🎉 AWS Free Tier Revolution - July 15, 2025
Amazon Web Services has completely revamped its Free Tier program for accounts created from July 15, 2025. The old 12-month model is gone and now we have a system based on credits and two plan types.
Old Model vs. New AWS Free Tier
⚠️ Accounts Created BEFORE July 15, 2025
If your AWS account was created before July 15, 2025, you keep the old (legacy) Free Tier model with the same conditions: 12 months of free access, traditional limits per service, and "Always Free" offers.
Free Account Plan New
Ideal for studies, testing, and small POCs. Eliminates the risk of unexpected charges, but with restricted access.
Paid Account Plan New
For companies and real projects. Full access to all AWS services with automatic billing after credits.
Extra Credits Earn +$100
Complete specific activities in 5 fundamental AWS services and earn $20 for each completed service.
Always Free Maintained
Over 30 services continue with "always free" offers with monthly limits - available in both plans.
✨ Main Benefits of the Changes
- Total Flexibility: With credits, you can test any AWS service (except Marketplace on the free plan)
- No Time Limit per Service: Use the $100 as you wish, there are no specific restrictions per service
- Spending Control: Automatic alerts when 50%, 25% and 10% of credits remain
- Advanced Notifications: Warnings 15, 7 and 2 days before the end of the free period
- Data Recovery: 90 days to reactivate account and migrate to paid plan if necessary
⚠️ Important Points of Attention
- Payment Method Required: Even on the free plan you need to register a credit card
- Free Plan has Restrictions: No access to AWS Marketplace or Savings Plans
- Paid Plan charges automatically: If you forget services running, you'll be charged after exhausting credits
- Cutoff Date: Only accounts created FROM July 15, 2025 have the new model
- Always Free Remains: The +30 services with monthly limits continue working in both plans
🎯 Strategies to Maximize the New Free Tier
- Choose the Right Plan: Free Plan for studies and testing. Paid Plan if you intend to develop something for production or need complete access to services.
- Complete the 5 Activities: Earn up to $100 extra by completing tutorials in EC2, RDS, Lambda, Bedrock and Budgets services. That's $20 for each activity!
- Configure Budgets Immediately: Use AWS Budgets to monitor your credits and receive personalized alerts before exhausting your balance.
- Take Advantage of Flexibility: Unlike the old model, now you can test more expensive services like SageMaker, Bedrock (AI) or QuickSight without specific limitations.
- Combine with Always Free: Use credits for premium services and keep basic infrastructure on "always free" services like Lambda and DynamoDB.
- Plan B for Students: If 6 months aren't enough for your studies, you can create a new account and earn another $100. It's a valid option!
🚀 New possibilities now: Premium Services with Credits
With $200 in potential credits, now you can test services that were previously inaccessible in the Free Tier:
- Amazon Bedrock: Test AI models like Claude and Llama to create intelligent chatbots
- Amazon SageMaker: Experience machine learning with Jupyter notebooks in the cloud
- Amazon QuickSight: Create professional dashboards for data analysis
- AWS Glue: Process and transform large volumes of data
- Amazon Rekognition: Add image and video recognition to your applications
- AWS Step Functions: Orchestrate complex workflows between different services
- Amazon ECS/EKS: Test managed containers and Kubernetes