How to Deploy 10 Projects for Free Using Cloudflare's Ecosystem

Cloudflare's Free Tier Is Absurdly Generous

Most developers don't realise how much Cloudflare gives away for free. Here's the complete picture:

The cost to host 10 small projects on Cloudflare: $0/month.

Project 1: Static Site or Blog (Pages)

# Deploy any static site or Next.js app
wrangler pages deploy ./out --project-name my-blog

Or connect via GitHub:

• Push code to GitHub
• Cloudflare Pages dashboard → Create Project → Connect to Git
• Set build command and output directory
• Deploy

Supports: Next.js, Astro, Hugo, Gatsby, SvelteKit, plain HTML/CSS.

Project 2: API Server (Workers)

// worker.js
export default {
  async fetch(request) {
    const url = new URL(request.url)

    if (url.pathname === '/api/ping') {
      return Response.json({ pong: true, time: Date.now() })
    }

    return new Response('Not found', { status: 404 })
  }
},

wrangler deploy
# Live at: https://my-worker.your-username.workers.dev

Project 3: File Storage (R2)

R2 is S3-compatible object storage. Use it to store user uploads, generated files, or media.

# Create a bucket
wrangler r2 bucket create my-uploads

# wrangler.toml
[[r2_buckets]]
binding    = "UPLOADS"
bucket_name = "my-uploads"

// Upload a file
export default {
  async fetch(request, env) {
    if (request.method === 'PUT') {
      const key  = new URL(request.url).pathname.slice(1)
      const body = await request.arrayBuffer()
      await env.UPLOADS.put(key, body)
      return Response.json({ key, url: `https://files.yourdomain.com/${key}` })
    }

    if (request.method === 'GET') {
      const key    = new URL(request.url).pathname.slice(1)
      const object = await env.UPLOADS.get(key)
      if (!object) return new Response('Not found', { status: 404 })
      return new Response(object.body, { headers: { 'Content-Type': object.httpMetadata.contentType } })
    }
  }
},

Project 4: Scheduled Background Jobs (Workers Cron)

# wrangler.toml
[triggers]
crons = ["0 9 * * 1"]  # Every Monday at 9am UTC

export default {
  async scheduled(event, env, ctx) {
    // This runs automatically on the cron schedule
    console.log('Weekly job running:', new Date().toISOString())

    // Example: update exchange rates, send digest emails, clean old data
    const rates = await fetch('https://api.exchangerate-api.com/v4/latest/USD').then(r => r.json())
    await env.KV.put('exchange-rates', JSON.stringify(rates), { expirationTtl: 86400 })

    console.log('Exchange rates updated')
  }
},

Managing Multiple Projects

Naming Convention

my-name-project1-api       ← Worker: API for project 1
my-name-project1-site      ← Pages: Frontend for project 1
my-name-project1-files     ← R2: Storage for project 1
my-name-project1-db        ← D1: Database for project 1

my-name-project2-api
my-name-project2-site
...

Custom Domains (Free SSL Included)

For every project:

• Add your domain to Cloudflare (free DNS management)
• In Pages: Settings → Custom Domains → Add
• In Workers: Triggers → Add Custom Domain

SSL certificates are issued automatically and renewed forever for free.

Monitoring With Free Tools

When to Leave the Free Tier

Most indie projects never leave the free tier. The 100,000 requests/day limit on Workers is roughly 3 requests per second sustained — enough for thousands of daily users.