • Teams that want a reliable database for their customers
  • Applications that are preparing for high growth

Key features:

  • Advanced query insights for performance optimizations
  • Automated backups and point-in-time recovery
  • Automatic failovers with our custom Kubernetes operator

Learn about Postgres

Vitess

MySQL at hyperscale. Built to handle petabytes of data and millions of QPS, Vitess is perfect for startups that anticipate massive growth. PlanetScale Vitess powers tier 0 workloads at Cursor, Block, Intercom, and more.

Perfect for:

  • Applications requiring MySQL compatibility
  • Startups planning for horizontal sharding on MySQL
  • Teams migrating from existing MySQL/MariaDB providers

Key features:

  • Horizontal sharding for unlimited scale
  • MySQL wire protocol compatibility
  • Online schema changes with zero downtime

Learn about Vitess


Migration assistance and credits

Already have a database elsewhere? We offer migration assistance packages to help you move to PlanetScale with zero downtime.

Our team has helped hundreds of companies migrate from:

Migration credits available: We can work with you to provide credits to help offset migration costs and get you started on PlanetScale. Contact us about migration options.


Simple, transparent pricing

Our pricing is straightforward and resource-based. High-availability clusters start at less than $40 per month, and you only pay for what you use.

What's included

  • High availability by default: 1 primary + 2 replicas across 3 availability zones
  • Automated backups: Point-in-time recovery for Postgres
  • Branching: Create isolated environments for testing
  • Monitoring: Built-in query insights and performance metrics
  • Support: Access to our team of database experts

Explore pricing options

Flexible billing

  • Pay-as-you-go: No long-term contracts required
  • Annual commitments: Discounts starting at 10% for annual prepayment
  • Consumption commitments: Additional discounts available for committing to annual resources
  • No surprise charges: Transparent, predictable pricing
  • Additional purchase options: Available for purchase in the AWS Marketplace and Google Cloud Marketplace

Trusted by growing startups

PlanetScale powers databases for startups and scale-ups across industries. Our customers include fast-growing companies who trust us with their most critical infrastructure, so you can feel confident that you're in good hands.

Cursor — AI-powered code editor doing millions of queries per second
Whop — Digital commerce platform scaling rapidly
Kick — Live streaming platform handling massive traffic

Our technology also powers Tier 0 databases at Block (Cash App), Slack, Etsy, and hundreds of other companies at scale.

Read our case studies


Get started today

Join the startups building on PlanetScale. Sign up today or reach out to discuss migration assistance and credits.

Ready to get started?