{"rid":"storage/discourse-hosted-free-plan","card":{"rid":"storage/discourse-hosted-free-plan","eid":"discourse","topic":"storage","slug":"discourse-hosted-free-plan","provider":"Discourse hosted Free plan","url":"https://www.discourse.org/free","domain":"discourse.org","category":"paas","tier":null,"verdict":"qualifies-with-caveat","vorder":1,"grp":"usable","confidence":"reported","binding":"none","identity_kind":"email","identity_basis":"defaulted","needs_card":null,"needs_phone":null,"needs_id":null,"needs_institution":null,"country":null,"crypto":null,"interfaces":"rest,rclone","egress_metered":0,"per_object_bytes":null,"retention_days":null,"verified_at":"2026-10-21T00:00:00.000Z","verified_basis":"inherited","checked_on":"2026-10-21","stale_on":"2026-11-04","n_evidence":4,"usd_month":null,"usd_per_tb_month":null,"summary":"5 GB storage per free site, with unlimited topics, chat and members","duplicate_of":null,"n_unknown":7},"record":{"topic":"storage","slug":"discourse-hosted-free-plan","provider":"Discourse hosted Free plan","url":"https://www.discourse.org/free","category":"paas","free_tier":{"stated":"5 GB storage per free site, with unlimited topics, chat and members","unit":"GB","metered_on":"stored-bytes","source_url":"https://meta.discourse.org/t/youre-invited-to-try-the-discourse-free-plan-beta/395632","read_on":"2026-10-21","notes":null},"per_object_cap":{"stated":"not stated","source_url":"https://meta.discourse.org/t/youre-invited-to-try-the-discourse-free-plan-beta/395632","notes":"not stated"},"retention":{"stated":"not stated","source_url":"https://meta.discourse.org/t/youre-invited-to-try-the-discourse-free-plan-beta/395632","notes":"not stated"},"egress":{"terms":"Free; uploads served from *.discourse-cdn.com behind CloudFront, so a Cloudflare/CloudFront cache sits in front already","metered":false},"interface":["rest","rclone"],"interface_detail":"rest","tooling":"Discourse's own REST API is fully available on the free site (POST /uploads.json with an API key, /posts.json, /latest.json); no rclone backend","chaining":"5 GB x N free sites. Free sites are self-serve from id.discourse.com/create-site with a Discourse ID; provisioning is rate-limited but per-hour, not per-account. 100 sites = 500 GB; 400 sites = 2 TB.","limits":[],"limits_note":"5 GB per site; 2 staff seats; 10 categories; no tags; no private categories; site provisioning throttled ('You have provisioned too many sites in the past hour'); post/upload rate limits are default Discourse","identity_cost":{"kind":"email","detail":null,"country":null},"reliability_note":"Free plan launched 2026-02 and is still labelled beta; the provisioning throttle is the real scaling brake, and the 10-category cap makes bulk-upload workflows awkward.","confidence":"reported","confidence_note":"One page read moves it to documented.","evidence":[{"url":"https://meta.discourse.org/t/youre-invited-to-try-the-discourse-free-plan-beta/395632","date":"2026-10-21","proved":"'Unlimited topics, chat and members... 2 staff seats, 5GB storage'"},{"url":"https://www.discourse.org/free","date":"2026-10-21","proved":"'A real Discourse, free forever... No credit card - Unlimited members - Set up in about 1 minute'"},{"url":"https://meta.discourse.org/latest.json","date":"2026-10-21","proved":"probe: GET -> HTTP 200 application/json (public read API works anonymously); POST https://meta.discourse.org/uploads.json -> HTTP 403 (write path auth-gated as expected)"},{"url":"https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/","date":"2026-10-21","proved":"probe: GET ... -> 302 -> 200 via CloudFront (uploads are CDN-fronted)"}],"verdict":"qualifies-with-caveat","verified_at":"2026-10-21T00:00:00.000Z","notes":"5 GB storage per free site, with unlimited topics, chat and members","extras":{},"binding":"none","binding_note":"no constraint in the record binds at this scale; the record carries no limit of a kind the vocabulary names"},"claims":[{"path":"$.free_tier.stated","kind":"free-quota","num":5,"unit":"GB","per":null,"currency":null,"usd":null,"fx_date":null,"parse":"ok"}],"unknown":[["$.free_tier.notes","process"],["$.identity_cost.detail","defaulted"],["$.identity_cost.kind","identity-defaulted"],["$.per_object_cap.notes","not-extracted"],["$.per_object_cap.stated","not-extracted"],["$.retention.notes","not-extracted"],["$.retention.stated","not-extracted"]],"history":[],"drift":[]}