# Free Discord bot hosting, explained Free Discord bot hosting means someone else runs your bot's process so it stays online when your computer is off. On HostDC that is a permanent free plan with a 256 MB RAM pool, 0.5 CPU and 512 MB storage, reactivated weekly from your dashboard. ## What "free" costs you The free plan costs no money and asks two things of you: - **A weekly reactivation.** On Free accounts you reactivate your bots weekly to keep them running. Forget, and your bots keep running for one hour of grace, then pause until you reactivate. Nothing is deleted then. A Free account nobody visits for a long time is different: its bots are stopped and their files archived as a ZIP you can download or restore with one click, and later the account and archive are deleted. We email you before each step; the [FAQ](/faq) and the [Terms](/terms) give the days. - **Ads.** Free shows Google ads and sponsored ads, which help pay for the servers. Paid plans remove the weekly click and the Google ads; only sponsored ads stay. Mini is $9.99 a year, Lite $1.69 a month, Pro $2.49 a month and Max $4.49 a month; none of them needs reactivation. The [pricing page](/pricing) compares them. ## What you get on the free plan | | Free | |---|---| | RAM pool | 256 MB | | CPU | 0.5 | | Storage | 512 MB | | Bots you may run | as many as fit in 256 MB | | Backups | none | | Reactivation | weekly, 1 h grace | The number of bots is limited by the RAM pool. The 256 MB free pool holds 4 small bots at 64 MB each. ## What is not supported Custom Docker images and languages other than Node.js, Python and Go. Your bot writes to its own `/app` folder, which is the right place for a SQLite file or JSON state; paid plans can add a hosted database instead. ## Get started 1. [Create an account](/register) with email or Discord. No card. 2. Pick your runtime: [Node.js](/host/node), [Python](/host/python) or [Go](/host/go). 3. Add the token, press Deploy, and watch the console. ## FAQ ### Is this a trial? No. The free plan has no end date. The weekly reactivation exists so idle accounts stop consuming a node. ### Will my bot be stopped without warning? No. You get a reminder before the timer runs out, then one hour of grace after it. We do stop abusive bots: we detect mining, spam and attacks on other services. ### Can I lose my files? Free keeps one snapshot a week (weekly, kept 1 day), so keep your own copy of anything that matters. Paid plans take daily snapshots. ### How many bots can I run at once? As many as fit your RAM pool. Lower each bot's allocation on its Settings tab and more of them fit.