VPS (4 vCPU, 8GB): 22. Error tracking is our own product, so free, but Sentry was 26 before we dogfooded. Backups to S3-compatible: 4. Transactional email: 9. Uptime checks: ours. Domain + odds: 6. Total: 41 euros for 1,900 paying restaurants.
The only scaling lever we have pulled in two years: PgBouncer in transaction mode when connections got spiky during lunch rush. Everything else is the same shape as day one.
Where is your money actually going? I bet it is not the VPS.
~60k a month, booking confirmations plus reminders. Local SMTP relay with strict SPF/DKIM/DMARC, not a big provider. Deliverability took a month of tuning and has been boring since.
Ours is the app stores. 99 dollars a year each plus the 15-30 percent cut dwarfs every server bill combined. Web would be cheaper, patients want the app. Cest la vie.
Fonts. PDF fonts with full Central European glyph coverage, licensed per server. More than the VPS. More than backups. Fonts.
This is the best answer in the thread. The invoice is never the VPS. It is always the thing you forgot was metered.