What is the AWS Free Tier?

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The AWS Free Tier lets new customers explore AWS at no cost for limited usage across 100+ services. 12-Month Free — for new accounts. Examples: 750 hrs/month of t2.micro or t3.micro EC2, 5 GB S3 standard storage, 750 hrs of RDS db.t2.micro. Always Free — never expires. Examples: 1 M Lambda requests/month, 25 GB DynamoDB, 10 custom CloudWatch metrics. Short Trials — service-specific (e.g., Amazon Inspector 90-day trial). 2024+ refresh — AWS now offers a credit-based free trial model alongside the classic tier for new sign-ups. Watch out: the Free Tier covers usage, not data egress and not premium service tiers. Set a Billing Alarm to avoid surprise charges. Always set a billing alarm — Free Tier doesn't include data egress, and that's where surprise bills come from. Mention Always Free (Lambda 1M req/mo) for bonus points.