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Workers vs Lambda for a CPU-heavy cron

Comparison · lambda

Reviewed 2026-10-25 · against the official Cloudflare pricing pages listed under Sources

Try this scenarioLoads these inputs into the calculator so you can change them.

Cloudflare's hourly cron example is $6.99 on the pricing page. Lambda's GB-second price is not printed here.

Competitor dollar amounts are unverified. This page calculates Cloudflare only and links the other price list. Do not quote a vendor price from memory.

Example 3 runs 720 times a month and spends 180,000 CPU milliseconds on each run. The published CPU line is $1.99.

Workers charge the CPU milliseconds the cron actually burns. Waiting on APIs is free. Lambda's duration meter usually includes waiting, and it depends on the memory size you configured.

Use the same 720 runs and the same 3 minutes of work when you read the Lambda page.

CPU is active time, not wall time

Waiting on the network, KV, or D1 does not count as CPU. Paid usage includes 30 million CPU milliseconds and then charges $0.02 per million, prorated. The Free plan allows 10 ms per invocation and fails with error 1102 past that. It is not a monthly pool.

This model

$6.99 · Paid

Workers Paid minimum
$5.00

The $5 is an account minimum for Workers Paid, not a per-product fee. Included usage sits inside it.

Worker CPU time
$1.99

129,600,000 used, 30,000,000 included. Billable: 99,600,000. Exact charge $1.992, shown as $1.99. CPU time is active execution only. Waiting on fetch, KV, or D1 does not count. Paid CPU is prorated at $0.02 per million milliseconds after 30 million.

Assumptions

  • A 30-day month and steady traffic across it.
  • Rates as published on 2026-10-25; taxes excluded.
  • The Workers Paid plan has a $5 monthly minimum. It is charged even if you use nothing, and it covers the included allowances.
  • Worker CPU time adds $1.99 (28% of the bill): you used more than the 30,000,000 included.

Try this scenario

Sources