We love cheap VPSes around here. But FREE? That gets our attention!

RackNerd and AdminBolt have teamed up for a community giveaway on our sister site, LowEndTalk: 100 VPS instances FREE for an entire year, plus a chance for qualifying VPS winners to pick up one of 20 lifetime AdminBolt licenses!

No purchase required, no payment method on file, and no obligation to renew the VPS. If you’ve been curious about trying a different hosting panel (especially in light of today’s cPanel price increases), this is a great opportunity to get your hands on one – with a server to run it on!

👉 Head over to the giveaway thread on LowEndTalk and join the fun!

What Does a FREE VPS Look Like?

Each giveaway VPS comes with:

• 3 vCPU cores
• 4 GB RAM
• 60 GB SSD storage
• 7 TB monthly transfer
• 1 Gbps network port
• 1 dedicated IPv4 address
• Full root access
• RackNerd ctrl with AdminBolt one-click installation

The VPS is free for one year. RackNerd will release the 100 VPS instances in batches through surprise announcements in the thread. Each announcement will explain how to enter and how that batch’s winners will be selected, so keep an eye on posts by @dustinc!

Meet AdminBolt – Because More Choice Is a Good Thing

As we recently discussed, cPanel’s licensing costs have climbed considerably over the years. If you’re a hosting provider trying to keep your services affordable, another increase is hardly something to celebrate. At some point, “enough is enough” becomes a good reason to start exploring alternatives.

One worth checking out is AdminBolt, a modern hosting control panel for managing websites, email, DNS, SSL, WordPress, and databases from one place. It was founded by hosting industry veterans Łukasz Gawior and Konrad Keck, co-founder of ModulesGarden.

More competition and more choice are good things for our industry – and this giveaway gives you an opportunity to try the panel firsthand, with a free VPS to run it on!

AdminBolt is also available in the one-click apps catalog within RackNerd’s newly launched ctrl platform, making it easy to deploy on your VPS.

Got questions or feedback about the panel? The AdminBolt team is participating in the discussion too, so bring ’em over to the LowEndTalk thread!

Try the Panel, Share Your Feedback, Get Free Licensing

VPS winners can receive free AdminBolt licensing through the end of their VPS’s first year by completing the feedback step:

1. Log into AdminBolt and complete the setup wizard with your email address.
2. Click the emailed confirmation link within 24 hours to activate the 30-day trial.
3. Try the panel and post your feedback in the LET thread before your trial expires.
4. Reply to your winner notification DM with a link to your feedback.

Once verified, RackNerd will coordinate with AdminBolt to extend your license through the end of your VPS’s first year.

Positive or constructive feedback is welcome. They want to hear about your experience, so please only claim a VPS if you intend to try AdminBolt and share your thoughts.

And Then There Are the LIFETIME AdminBolt Licenses!

Every giveaway VPS winner who completes the feedback step also gets one entry into a random drawing for one of 20 lifetime AdminBolt licenses. Positive or constructive feedback makes no difference to eligibility – every qualifying participant gets an equal chance.

Each lifetime license can be used on one server of your choice at a time, including servers hosted with other providers. It can be reissued when you change servers too!

I Want In!

Join the RackNerd & AdminBolt giveaway on LowEndTalk!

Read the opening post for the full details, watch for the next batch announcement, and follow that batch’s entry instructions.

A free VPS, a hosting panel to explore, and a shot at a lifetime license? Sounds like a good reason to spend some time on LET!

raindog308

raindog308 is a longtime community LETizen, technical writer, and self-described techno polymath. With deep roots in the *nix world, he has a passion for systems both modern and vintage, ranging from Unix, Perl, Python, and Golang to shell scripting and mainframe-era operating systems like MVS. He’s equally comfortable with relational database systems, having spent years working with Oracle, PostgreSQL, and MySQL.

As an avid user of LowEndBox providers, raindog308 runs an empire of LEBs, from tiny boxes for VPNs, to mid-sized instances for application hosting, and heavyweight servers for data storage and complex databases. He brings both technical rigor and real-world experience to every piece he writes.

Beyond the command line, raindog308 has a life-long love of German Shepherd Dogs, high-quality knives, target shooting, theology, tabletop RPGs, playing guitar, and hiking in deep, quiet forests.

His goal with every article is to help users, from beginners to seasoned sysadmins, get more value, performance, and enjoyment out of their infrastructure.

You can find him daily in the forums at LowEndTalk under the handle @raindog308.