is there a free (for very low traffic) IoT Platform for home project use?

I have an Arduino project that I had been using with the Xively IoT platform -- Xively was free for low volume usage. But now that Xively has been bought, it appears the free low volume offering is no longer available.

I'm looking for an Xively replacement and have searched the web for recommendations, but cannot find concise answer to this question. (I find many "answers", but none are clear re: the following:

  • is it free beyond some initial time period
  • does it allow for multiple channels
  • does it have data storage capability
    -...

Before I go do the research of each potential candidate, just wondering if someone has already done it.

I have the same problem, but I haven't looked too deeply yet. Once you worked out how to use it, I think cosm (xively) was too good to be true, but two possible replacements are Thingspeak and Blynk.
I believe they only allow updates at 15 second intervals. I'm not sure anybody matched xively's 10 seconds, even if you paid.
I assume they allow several channels. It didn't occur to me that they might not.
I don't know about data storage, they didn't seem to, but I think it is a minor issue anyway.

See Adafruit IO https://io.adafruit.com/

The free service is shown as:
30 data points per minute
30 days of data storage
5 feed limit

Now that looks interesting. I had had a look before but I had forgotten. I was dismissive then, as it all seemed so proprietary. I think this might still be the case if you go down the recommended path, which is to use the REST API. I was getting a few mental blocks here that may simply be because the procedures were not what I am used to, this may be due to a close connection with Adafruit hardware that I don't have.

I found this guy enlightening. The programme and procedure look more familiar and uses the plain-vanilla NODE-MCU that I already have. It appears that the secret is in the MQTT API, although the Adafruit learning notes implies that it is for a different purpose.