[ Video ] Stories from the Vibe Coding Trenches – Accidentally Overpaid $150 to Cloudflare

In a new series of videos, the author shares a story from their coding experiences titled "Stories from the Vibe Coding Trenches." The first episode details an accidental overpayment of $150 to Cloudflare. This began with the launch of an app called Flight Lens, which monitors air disruptions and delays, allowing users to track ticket prices.

The app uses an expensive API to process flight delay data and plans the engine to stay within the beginner plan of the API. The API cost around $45 a month, and the backend was deployed on Cloudflare for approximately $5. After two months of refining the app, the author launched the product, and it received positive feedback from users.

However, the Cloudflare invoice arrived, revealing a payment of $150, which was three times the cost of the API. The author initially had no idea how this happened. Upon further investigation, they discovered that database reads and writes are charged separately. They were writing roughly 150 million times a month, which exceeded the write limit, causing the extra charges.

The author then optimized the code again, monitoring both API limits and database write ceilings. They also set up billing alerts to get notified before any charges became too high. This experience taught the author the importance of paying attention to service charges, as even experienced coders can be surprised by hidden fees.

The author concluded that this story highlights the need to stay vigilant and aware of how services are billed to avoid unexpected expenses.