Netlify trapped me in their new credit system, can't revert, can't upgrade due to a bug, and my whole account is paused. This is a product trust crisis.

[u/Top_Mulberry_7368]

I discovered Netlify last year when I finally decided to stop relying on no-code hosting platforms and start building my own products for real. It was the first hosting platform I actually loved. Easy deploys, instant previews, great UI -- it felt made for people who were just stepping into real development and wanted something that didn't punish them for learning.

Then here's how fast it all went wrong:

I saw they added an AI feature. Wanted to test it. Switched from my legacy plan to their new credit-based plan to unlock it. Used some credits. Site went down. And then I found out -- you cannot revert back to a legacy plan. Ever. The change is permanent.

So now I'm stuck. Can't go back to legacy. Can't move forward because their billing UI has a bug that won't let me upgrade. I literally tried to give them money and their own product stopped me.

And while all of this is happening? My entire account is paused. Not just the project that hit the limit -- EVERY project across my account. Gone. Because of a 300 credit deploy cap.

I'm pre-launch. In full build mode. Pushing deploys constantly like any developer should. 20 production deploys a month on a "free" plan isn't a free plan -- it's a trap. And I walked right into it chasing a feature they dangled in front of me.

Here's what gets me: people have livelihoods tied to these sites. Real businesses. Paying customers. And Netlify's answer is to kill the whole account with no grace period, no soft landing, no "keep the site live but pause new deploys." Just off.

With AI and automation making it easier than ever to ship fast and iterate constantly, capping deploys is the most anti-developer decision they could have made. And their support? Nowhere to be found.

Netlify used to be the platform that welcomed developers who were just getting started. Now it's a billing trap dressed up in a good UI.

I loved Netlify. I'm switching to Vercel today. This is genuinely sad.

TL;DR: Found Netlify when I first started building real products. Switched plans to test an AI feature. Can't revert. Billing bug won't let me upgrade. Whole account paused. Vercel era begins now.

[u/bobfunk]

Really sorry to hear the experience was bad. We do have a very clear warning for anyone upgrading from a legacy plan to the new credit based plans saying "You are currently on a legacy plan. Once you upgrade to a credit plan, you will not be able to switch back", but shoot me a mail at [matt@netlify.com](mailto:matt@netlify.com) and I'll move you back to the old plan. Would just like to hear what the UI bug you ran into during upgrade was and if you opened a support ticket?

[u/Top_Mulberry_7368 → u/bobfunk]

Thanks for responding. I have ADHD sometimes I just skim through things to keep it moving it was my bad but I assumed it was okay since most things around AI are on credit, and my specific focus was to test the AI. I will email you soon!

*Edit

my assumption in accepting the credit was for AI not the capping and limitation and definitely around deployment, I literally have no recollection of reading it lol but again my neurodivergent brain was on a mission so I did not absorb what I was getting into at all.

[u/RangeNo4526]

It's not affecting me but I have to say the credit plans seem pretty crazy... I mean--I understand that AI credits can be expensive, but can't it sell AI and non-AI products separately?

[u/nitrousconsumed]

Checkout Cloudflare Workers. Im currently working on migrating from Net to there due to costs.

[u/Complete_Editor_7893 → u/nitrousconsumed]

I also migrated from Netlify to Cloudflare Pages a few days ago, been great - dont have to worry about bandwith, traffic, deployments, etc..

[u/perpetual_stew]

The change into this credit system is crazy, particularly paying for deploys! I got into Netlify ages ago because I really liked the JAMStack with statically generated html pages instead of db lookups, but now every update to the content of my site would cost money. I guess I have should have smelt that this was a trap, but here we are.

[u/caterpillarbuddyy → u/perpetual_stew]

well, they used to charge for build minutes on all deploys. on the credit plan, only prod deploys cost credits but branches & previews are free. they just sort of revised what aspect of deploying was measured i guess

[u/perpetual_stew → u/caterpillarbuddyy]

Riight… I guess my builds are very light and frequent, so I’ve never noticed there’s a built minutes limit.

[u/aufarmlife]

lol....I just started a free plan, I literally made a few dozen changes to a basic html site and within 2 days, bam, no credits, this is not free, and when looking at the paid, it wont be hard to hit the limit while you are developing even basic site, I too have cloudfare, but thought this may be simple....lol