Amazon CloudFront vs Heroku Comparison
Compare Amazon CloudFront vs Heroku features, pricing, and more.
Last updated: November 2026
Amazon CloudFront
7.9/10
Amazon CloudFront is the AWS content delivery network. It caches and serves websites, APIs and media from more than 750 edge locations, and includes DDoS protection, WAF and edge compute.
Heroku
6/10
Salesforce-owned platform as a service where developers deploy apps from Git onto managed dyno containers, with Postgres and Key-Value Store add-ons.
Feature-by-Feature Comparison
| Feature | A Amazon CloudFront | |
|---|---|---|
| Scores | ||
| Overall Rating | 7.9/10 | 6/10 |
| Integration | 9/10 | 8/10 |
| Support | 6/10 | 5/10 |
| Cost | 6/10 | 4/10 |
| Customization | 9/10 | 4/10 |
| Security | 9/10 | 7/10 |
| Reliability | 9/10 | 7/10 |
| Ease of Use | 5/10 | 9/10 |
| Analytics | 7/10 | 5/10 |
| Scalability | 10/10 | 6/10 |
| Pricing | ||
| Free plan | Yes | No |
| Cheapest paid plan | $15/mo Pro (flat-rate) | $5/mo Eco dynos |
| Estimated cost for 10 users | Free Free (flat-rate) | $5/mo Eco dynos |
| Features | ||
| API and CLI | ||
| Multiple Regions | ||
| Cloud Compute | Not listed | |
| Content Delivery Network | Not listed | |
| DDoS Protection | Not listed | |
| Dedicated Servers | Not listed | |
| Free SSL Certificates | Not listed | |
| Git Deployments | Not listed | |
| Managed Databases | Not listed | |
| Managed WordPress | Not listed | |
| Serverless Functions | Not listed | |
| Shared Hosting | Not listed | |
| Uptime SLA | Not listed | |
Amazon CloudFront vs Heroku cost by team size
Amazon CloudFront costs less at every team size we checked.
| Team size | Amazon CloudFront | Heroku |
|---|---|---|
| 1 user | FreeFree (flat-rate) | $5/moEco dynos |
| 5 users | FreeFree (flat-rate) | $5/moEco dynos |
| 10 users | FreeFree (flat-rate) | $5/moEco dynos |
| 25 users | FreeFree (flat-rate) | $5/moEco dynos |
| 50 users | FreeFree (flat-rate) | $5/moEco dynos |
The plan that fits each team size, billed monthly, before add-ons and usage charges. Each cost opens that tool's pricing calculator for the team size.
Which One Should You Choose?
AWhy choose Amazon CloudFront
- Has a free plan (Heroku does not)
- Lower estimated cost for 10 users: Free vs $5/mo
- Higher Customization score (9/10 vs 4/10)
- Higher Scalability score (10/10 vs 6/10)
- Better fit for enterprise (8/10 vs 4/10)
Why choose Heroku
- Higher Ease of Use score (9/10 vs 5/10)
Pros & Cons
AAmazon CloudFront
Pros
- The network is very large, with more than 750 PoPs plus over 1,140 PoPs embedded inside ISP networks.
- Data transfer from AWS origins such as S3 and EC2 to CloudFront costs nothing, which lowers costs for workloads hosted on AWS.
- Flat-rate plans start at $15 a month with no overage charges, which makes bills predictable.
- It has strong compliance coverage, including PCI-DSS Level 1, HIPAA, SOC, ISO and FedRAMP Moderate.
- Two tiers of edge compute are available: CloudFront Functions at $0.10 per million invocations and Lambda@Edge for heavier code.
Cons
- G2 and Capterra reviewers report complex configuration and a steep learning curve for people new to AWS.
- Capterra-network reviewers rate customer support poorly, around 3.4 out of 5.
- Flat-rate plans lack some features, such as real-time logs, dedicated IP SSL and continuous deployment, and going over the allowance reduces performance.
- Dedicated IP SSL at $600 a month and Anycast Static IPs at $3,000 a month are expensive extras.
- Users on AWS re:Post and GitHub report cache invalidations that occasionally hang for hours or time out during deploys.
Heroku
Pros
- Deploying with a Git push or the CLI takes almost no setup for common web stacks.
- Postgres and Key-Value Store are integrated with the apps and offered at many plan sizes.
- Shield plans support HIPAA and PCI compliant workloads.
- Pricing is public and itemized for every dyno and database size.
Cons
- Since February 2026, Salesforce is only maintaining the platform with stability and security work and no new features.
- New customers can no longer sign Enterprise contracts.
- Reviewers often say costs climb steeply as apps scale.
- Common Runtime apps can only run in the US or Europe, and other regions need costly Private Spaces.
- There is no free tier, and Eco dynos sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity.
Not sold on either?
Frequently Asked Questions
Amazon CloudFront scores higher on our Hosting & Infrastructure criteria: 7.9/10 against 6/10 for Heroku. The largest gap is in Customization: 9/10 for Amazon CloudFront and 4/10 for Heroku.
Amazon CloudFront costs less for 10 users: free on its Free (flat-rate) plan, against about $5/mo on its Eco dynos plan for Heroku, billed monthly.
Amazon CloudFront has a free plan; Heroku does not list one.
Amazon CloudFront is the better fit for enterprise: we rate it 8/10 for them, against 4/10 for Heroku.
