Laravel Forge vs CapRover
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Laravel Forge and CapRover.
Quick Verdict
4.1/5
Laravel Forge
0 reviews
4.0/5
CapRover
0 reviews
Laravel Forge is rated higher (4.1 vs 4.0). Laravel Forge provisions and manages PHP servers for Laravel applications. Auto-deploys from GitHub, manages Nginx, databases, SSL, and cron jobs. The standard for Laravel deployments. CapRover is a free, open source PaaS that runs on your own server. Deploy apps via CLI, dashboard, or GitHub Actions. One-click app templates for WordPress, Ghost, Mattermost, Nextcloud, and 100+ more.
Laravel Forge Server management for PHP/Laravel deployments | CapRover Self-hosted app deployment — free open source PaaS | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 4.1 (0 reviews)✓ | 4.0 (0 reviews) |
| Pricing model | paid | free |
| Starting price | From $12/mo | Free✓ |
| Best for | Laravel and PHP developers — and agencies running multiple client servers — who want automated provisioning and deployment to any cloud VPS while keeping root access and provider choice | Developers and small teams wanting a free, self-hosted Heroku-style PaaS with one-click apps on their own VPS |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ||
| DDoS protection | ||
| Automated backups | ||
| Snapshots | ||
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ||
| Free tier | ✓ | |
| Tags | ||
| Tags | managed optionapi access | free tieropen sourceself hostable |
| Visit Laravel Forge → | Visit CapRover → | |
Laravel Forge
Pros
- + Flat, published pricing ($12/$19/$39) on top of cheap self-chosen servers — strong cost control versus PaaS
- + Zero-downtime deployments, automated SSL, managed databases, queues, cron, monitoring and heartbeats in the box
- + Provider flexibility: Laravel VPS, DigitalOcean, Linode, Vultr, AWS, Hetzner Cloud, or bring your own server
- + A decade of Laravel deployments behind it; backed by Laravel Holdings with a $57M Series A and active development
- + Agency-friendly: organizations with role-based access and billing separation, unlimited sites and deployments
Cons
- - Monthly fee on top of server costs — poor value for a single small site
- - PHP-first; Node/Nuxt/Next.js support is newer and broader language support is still promised
- - No uptime SLA and community-only support on the Hobby plan
- - Power tool: provisioning existing servers can cause data loss; backups and OS security are your responsibility
- - Reliability of the running app depends on the underlying provider Forge does not control
CapRover
Pros
- + Free forever, Apache 2.0, no feature gating or license keys
- + One-click app catalog (WordPress, MySQL, MongoDB, and more) deploys in minutes
- + Automatic Let's Encrypt HTTPS with one-click redirects
- + Deploys from dashboard, CLI, webhook, or Git; runs on any VPS you choose
- + Docker-native: any language or service that runs in a container
Cons
- - Largely solo-maintained — feature development has slowed and the bus factor is low
- - You own server ops: patching, backups, monitoring, and build sizing
- - Rougher edges and docs than commercial PaaS; support is community-only with no SLA
- - No autoscaling, managed backups, or Kubernetes-grade orchestration
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