Surge vs Netlify

In an era where the relevance of static web pages has greatly risen, an easy and flexible way to deploy web pages can be great for productivity and cost-efficiency.

Netlify has remained one of the most popularly used static web publishing platforms for a while now, posing serious competition to GitHub Pages and other such platforms.

However, recently, Surge.sh has been gathering some attention from web developers, owing to how easy it is to set up and deploy your web pages.

Continue reading as we compare the two platforms, i.e., Surge and Netlify. If you have been thinking about shifting to any of these for your projects, read the features and advantages mentioned below to make an informed decision.

What is Surge?

Simply put, Surge.sh is a static web publishing platform for front-end developers that allows you to publish your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript pages for free (mostly) directly from the CLI. It supports building a project through popular build tools like Browserify, Gulp, and Grunt.

There is also support for Git Hooks, where your project is deployed whenever you push to GitHub without any branch juggling. Moreover, you can also publish Jekyll sites, use npm run scripts, and collaborate on your project, right from the command line.

Surge Core Features

• Custom domains

With Surge, you can use your custom domain if you have one instead of using the surge.sh subdomain. This process involves logging into your domain registrar and creating a CNAME record, followed by changing the hostname values to a custom one. If your registrar does not support creating a CNAME record, you can create an A record and set a custom IP instead.

• Security features

While SSL deployment is nothing short of crucial these days, they do not always come cheap. Every Surge deployment comes with free basic SSL with no extra cost. Moreover, you can prevent your visitors from visiting the HTTP version of your site by forcing them to the HTTPS version using a – –domain command.

• Clean URLs

Semantic URLs are enabled by default on Surge, allowing you to publish readable URLs without mentioning the underlying implementation, i.e., .html or .php, etc. Since clean URLs are explicitly mapped to an underlying resource, they are less fragile, SEO friendly, do not leak server information, and make site navigation easier.

Surge Advantages

• Free custom domain publishing

Publishing to Surge.sh with a custom domain name is free by default. Surge says that it aims to “provide more value” than what they capture and keeping their custom domain publishing free will allow more people to easily publish to the web.

Moreover, most dependencies on the platform are open source, including the powerful Surge CLI. For advanced workflows and unlimited production-ready projects, you can upgrade to Surge Professional with more features.

• Easy setup and deployment

To get a project up and running in Surge.sh, the only prerequisite is a preinstalled Node.js environment. You can install Surge directly from the terminal on Windows, Mac, or Linux using a simple npm script.

Setup takes a couple of minutes, and you will be ready to use the platform after logging in or registering (for new users). Deploying is equally easy and all you have to do is open the terminal and run the surge command in your project directory.

What is Netlify? 

Netlify is one of the most popular serverless, continuous web development and deployment platform that allows developers to build, test, and scale modern web deployments.

It comes with an intuitive drag and drop interface that automatically deploys from GitHub or BitBucket. Netlify makes sure that the HTML is served directly from the CDN nodes and provides instant cache validation, which minimizes downtime and eliminates maintenance windows.

Netlify Core Features 

• Simultaneous deployment

Netlify is essentially a holistic cloud computing platform for static websites and apps. Customers caching their content on the platform get a single repository, from where they write and manage everything about their static websites like frontend builds, serverless code, and edge routing logic. Moreover, you can deploy custom codes from within the network edge without performance issues.

• Git integrated CI/CD

Netlify automatically processes the site and ensures that all assets are optimized and served from a cookie-less domain. Various apps on the Netlify platform integrate to automate development, testing, and deployment, allowing you to go straight from Git to global deployment without testing backend infrastructure.

• Security features

With Netlify, you can either use their proprietary or third-party proxy service to bring advanced protection for your web deployments. You can hide a part of your entire website behind a password and restrict access to certain paths and repositories using authentication providers like Netlify Identity, etc.

Netlify Advantages 

• Control over the content requests

One of the most popular features of Netlify is the control over content requests. You get a simple text-based configuration that can be used to customize how the app platform will handle network requests inside your repository.

For instance, you can apply custom headers, set up location-based redirects, and integrate a legacy blog or remote APIs into a domain with the platform’s capable proxy functionality.

• No maintenance windows between deployments

On Netlify, all global deployments are treated as an instant atomic update, meaning all the codes and assets are updated simultaneously while the previous versions remain available at their permanent URLs. It also offers instant cache invalidation, allowing you to deploy updated codes multiple times in a day without long maintenance windows or broken deploys.

Conclusion

Surge is one of the most flexible web publishing platforms and offers some unique features that make web deployment fast and easy.

Surge is static web publishing for frontend developers. It works directly from the CLI, it is free to start, and paid plans start at $30/mo.

Netlify is a serverless platform to deploy fantastic web experiences. It offers features like build, functions, and workflows. Pricing wise it has a generous free tier, and paid plans start at $19 per month.

Consult a leading app hosting company for more insights into how your project can benefit from either of them. 

If you liked this article, you may also be interested in reading Netlify vs Github Pages.

FAQ