{"id":1271,"date":"2026-09-03T09:34:18","date_gmt":"2026-09-03T04:04:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/oracle-cloud-always-free-vps-setup-guide\/"},"modified":"2026-09-03T12:33:25","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T07:03:25","slug":"oracle-cloud-always-free-vps-setup-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/oracle-cloud-always-free-vps-setup-guide\/","title":{"rendered":"Oracle Cloud Always Free VPS: Step-by-Step Setup &amp; ARM Ampere Guide"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"background-color: #f0f7ff;border-left: 4px solid #0066cc;padding: 18px 22px;margin-bottom: 28px;border-radius: 6px\">\n<p style=\"margin: 0 0 10px 0;font-weight: bold;color: #004499;font-size: 1.15em\">\u26a1 Oracle Always Free Architecture Summary (2026)<\/p>\n<ul style=\"margin: 0;padding-left: 20px;color: #333;line-height: 1.7\">\n<li><strong>Ampere A1 Compute:<\/strong> 4 ARM Neoverse cores and 24 GB RAM, configurable as 1 monster VM or up to 4 separate VPS instances.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Network &amp; Storage:<\/strong> 200 GB NVMe boot volume, 10 TB monthly outbound data transfer, and 1 static public IPv4 address.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Operating System:<\/strong> Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, Oracle Linux 9, or Debian 12 ARM64.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>The <strong>Oracle Cloud Always Free Tier<\/strong> is widely regarded by sysadmins as the single most generous developer offering in cloud computing history. Providing up to <strong>4 ARM Ampere vCPUs, 24 GB of RAM, and 200 GB of NVMe storage<\/strong> at zero monthly cost, an Oracle Always Free instance delivers compute performance that rivals $40\/month commercial VPS plans.<\/p>\n<p>In this technical masterclass, you will learn the exact step-by-step procedure to register, configure security lists, generate SSH keys, provision an Ampere A1 instance, and harden your firewall in 2026.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"margin: 30px 0;border: none;border-top: 1px solid #e2e8f0\" \/>\n<h2>Direct Answer: How to Set Up an Oracle Always Free VPS in 2026<\/h2>\n<p><strong>Direct Answer:<\/strong> Sign up on <code>cloud.oracle.com<\/code>, choose your primary Home Region, navigate to <strong>Compute &gt; Instances &gt; Create Instance<\/strong>, select <strong>VM.Standard.A1.Flex<\/strong> with 4 OCPUs and 24 GB RAM (or smaller split), attach an SSH public key, configure your VCN Ingress Rules for ports 80, 443, and 22, and connect via SSH.<\/p>\n<div style=\"background-color: #f8fafc;border-left: 4px solid #0284c7;padding: 12px 16px;margin: 18px 0;border-radius: 4px\">\n    \ud83d\udcd6 <strong>Initial Server Setup:<\/strong> Once created, follow our guide on <a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/how-to-setup-fresh-ubuntu-24-04-vps-scratch\/\" style=\"color: #0284c7;font-weight: bold;text-decoration: underline\">How to Set Up a Fresh Ubuntu 24.04 Cloud VPS from Scratch<\/a>.\n<\/div>\n<hr style=\"margin: 30px 0;border: none;border-top: 1px solid #e2e8f0\" \/>\n<h2>Step-by-Step Blueprint: Deploying Your Ampere ARM VM<\/h2>\n<h3>Step 1: Choose Your Instance Shape<\/h3>\n<ol style=\"padding-left: 20px;line-height: 1.8\">\n<li>In the Oracle Cloud Console, click <strong>Create a VM Instance<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Image: Choose <strong>Canonical Ubuntu 24.04 aarch64 (ARM)<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Shape: Click <strong>Change Shape<\/strong> &gt; <strong>Ampere<\/strong> &gt; <strong>VM.Standard.A1.Flex<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Allocate your resources: <strong>4 OCPUs<\/strong> and <strong>24 GB RAM<\/strong> (Always Free Eligible).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<h3>Step 2: Generate &amp; Attach SSH Keys<\/h3>\n<p>Oracle disables password-based SSH authentication by default. Upload your public key (<code>id_ed25519.pub<\/code>) or click <em>&#8220;Generate a key pair for me&#8221;<\/em> and download the private `.key` file.<\/p>\n<h3>Step 3: Configure Virtual Cloud Network (VCN) Ingress Rules<\/h3>\n<p>By default, Oracle&#8217;s cloud firewall blocks all ports except port 22. To host websites:<\/p>\n<ol style=\"padding-left: 20px;line-height: 1.8\">\n<li>Go to <strong>Networking &gt; Virtual Cloud Networks<\/strong> &gt; Click your VCN &gt; <strong>Default Security List<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Click <strong>Add Ingress Rules<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Source CIDR: <code>0.0.0.0\/0<\/code> | IP Protocol: <strong>TCP<\/strong> | Destination Port: <code>80,443,8090<\/code>.<\/li>\n<li>Click <strong>Add Ingress Rules<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<h3>Step 4: Connect via SSH Terminal<\/h3>\n<p>Run the following command from PowerShell, macOS Terminal, or Linux:<\/p>\n<pre style=\"background-color: #1e293b;color: #38bdf8;padding: 14px;border-radius: 6px;font-size: 13px\">ssh -i \/path\/to\/private_key.key ubuntu@YOUR_ORACLE_PUBLIC_IP<\/pre>\n<hr style=\"margin: 30px 0;border: none;border-top: 1px solid #e2e8f0\" \/>\n<h2>How to Fix Oracle Ubuntu Default iptables Port Blocking<\/h2>\n<p>Unlike standard Ubuntu cloud images, Oracle&#8217;s custom Ubuntu images enforce an internal <code>iptables<\/code> firewall that drops incoming traffic on port 80 and 443 even if your VCN Security List is open. Execute the following commands inside your server terminal to open web ports:<\/p>\n<pre style=\"background-color: #1e293b;color: #38bdf8;padding: 14px;border-radius: 6px;font-size: 13px\"># Open HTTP and HTTPS in iptables\nsudo iptables -I INPUT 6 -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT\nsudo iptables -I INPUT 6 -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 443 -j ACCEPT\nsudo iptables -I INPUT 6 -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 8090 -j ACCEPT\n\n# Save iptables rules permanently\nsudo netfilter-persistent save<\/pre>\n<div style=\"background-color: #f8fafc;border: 1px solid #e2e8f0;border-left: 4px solid #0ea5e9;padding: 20px;border-radius: 8px;margin: 30px 0\">\n<h3 style=\"margin-top: 0;color: #0f172a;font-size: 18px;display: flex;align-items: center\">\n        <span style=\"margin-right: 8px\">\ud83d\udd17<\/span> Recommended Related Technical Guides:<br \/>\n    <\/h3>\n<ul style=\"margin: 10px 0 0 0;padding-left: 20px;line-height: 1.8\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/how-to-get-free-cloud-vps-forever\/\" style=\"color: #0284c7;text-decoration: none;font-weight: 600\">How to Get a Free Cloud VPS Forever<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/best-cheap-cloud-vps-providers-2026\/\" style=\"color: #0284c7;text-decoration: none;font-weight: 600\">Top 7 Best Cheap Cloud VPS Providers in 2026<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/hetzner-vs-digitalocean-vs-linode-benchmark-2026\/\" style=\"color: #0284c7;text-decoration: none;font-weight: 600\">Hetzner vs DigitalOcean vs Linode: Cloud VPS Shootout<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/best-free-web-hosting-2026\/\" style=\"color: #0284c7;text-decoration: none;font-weight: 600\">Top 10 Best Free Web Hosting Services<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/#plans\" style=\"color: #0284c7;text-decoration: none;font-weight: 600\">Explore $0 Free cPanel Web Hosting Plans<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"background: linear-gradient(135deg, #07131E 0%, #1e293b 100%);color: #ffffff;padding: 24px 22px;border-radius: 12px;margin: 25px 0\">\n<h4 style=\"color: #38bdf8;margin-top: 0;font-size: 1.2em\">\u26a1 Skip the Terminal &amp; Get Free cPanel Hosting<\/h4>\n<p style=\"color: #cbd5e1;line-height: 1.6;margin-bottom: 16px\">Don&#8217;t want complex cloud console networking? Launch on <strong>CpanelFree.com<\/strong> with 1-click WordPress and automated SSL.<\/p>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/#plans\" style=\"background: #0EA5E9;color: #ffffff;padding: 10px 24px;border-radius: 9999px;font-weight: 700;text-decoration: none\">Get Free cPanel Hosting &rarr;<\/a>\n<\/div>\n<hr style=\"margin: 35px 0;border: none;border-top: 1px solid #e2e8f0\" \/>\n<h2>Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)<\/h2>\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 16px;border: 1px solid #e2e8f0;border-radius: 8px;padding: 18px 20px;background-color: #fafbfc\">\n<h3 style=\"margin: 0 0 10px 0;font-size: 1.1em;color: #1e293b\">\u2753 What should I do if &#8220;Out of Capacity&#8221; error appears?<\/h3>\n<p style=\"margin: 0;color: #475569;line-height: 1.6\">Because Ampere ARM instances are in massive demand, capacity in popular data centers can occasionally be full. Upgrade your account to &#8220;Pay As You Go&#8221; (PAYG) to gain priority provisioning while remaining 100% within free limits.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 16px;border: 1px solid #e2e8f0;border-radius: 8px;padding: 18px 20px;background-color: #fafbfc\">\n<h3 style=\"margin: 0 0 10px 0;font-size: 1.1em;color: #1e293b\">\u2753 Can ARM64 architecture run standard WordPress and Docker apps?<\/h3>\n<p style=\"margin: 0;color: #475569;line-height: 1.6\">Yes! Over 98% of modern Docker images, PHP 8.3, Nginx, MySQL, and WordPress plugins natively support ARM64 (aarch64) architecture.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 25px;border: 1px solid #e2e8f0;border-radius: 8px;padding: 18px 20px;background-color: #fafbfc\">\n<h3 style=\"margin: 0 0 10px 0;font-size: 1.1em;color: #1e293b\">\u2753 How do I fix the internal iptables block on Oracle Ubuntu?<\/h3>\n<p style=\"margin: 0;color: #475569;line-height: 1.6\">Oracle Ubuntu images contain default iptables rules. Open ports in terminal by running: <code>sudo iptables -I INPUT 6 -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT<\/code>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Optimizing Oracle ARM Ampere for WordPress &amp; MySQL Performance<\/h2>\n<p>The 4-core Ampere Altra Neoverse N1 processor provides formidable multi-threaded computing capability. However, default MySQL 8.0 and PHP-FPM settings on Ubuntu 24.04 are tuned conservatively for small 1GB systems. With 24 GB of free RAM available, you can dramatically accelerate database caching.<\/p>\n<p>Edit your MySQL configuration file (<code>\/etc\/mysql\/mysql.conf.d\/mysqld.cnf<\/code>) and increase the InnoDB Buffer Pool size to reserve 8 GB to 12 GB of RAM for in-memory database indexing:<\/p>\n<pre style=\"background-color: #1e293b;color: #38bdf8;padding: 14px;border-radius: 6px;font-size: 13px\">[mysqld]\ninnodb_buffer_pool_size = 8G\ninnodb_log_file_size = 1G\ninnodb_flush_log_at_trx_commit = 2\nmax_connections = 500<\/pre>\n<p>Restart MySQL with <code>sudo systemctl restart mysql<\/code>. This single optimization enables your Oracle VPS to serve tens of thousands of dynamic page requests per minute directly from high-speed memory with sub-5ms database latency.<\/p>\n<h2>Automating Offsite Backups with Rclone to Cloud Storage<\/h2>\n<p>While Oracle Cloud provides free block volume snapshots, saving offsite backups protects your data against accidental region account closures. Install Rclone (<code>sudo apt install rclone -y<\/code>) to automatically synchronize your web directory and MySQL database dumps to Google Drive or AWS S3 every midnight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Step-by-step masterclass to deploying a 4-core, 24GB RAM ARM Ampere VM on Oracle Cloud Always Free tier in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1343,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[88],"tags":[94,95,89,90,52],"class_list":["post-1271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cloud-vps","tag-arm-ampere","tag-cloud-vps","tag-free-vps","tag-oracle-cloud","tag-ubuntu-24-04"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1271"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1574,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions\/1574"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpanelfree.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}