A database
Where the data lives.
My stack for this
- 01Neon (serverless Postgres)
Default. Branches, scale to zero, HTTP driver.
- 02Aurora PostgreSQL
When the client must stay all-AWS.
Don't
- Amazon DynamoDB
You design every query up front and pay for it in rewrites when the app changes. Postgres with JSONB gives you documents and SQL in one place, and covers every case I've met.
Instead: Neon (serverless Postgres)
- Cloudflare D1
A thin business case and no tooling to migrate thousands of databases. For per-tenant SQLite, use the primitive D1 is built on; for a normal database, use Postgres.
Instead: Cloudflare Durable Objects or Neon (serverless Postgres)
The picks, in brief
What each one is, my verdict, and what it costs. Every name opens the full entry: when to use it and when not, the gotchas with their fixes, provisioning and alternatives.
My go-to Postgres. Scales to zero, branches like git, and talks HTTP so Lambda needs no VPC or proxy.
Pricing: Launch plan $0.106 per compute-unit hour, Scale $0.222; storage $0.35/GB-month; no minimum. Available in Sydney.
Peace of mind and scale, at a price. My choice when the client must stay all-AWS.
Pricing: Serverless v2 kept at 0.5 ACU always-on ≈ $73 a month. RDS Proxy adds at least about $26 a month (provisioned) or about $146 (Serverless v2, minimum 8 ACU).
Where they sit
The layers of the stack this job touches, with every tool named on this page.
Edge
Between your users and your backend.
Want this stack in your AWS account?
Cloudless Labs is a Sydney consultancy. We migrate on-premises systems to AWS, build serverless apps on this stack, and coach teams to ship with Claude Code and Codex.