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VPS Deals: trial credits, task-renewal hosts & limited-time promos
The bottom line: a deal is not free. Trial credits expire, task hosts need renewing, and promo prices have windows. This page lists 6 live entries: 4 trial credits (Vultr, Hetzner, Akamai, DigitalOcean), 1 task-renewal host (only specs verified; renewal rules disputed), and 1 sandbox credit (Simular Box, conflicting terms); plus 1 RackNerd Black Friday historical archive (2025 prices, expired). Every entry states its validity, card requirement, task burden, and data risk; anything the official page does not state is written as “not stated”; no promise is made on the vendor’s behalf.
The Deals section is strictly separated from Free VPS: the free section only lists free tiers, free trials, and students-only offers; trial credits, task renewals, and limited-time promos live here. For standing cheap prices, see Cheap VPS. All three sections share one verification rule: only content checked against vendor official pages — no invite links, no promo-code strings published.
Group 1: Trial credits (4 entries)
Ranked by credit honesty: amount + duration + card requirement + expiry rules. Check the expiry rules before claiming.
| Vendor / offer | Credits (official wording) | Duration / validity | Card? | Task burden / offset | Risk level | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vultr deposit match (up to $100) + $200/$300/$250 free credits Limited-time, no end date stated | First-deposit match up to $100; plus $200 / $300 / $250 free credits | Matched credits expire 12 months after issuance; free-credit duration not stated | Match requires a deposit; free-credit card requirement not stated | No tasks; matched credits offset 50/50 | Medium: limited-time with no end date; free-credit duration not stated | 2026-11-13 · Official campaign page |
| Hetzner €50 new-customer credit (valid in the current billing month only) Current month only | €50 credit, all products | Redeem within 14 days of registration; valid in the redemption month only | Not stated on the promo page | No tasks; get the promo code on the official page | Low: clearest rules; redeeming late in the month loses validity | 2026-11-13 · Official promo page |
| Akamai $100 credit (Managed Kubernetes trial) | US$100 credit, except GPU plans | Within the trial period (day count not stated); unused credits expire automatically | Card required (identity verification, no charges during trial) | No tasks | Medium: trial length in days not stated | 2026-11-13 · Official campaign page |
| DigitalOcean $200 / 60-day trial (disputed) Disputed | $200 credit, 60-day trial (campaign page wording) | 60 days | Card required (valid credit card) | No tasks | High: community says direct signup only gets $5/90 days, conflicting with the campaign page | 2026-11-13 · Official campaign page |
Group 2: Task-renewal hosts (1 entry)
Free hosts kept alive by posting, check-ins, or points. Only 1 entry meets the “specs verified on an official page” bar; the rest are under “Services not in the list, and why” below.
| Vendor / offer | Specs (official wording) | Duration / validity | Card? | Task burden / offset | Risk level | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sanfengyun free cloud server (only specs verified; renewal rules disputed) Renewal rules disputed | 1 core 1 GB 5 Mbps 10 GB SSD, BGP, dedicated IP | Task renewal required (rules disputed) | Not stated on the official page | Disputed: posting renewal +5 days vs 7-day click renewal | High: task host, high data risk | 2026-11-12 · Official page |
Group 3: Sandbox credits (1 entry)
Cloud computers / sandboxes for AI agents, not traditional VPS: no 24/7 always-on promise; idle boxes sleep or get deleted.
| Vendor / offer | Credits (official wording) | Duration / validity | Card? | Task burden / offset | Risk level | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simular Box: $5-credit cloud computer (conflicting terms) Conflicting statements | Cloud Linux desktop; $5 credit + pay-as-you-go from ~$0.10/hour (official blog) | $5 credit once per account; deleted with data if not woken for 14 consecutive days | Not stated on the official page | No tasks; model calls by the box’s own tools consume credits separately | High: homepage says the box is free; email and blog say the beta ended | 2026-11-13 · Official homepage |
Group 4: Limited-time promo archive (1 entry)
Expired promos are not deleted — they are archived here and marked as historical prices, so old prices are not mistaken for current ones. Black Friday 2026 is November 27; as of 2026-11-12 no official RackNerd 2026 list had been seen; near the date, go by the official page for that year.
| Vendor / offer | Price (historical) | Duration / validity | Card? | Task burden / offset | Risk level | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RackNerd Black Friday promo archive (2025 prices, expired) Historical archive | From $10.60/year (2025 historical price) | Expired, not purchasable | — | — | Low: reference only | 2026-11-13 · Standing-price page |
How the labels work
Every deal uses the same labels, to avoid vague wording:
- Status: live / live (no end date stated) / disputed / historical archive / unverified.
- Renewal label: same-rate renewal stated / first-term price only / not stated. Credit-type entries have no “renewal” — only expiry rules.
- Task burden: none / click to renew / daily check-in / must post / points-based / disputed (conflicting accounts stated).
- Data and continuity risk: low (listed cloud vendor) / medium (budget host, back up) / high (task host, unverified terms, or exit signals), with the reason stated.
- Promo-code dependence: no code / get the code on the official page / third-party code (unverified).
Services not in the list, and why
The following claims could not be verified on an official page or have unclear terms, so they are not shown as verified offers. The reasons are given below — not as recommendations.
- Cloudways $25: appears only in the referral program — a referral counts only after the referred person upgrades to a paid account, pays at least 2 invoices, and spends $30; invite-link offers are not shown on their own, so the $25 is not shown separately. (Verified 2026-11-13 on the official referral program page.)
- Abeiyun: the official page could not be opened during re-check (fetch tool error); an earlier index snippet showed “free cloud servers officially stopped”, and the free page showed only shared hosting. Status unclear, possibly ended.
- Rainyun: the official homepage returned only a loading placeholder; no terms were verified; points and task details appear only in third-party sources and conflict. (Checked 2026-11-13.)
- Hax / Woiden: the renewal page returned only a bot-verification placeholder; no terms verified; third parties describe IPv6-only / NAT limits. (Checked 2026-11-13.)
- BandwagonHost promo codes: no currently valid official promo code was verified; third-party code claims contradict each other and most are expired.
- HostEONS promo codes: third-party promo-code information is a mess; no promo code was verified on the official plan pages; only the plan-table list prices are shown — see the Cheap VPS listing.
- GreenCloud, CloudCone, and other rotating promos: promo SKUs rotate fast; no currently valid official price was verified this round, so no specific plan is shown.
Change log
- 2026-11-12: Simular free beta ended (vendor email), moving to $5 credit + pay-as-you-go; the product homepage still says the box itself is free — conflicting statements, see the Simular Box row above.
- Black Friday 2025: RackNerd promo prices (from $10.60/year) expired — see the historical archive row above; Black Friday 2026 is November 27, and as of 2026-11-12 no official 2026 list had been seen.
- 2026-11-13: Deals section launched, 6 live entries + 1 historical archive.
Machine-readable data: data/wool-en.json (7 entries, English text, facts identical to the Chinese data file).