A “free control plane” means you pay $0 for the managed Kubernetes API/masters and only for the worker nodes that run your workloads. It’s one of the highest-intent questions in Kubernetes cost research — here’s the straight answer.
Providers with a free control plane
| Provider | Control plane | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Azure AKS | Free (base tier) | SLA tier is $0.10/hr |
| DigitalOcean DOKS | Free | HA control plane $40/mo |
| Akamai/Linode LKE | Free | HA $60/mo, Enterprise $300/mo |
| OVHcloud MKS | Free | Unlimited egress on instances |
| Scaleway Kapsule | Free (shared) | Dedicated control plane ~€80/mo |
| Civo | Free | Flat node pricing, no egress fees |
| Vultr VKE | Free | Nodes from $10/mo |
| Oracle OKE | Free (basic) | Enhanced clusters $0.10/hr |
Snapshot captured June 2026 — verify on each vendor’s pricing page. See the always-current free-control-plane ranking.
Who charges for it
AWS EKS and Google GKE both charge $0.10/cluster/hour (~$73/month). GKE softens this with a ~$74.40 monthly free-tier credit that covers a single zonal or Autopilot cluster.
Is “free control plane” actually cheaper?
Not always. The control-plane fee is small next to node costs, so a provider with a free control plane but pricier nodes or expensive egress can cost more overall. For the cheapest end-to-end option, compare the cheapest managed Kubernetes ranking and model your own cluster in the calculator.
The catch
Free tiers often drop the financially-backed SLA (Azure AKS free tier, Oracle basic clusters). For production you may want the paid SLA tier. You also still pay for nodes, load balancers, storage and egress on every provider.