DigitalOcean vs Hetzner Cloud
A detailed comparison to help you choose between DigitalOcean and Hetzner Cloud.
Quick Verdict
3.7/5
DigitalOcean
0 reviews
4.4/5
Hetzner Cloud
0 reviews
Hetzner Cloud is rated higher (4.4 vs 3.7). Cloud VPS and managed services platform offering droplets, databases, and app hosting. Built for developers who want straightforward pricing and documentation without enterprise complexity. German cloud provider offering the best price-to-performance ratio in the market. CX22 (2 vCPU, 4GB RAM, 40GB NVMe) costs €4.35/month. Loved by European developers for fast NVMe, generous bandwidth, a
DigitalOcean Simple, predictable cloud infrastructure for developers | Hetzner Cloud Affordable VPS hosting with fast deployment and transparent pricing | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 3.7 (0 reviews) | 4.4 (0 reviews)✓ |
| Pricing model | paid | paid |
| Starting price | From $4/mo✓ | From $5.99/mo |
| Best for | Developer teams and small SaaS companies that value documentation, API quality, and managed add-ons over raw compute value, especially for NA/EU/APAC audiences. | Developers and small teams who want unmanaged Linux infrastructure at the lowest cost per unit of compute, especially for European workloads with data-residency requirements, dev/test environments, CI runners, and price-sensitive production web apps. |
| Specifications (entry plan) | ||
| CPU cores | 1 vCPU | 2 vCPU✓ |
| RAM | 1 GB | 4 GB✓ |
| Storage | 25 GB | 40 GB✓ |
| Bandwidth | 1 TB/mo | 20 TB/mo✓ |
| SLA uptime | 99.99%✓ | 99.9% |
| Data-center count | 16✓ | 6 |
| €/vCPU/mo | €4.00 | €3.00✓ |
| €/GB RAM/mo | €4.00 | €1.50✓ |
| Performance | ||
| CPU score (sysbench) | 2,200 | 4,820✓ |
| Disk read (fio) | 560 MB/s | 2,100 MB/s✓ |
| Disk IOPS (4K random) | 8,400 | 42,000✓ |
| Network out | 0.5 Gbps | 1 Gbps✓ |
| Latency (TTFB) | 32 ms | 18 ms✓ |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ||
| DDoS protection | ||
| Automated backups | ✓ | |
| Snapshots | ✓ | |
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ||
| Free tier | ✓ | |
| Data-center locations | ||
| Regions | United StatesNetherlandsSingaporeUnited KingdomGermanyCanada+2 | GermanyFinlandUnited StatesSingapore |
| Tags | ||
| Tags | free tierhourly billingnvme storageipv6ddos protectionbackups includedsnapshotsmanaged options3 compatibleeu datacenterus datacenterapac datacenterterraform providerkubernetes supportprivate networkingapi access | hourly billingnvme storageipv6ddos protectionbackups includedsnapshotseu datacenterus datacentergdpr compliantterraform providerapi access |
| Visit DigitalOcean → | Visit Hetzner Cloud → | |
DigitalOcean
Pros
- + Transparent bundled pricing from $4/month with per-second billing and monthly caps
- + Documentation and community tutorials are the strongest we have seen in mid-market cloud
- + Real 99.99% SLA with publicly posted service-credit tiers
- + Managed add-ons (databases, Kubernetes with free control plane, S3-compatible Spaces) on one bill and one API
- + GPU Droplets (H100/H200/MI300X) with per-second billing and no commitment
- + Free monitoring, Cloud Firewalls, and generous bundled outbound transfer
Cons
- - Weak compute-per-euro versus Hetzner/UpCloud/Vultr — our benchmarks show ~3.4x price for less CPU at the 4GB tier
- - Backups cost 20% of Droplet price; snapshots billed separately; no permanent free tier
- - No coverage in South America, Africa, the Middle East, or Japan
- - SMTP ports blocked by default on new Droplets; low initial Droplet caps for new accounts
- - Support responsiveness on standard plans is ticket-based and often slow for small accounts
- - SLA uptime is measured by DigitalOcean itself, in its own discretion
Hetzner Cloud
Pros
- + Best CPU-per-euro in our 2026-04-01 benchmark run: the CX22 outperformed plans costing up to six times as much
- + Strong NVMe throughput: 2,100-2,400 MB/s sequential reads and 42,000-48,000 random 4K IOPS in our tests
- + Transparent hourly billing with a monthly price cap and no setup fees or contracts
- + Six cloud locations with owned, ISO 27001-certified EU data centers and GDPR-compliant processing
- + At least 20 TB included transfer at EU locations, plus free DDoS mitigation for all customers
- + Mature automation: REST API, Terraform provider, official Go/Python libraries, cloud firewalls and private networks
Cons
- - Backups and snapshots are paid add-ons rather than plan inclusions, which erodes the headline price advantage
- - Email-only support with no phone option and no managed tier for cloud customers
- - Entry plans use shared vCPUs and Hetzner offers no bandwidth guarantee (typical 300-500 Mbit/s stated by Hetzner)
- - No supported Windows installs and a smaller managed-ecosystem than larger providers
- - Default resource limits on new accounts require a support ticket to raise; cost-optimized stock is periodically unavailable
- - Object storage only available in the three European locations
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