The AWS Free Tier offers an accessible entry point for launching projects using a t3.micro instance, which features 1GiB of memory and an EBS baseline throughput of approximately 10MB/s. This setup is particularly advantageous for early-stage projects, allowing developers to experiment without incurring costs. In this context, the article explores the implementation of the Tansu broker with an embedded SQLite storage engine, which simplifies data management by storing all meta and message data in a single database file (tansu.db). This approach also facilitates easy environment backups and restores by merely copying the database file. For those requiring zero downtime, the article suggests using an S3 storage engine that supports multiple stateless brokers accessing the same bucket simultaneously. Setting up the Tansu broker on a t3.micro instance involves a series of straightforward steps, including installing the necessary packages such as Docker Compose and enabling the containerd service. A customized `compose.yaml` file is created to configure the Tansu broker, tailoring settings like the advertised listener URL and logging levels. Once the broker is up and running, the article highlights the ease of creating and verifying topics using the Tansu CLI. Performance tests reveal that while the throughput may not be record-breaking, it effectively demonstrates the feasibility of launching a Kafka-compatible broker on minimal hardware, with recorded latencies and throughput rates providing a practical insight into the broker's performance. The article also outlines the benefits of utilizing the CPU credit system inherent to t3 instances. By operating below the baseline CPU utilization, users can accumulate credits and utilize them during peak demand, allowing for cost-effective scaling. The Tansu broker is noted for its efficiency in memory usage, with detailed metrics provided to illustrate its low resource consumption and the ample memory available for system performance. Furthermore, the piece encourages experimentation with Tansu, an open-source Kafka-compatible broker written in Rust, and offers links to additional resources for further exploration of its capabilities and optimizations.