Supabase project paused on the free plan: how to restore it

Supabase pauses Free plan projects that show low activity over a 7-day period. To bring one back, open it in the Supabase dashboard and use the restore option on the project page; your data and settings return as they were. To stop it happening again, move the project to a paid plan, because paid projects are never paused for inactivity. A project with real users shouldn't be on the Free plan anyway.

This guide covers why the pause happens, how to restore safely, what to check once the project is back, and what your options are if you want to stay on Free.

Why did Supabase pause my project?

According to the Supabase project pausing docs, Free plan projects with too little activity over a week are paused to save server resources. Activity includes visits to the project in the dashboard and requests from a connected app. The docs say a few user requests to the database each day are typically enough to avoid a pause.

So if your project paused, one of these is usually true:

• Nobody used the app for a week (a demo, a side project, a prototype between test rounds).
• The app is live, but its traffic goes somewhere else. For example, the front end was redeployed against a different Supabase project, or the environment variables point to an old project.
• The app only reads cached or static content and rarely touches the database.

Supabase sends the project owner a warning email roughly a week before the pause, and a confirmation once it's done. Those emails go to the account owner, which is often the person who first set up the builder, not whoever runs the app now. Check that inbox and its spam folder.

How do I restore a paused project?

1. Sign in to the Supabase dashboard with the account that owns the project, and select the right organization.
2. Open the paused project. It is marked as paused, with an option to restore it.
3. Confirm the restore and wait. The time it takes depends on the size of the project. Don't start other changes until the dashboard shows the project as healthy.
4. Check your active project count. The Free plan allows 2 active projects. If you already have two running, you may need to pause another or upgrade before this one can come back.

There is a time limit. Supabase's docs currently say a paused project can be restored for up to one year after it was paused, and explain the limit exists because backups are only kept for a limited period. Another version of the same page mentions 90 days, so treat the window as limited and restore soon. If you might need the data later, restore it and take your own export with the CLI; our guide to Supabase backups shows the commands.

What should I check after it comes back?

The project returns with its data and configuration, but the world kept moving while it was paused. Go through this list:

• Sign in from the live app with a test account, then sign up a new one. Confirm emails arrive. If they don't, see Supabase not sending confirmation emails.
• Run the main flows: create, edit and delete something, upload a file if your app does.
• Payments and webhooks. Anything that tried to reach your project while it was paused failed. Stripe, for example, retries failed webhook deliveries for a while and then stops, so open your Stripe dashboard and check for failed events in that window. Re-send them once the project is up.
• Scheduled jobs. Jobs scheduled inside the database or calling Edge Functions didn't run while paused. Run anything important (reminders, renewals, reports) by hand.
• Edge Functions and secrets. Call each function once and check its logs.
• Your users. If customers saw errors, a short note explaining it is fixed goes a long way.

How do I stop it from pausing again?

Option 1: upgrade to a paid plan

The docs state that paid projects are not paused for inactivity. Pro starts at $25 a month, with compute credits that cover one small instance, and it adds daily backups for 7 days. If people depend on the app, this is the straightforward fix, and it also gets you backups and longer log retention, which Free doesn't have.

Option 2: make sure real traffic reaches the right project

If the app is genuinely used but still paused, confirm the front end points at this project. Check the project URL in your hosting provider's environment variables (often VITE_SUPABASE_URL or NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_URL) against the URL in the Supabase Connect dialog. Preview and production deployments can have different values; our guide to production vs preview environment variables explains how that happens.

Option 3: keep-alive requests, with eyes open

Some people run a scheduled job, such as a GitHub Actions workflow, that makes a small database request every day so the project never looks idle. It can keep a hobby project or a demo alive. Know what it doesn't do: it doesn't give you backups, it doesn't change the 2-active-project limit, and if the job stops running (an expired token, a disabled workflow) you're back to a pause without warning except the email. For anything with customers, choose option 1.

Is the Free plan OK for a production app?

It's fine for prototypes, demos and learning. For a live product it has three gaps worth knowing: projects can pause, there are no automatic backups, and the built-in email sender is limited to your own team. If your app was built in a weekend with an AI tool and now has paying users, plan the move to a paid plan before launch day. Our MVP launch checklist covers the other items to sort out at the same time.

Quick answers

Will I lose data when a project is paused? No. Pausing keeps your data, and restoring brings it back. The risk is waiting too long, past the restore window.

Do my API keys and URL change after a restore? The project comes back with its configuration, so your app should reconnect with the same settings. Test it rather than assume.

Can I get a warning before it pauses? Supabase emails the project owner about a week in advance. Make sure that address is one someone reads.

Does an upgrade restore the project automatically? Upgrading prevents future pauses. If the project is already paused, restore it from the dashboard as well.

Want help keeping it running?

The free App Health Check gives a quick outside view of your live app. If you'd rather not think about pauses, backups and failed webhooks at all, our Care plans cover monitoring and fixes, and the Supabase security review checks the setup end to end.