AWS Lambda vs AWS Fargate: pricing
AWS Lambda prices per request while AWS Fargate bills by resource-time, so they are hard to compare head-to-head. AWS Lambda is faas (request + gb-second) ($0.20 / 1M) and AWS Fargate is serverless containers (vcpu-hour + gb-hour) (Not request-priced). Snapshot June 2026 — verify on the vendor's pricing page.
Data as of June 2026.
AWS Lambda vs AWS Fargate side by side
| Cost factor | AWS Lambda | AWS Fargate |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Amazon Web Services | Amazon Web Services |
| Pricing model | FaaS (request + GB-second) | Serverless containers (vCPU-hour + GB-hour) |
| Per 1M requests | $0.20 / 1M | Not request-priced |
| Per GB-second | $0.0000167 / GB-s | n/a |
| Free tier | 1,000,000 requests/month + 400,000 GB-s/month, perpetual (does not expire after 12 months). | No always-free tier. Billed per second (1-minute minimum). On-demand US East: $0.04048/vCPU-hour + $0.004445/GB-hour. Fargate Spot up to ~70% cheaper; Savings Plans up to ~50%. |
| Scale to zero | Yes | No |
| Egress | $0.09/GB | $0.09/GB |
| Regions | 30+ AWS regions worldwide. | All AWS regions (via ECS/EKS). |
Sources: Amazon Web Services pricing · Amazon Web Services pricing.
Sample monthly cost
A rough monthly total for a sample workload: 5,000,000 requests/month, each ~150 ms at 256 MB of memory, plus 25 GB of egress. Computed after each platform's free tier; excludes platform minimums and regional variation, so treat it as a starting point:
| Component | AWS Lambda | AWS Fargate |
|---|---|---|
| Compute (after free tier) | $0.80 | Usage-based |
| Egress (25 GB) | $2.25 | $2.25 |
| Estimated total / month | $3.05 | Usage-based |
Verdict
On cost for this sample workload, AWS Lambda prices per request while AWS Fargate bills by resource-time, so they are hard to compare head-to-head. But price is not the only factor: AWS Lambda (mature, deepest aws ecosystem (api gateway, sqs, dynamodb, eventbridge)) versus AWS Fargate (run long-lived containers without managing servers). Read each platform's full breakdown — AWS Lambda and AWS Fargate — and model your own workload in the calculator.
Frequently asked questions
Is AWS Lambda or AWS Fargate cheaper?
For a sample workload of 5M requests/month at 256 MB, 150 ms each plus 25 GB egress, AWS Lambda prices per request while AWS Fargate bills by resource-time, so they are hard to compare head-to-head. This is illustrative and after each platform's free tier; your real cost depends on memory, duration, egress and region. snapshot captured June 2026.
How do AWS Lambda and AWS Fargate price requests?
AWS Lambda: $0.20 per 1M requests + $0.0000166667 per GB-second (x86). Arm/Graviton2 is ~20% cheaper. Billed per 1 ms. Memory is configurable 128 MB-10 GB and sets the GB-second rate. AWS Fargate: On-demand (US East N. Virginia): $0.04048 per vCPU-hour + $0.004445 per GB-hour. A 0.25 vCPU / 0.5 GB task is ~$10.50/month always-on. No scale-to-zero by itself (tasks run until stopped). Spot up to 70% off. Snapshot June 2026 — verify on the vendor's pricing page.
Do AWS Lambda and AWS Fargate scale to zero?
AWS Lambda: yes, no charge when idle. AWS Fargate: no, it bills while running. Scale-to-zero saves money for spiky traffic but adds cold-start latency on the first request.
Which has the better free tier, AWS Lambda or AWS Fargate?
AWS Lambda: 1,000,000 requests/month + 400,000 GB-s/month, perpetual (does not expire after 12 months). AWS Fargate: No always-free tier. Billed per second (1-minute minimum). On-demand US East: $0.04048/vCPU-hour + $0.004445/GB-hour. Fargate Spot up to ~70% cheaper; Savings Plans up to ~50%.
More comparisons
Last updated: 2026-06-21