How much does it cost to self-host Welcome to Zammad?
Short answer: $4.13/mo on the cheapest qualifying VPS, about $50/year. Compared to Zendesk at $55/mo, you save approximately $610/year per seat.
Cheapest plan per provider
Detected requirements: 4GB RAM, 40GB disk minimum. Each row is the cheapest plan from that provider that meets the requirement.
| Provider | Plan | Specs | Monthly | Yearly | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| hetzner | CAX11 | 2c · 4GB · 40GB | $4.13 | $50 | Deploy → |
| vultr | VC2 | 1c · 1GB · 25GB | $5 | $60 | Deploy → |
| linode | Nanode 1GB | 1c · 1GB · 25GB | $5.12 | $61 | Deploy → |
| digitalocean | Basic Regular 1GB | 1c · 1GB · 25GB | $6 | $72 | Deploy → |
Savings vs Zendesk, 3-year forecast
If you replace Zendesk (entry tier $55/mo per seat) with self-hosted Welcome to Zammad on hetzner CAX11, the cumulative savings compound:
| Year | Self-host Welcome to Zammad | Stay on Zendesk | Cumulative savings (per seat) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $50 | $660 | $610 |
| 2 | $100 | $1,320 | $1,220 |
| 3 | $150 | $1,980 | $1,830 |
Per seat. A 10-person team multiplies the savings by 10. Zendesk cloud pricing as of June 2026.
What costs are NOT in the table
The plan prices above only cover the VPS rental. A few extra costs to keep in mind for any honest self-hosting budget:
- Domain name: $8-15/year for a .com (Cloudflare or Porkbun, sold at-cost).
- Backups: $2-5/mo for offsite backup storage (Backblaze B2, Hetzner Storage Box).
- SSL/TLS: $0 if you use Caddy or Traefik (Let's Encrypt is free).
- Email-out: $0-15/mo if Welcome to Zammad sends notifications. Postmark, SendGrid free tiers suffice for <100 emails/day.
- Your time: 1-3 hours initial setup, ~30 min/month maintenance once stable. The biggest line item if you bill by the hour.
How Welcome to Zammad's requirements were detected
The numbers above (4GB RAM, 40GB disk) were extracted from Welcome to Zammad's public install docs and README. Welcome to Zammad's authors recommend at least these specs for a small-team deployment. For larger deployments (50+ users, high traffic), step up one tier on each provider.
The cost calculator picks the cheapest plan from each provider whose specs meet or exceed those requirements. If your deployment will exceed them, look at the next plan up on each provider, or use the methodology page for the exact formula.
Ready to self-host Welcome to Zammad?
hetzner CAX11 at $4.13/mo is the cheapest path. Spin one up and follow the project's official install docs.