Static HTML hosting, scored on free limits, expiry and price
Cloudflare Pages scores 95/100 for free hosting with no expiry ($0, 20,000 files); ship.page scores 84/100 for links with no account (10 MB HTML, 7-day link, $4 Pro). Netlify Drop deploys must be claimed within 1 hour.
| Job | Pick | Free limit | Cost | Full test |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free hosting with no expiry | Cloudflare Pages, 95/100 | 20,000 files, 25 MiB each | $0 | Free HTML hosting |
| A link right now, no account | ship.page, 84/100 | 10 MB HTML, 25 MB ZIP, 7-day link | $0; Pro $4 a month | Netlify Drop alternatives |
| Form submissions | Web3Forms | 250 submissions a month | $0; Pro $12 a month, billed yearly | Forms |
| User file uploads | Cloudflare R2 | 10 GB-month, no egress fees | $0, then $0.015 per GB-month | Storage |
| Reading and writing data | Supabase | 500 MB database | $0; Pro $25 a month | Database |
| Live updates | Cloudflare Durable Objects | 100,000 requests a day | $0; Workers Paid $5 a month | WebSockets |
StaticBackend compares the services a static HTML site runs on: where the files are hosted, and which hosted APIs handle forms, uploads, data and live updates. Every limit and price on the site comes from the vendor's own pricing, docs or support pages, and the upload timings come from our own runs. Limits & pricing verified November 2026.
How the hosting scores work
Hosts are scored out of 100 with two published rubrics, because the best host depends on the job. The free hosting benchmark rewards sites that stay up for good: no expiry, high size caps, no bandwidth cap and a free custom domain. The Netlify Drop alternatives test rewards getting a working link with no account: no signup, how long that link lives, and how few steps it takes. Each rubric, its point table and our upload test method are on the methodology page.
Who publishes StaticBackend
StaticBackend is published by Bitgate, the company that makes ship.page. ship.page appears in the benchmarks and is scored with the same rubric as every other host: it wins the no-account test and scores 54/100 in the free hosting benchmark, where its 7-day free links lose to hosts with no expiry. No vendor pays for placement, and outbound links carry no affiliate or tracking parameters.
The original StaticBackend project
StaticBackend began as an open-source backend for static sites, written in Go under the MIT license. Its repository, staticbackendhq/core, is archived with 744 stars, so the project no longer ships releases. This site covers the same problem with the hosted services available in 2026. If you followed an old link to the project's docs, the backend guides and getting started pages are where those topics live now.
Guides on this site
- Getting a static HTML site online, with ship.page, Cloudflare Pages and GitHub Pages compared
- Deploying from the terminal with curl, Wrangler, Surge and the Netlify CLI
- HTML form submissions with Web3Forms, Forminit, Formspree and Basin
- File uploads and storage with Cloudflare R2 presigned URLs
- A database behind a static site with Supabase, Firestore, Turso and D1
- WebSockets and live updates with Durable Objects, Pusher and Ably
Official sources used most