When comparing Now vs ZEIT Now, the Slant community recommends ZEIT Now for most people. In the question“What are the best Platform as a Service providers that have a free plan?” ZEIT Now is ranked 7th while Now is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose ZEIT Now is:
Installing their CLI and calling "now" inside your project's root will automatically build your project, whether it may be a Node.js or a Docker app , or maybe a static website, it works on the platform.
Specs
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Pros
Pro It is simple and convenient
Easy enough and quickly setup.
Pro Deploy Tools
Deployment is done via Now Desktop or Now CLI.
Pro Free plan
There are many possibilities in the free plan.
Pro Deployments via a simple command line command
Installing their CLI and calling "now" inside your project's root will automatically build your project, whether it may be a Node.js or a Docker app , or maybe a static website, it works on the platform.
Pro Custom domain support
ZEIT Now supports custom domains, if that doesn't ring your bell, they also allow you to buy a domain directly from ZEIT, and even from the CLI.
Pro From the developers of Hyper Terminal and Next.js
The renowned developers of the Hyper Terminal and Framework for React applications develops and maintains this platform.
Pro Good support
You can talk to the staff anytime via their slack real-time, or mail them. They provide good assistance and will help you on any questions or issues on the platform.
Pro In-depth documentation
The documentation is very in-depth and can help you understand on how to make your application work on the platform.
Cons
Con Expensive
The cheapest plan starts at $15 a month.
Con Docker builds can only execute at the CMD Layer
ZEIT Now executes everything using docker run, so whatever was defined in the CMD Layer, is what will ZEIT will only execute.
Con Node.js apps has no access to the instance's filesystem
Once the Node.js build has completed, the only accessible directory is /tmp, which makes any file operation impossible outside the /tmp directory.
Con Free plan makes your code public
Unless you upgrade to a paid plan, the source code can be easily viewed by others.