Netlify vs GitHub Pages: Which Should You Use in 2026?

Both Netlify and GitHub Pages deploy sites from a Git repo for free. But they're built for very different things, and picking the wrong one will either leave you fighting limitations or paying for features you don't need.

Short version: GitHub Pages is free static file hosting. Netlify is a full deployment platform. If you just need to put HTML on the internet, GitHub Pages is hard to beat. If you need anything beyond that — functions, forms, SSR, deploy previews — Netlify is the better tool.

The full comparison

| Feature | Netlify | GitHub Pages | |---|---|---| | Price | Free tier (300 credits/month), paid from $9/month | Free for public repos | | Static site hosting | Yes | Yes | | Server-side rendering | Yes (Next.js, Astro, Remix, etc.) | No | | Serverless functions | Yes | No | | Deploy previews | Yes, per pull request | No | | Forms | Built-in (no JavaScript needed) | No | | Custom domains | Yes, with automatic SSL | Yes, with SSL | | Build system | Full CI/CD with any framework | Jekyll built-in, or GitHub Actions | | Environment variables | Yes, per deploy context | Only via GitHub Actions secrets | | Redirects and rewrites | Yes, via _redirects or netlify.toml | No (only via Jekyll plugins or 404 hacks) | | Edge functions | Yes | No | | Split testing / A/B | Yes | No | | Password protection | Yes (Pro+) | No | | Bandwidth | 300 credits/month (~30 GB on free) | 100 GB/month soft limit | | Site size limit | No hard limit | 1 GB recommended | | Build time limit | Credit-based | 10 min per build (GitHub Actions) |

That's a lot of "No" in the GitHub Pages column — but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes less is more.

When GitHub Pages wins

GitHub Pages is great when you want the absolute simplest path from code to live URL:

• Documentation sites — especially with Jekyll or a docs generator like Docusaurus
• Personal portfolio — a single-page site or simple blog
• Open-source project pages — the site lives right next to the code
• You genuinely don't need backend features — no forms, no functions, no SSR

The killer feature of GitHub Pages is that there's nothing to set up. Push to a branch, flip a switch in repo settings, done. No separate account, no dashboard to learn, no build configuration. For open-source projects where the README is basically the product, that simplicity matters.

Where GitHub Pages falls short

• No serverless functions — you can't run any backend code
• No deploy previews — PRs don't get their own live URL
• No forms — you'll need Formspree or something similar
• Limited build support — Jekyll works out of the box, everything else needs GitHub Actions
• No redirects — your only options are meta refresh tags or JS redirects (both terrible for SEO)
• 1 GB site size limit, 100 GB/month bandwidth, 10 builds per hour

When Netlify wins

Netlify is what you want when you're building something real — a product site, a web app, anything where "just host some files" isn't enough:

• Frameworks with SSR — Next.js, Remix, Astro, SvelteKit, Nuxt all have first-class Netlify support
• Deploy previews — every PR gets its own live URL, which changes how your team reviews work
• Forms — add a netlify attribute to a form element and it just works
• Serverless functions — write API endpoints right next to your frontend code
• Environment variables per context — different API keys for production vs. preview? Easy
• Proper redirects — actual HTTP 301/302 redirects, not hacks

Netlify's free tier in 2026

Since September 2025, Netlify uses credit-based pricing. The free plan gives you 300 credits/month:

• Production deploys: 15 credits each
• Bandwidth: 10 credits per GB
• Compute (functions, SSR): 5 credits per GB-hour
• Form submissions: 1 credit each

For a small static site with ~10 deploys and ~10 GB of traffic, you'll use about 250 credits. That's well within the free tier. For more details, check my pricing breakdown.

Custom domains and SSL

Both platforms give you custom domains with free SSL. The experience is slightly different:

GitHub Pages: configure DNS manually, add a CNAME file to your repo, wait for GitHub to provision a cert. It works, but it can take up to 24 hours and involves a few manual steps.

Netlify: add the domain in the dashboard, follow the DNS instructions, SSL happens automatically. More guided, usually faster.

Neither one is hard. Netlify's just a bit smoother if you've never done it before.

Build systems

GitHub Pages comes with Jekyll. For anything else — Hugo, Astro, Next.js — you need to set up a GitHub Actions workflow to build the site and push the output to the gh-pages branch. It works, but it's another thing to configure and maintain.

Netlify auto-detects your framework and runs the right build command. I've deployed Next.js, Astro, Hugo, and Gatsby projects without touching the build settings once. It just figures it out.

So which one?

Pick GitHub Pages if:

• You want the absolute simplest setup
• Your site is pure static HTML/CSS/JS or Jekyll
• You don't need forms, functions, or deploy previews
• It's an open-source project already on GitHub

Pick Netlify if:

• You're building a product or business site
• You use a modern framework with SSR
• You want deploy previews for your PRs
• You need forms, functions, or environment variables
• You expect the site to grow beyond basic static hosting

Or just use both

A pattern I've seen work well: host your docs on GitHub Pages (close to the source code, minimal friction for contributors) and your main product site on Netlify (with all the platform features). There's no rule that says you have to pick one for everything.