VPS Showdown - April 2022 - DigitalOcean vs. Lightsail vs. Linode vs. UpCloud vs. Vultr
This post is old news – Get fresh benchmarks at VPS Showdown (daily updates!)
The landscape of Virtual Private Servers is ever changing and evolving. Gone are
the days of providers offering just servers. Many providers offer a wide range
of managed services in addition to traditional VPS offerings.
Maybe I'm too much of an old dog, but I'm finding the more recent trend of
offering multiple CPU architectures and nebulous marketing jargon to describe
the plans a bit off putting.
Vultr has continued further down this path by introducing "High Performance"
plans (both Intel and AMD) in addition to their "High Frequency" (just Intel).
Regardless of my curmudgeonly attitude towards this lack of simplicity, I'm
going to include these new offerings as part of the $6 section of this post :)
Also worth noting for this month, DigitalOcean recently released "Serverless
Functions" (similar to AWS Lambdas) in beta.
As always, I've went ahead and spun up three server instances with each provider
at each of the available price points in the $5 to $6 range. Each instance is
running the current Ubuntu LTS version (20.04) and the results are averaged
where appropriate.
$5 VPS Showdown - DigitalOcean vs. Lightsail vs. Linode vs. UpCloud vs. Vultr
Overview
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Location
New York 1
Virginia, Zone A
Newark, NJ
US-NYC1
New York (NJ)
Distro
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Kernel
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
MySQL
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
Redis
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
Base Price
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
Hourly Price
$0.007/hour
$0.007/hour
$0.0075/hour
$0.007/hour
$0.007/hour
RAM
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
CPU
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
Storage
25 GB
40 GB
25 GB
25 GB
25 GB
Storage Type
SSD
SSD
SSD
SSD
SSD
Transfer
1 TB
2 TB
1 TB
1 TB
1 TB
Transfer Overage
$0.01/GB
$0.09/GB
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
Backups
$1/month
$2/month
$2/month
$1/month
$1/month
DNS
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Firewall
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Load Balancer
$10/month
$18/month
$10/month
No
$10/month
Block Storage
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
$0.223/GB
$0.1/GB
Object Storage
$5/month
$0.023/GB
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
Managed Databases
MongoDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis
MySQL, PostgreSQL
MySQL
MySQL, PostgreSQL
No
2FA/MFA
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
One-click Apps
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Custom Images
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Kubernetes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Container Registry
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Container Hosting
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Serverless Functions
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
CPU Info
Model Name
DigitalOcean - All Instances
DO-Regular
Lightsail - All Instances
Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2676 v3 @ 2.40GHz
Linode - Instance #1
AMD EPYC 7601 32-Core Processor
Linode - Instance #2
AMD EPYC 7601 32-Core Processor
Linode - Instance #3
AMD EPYC 7542 32-Core Processor
UpCloud - All Instances
AMD EPYC 7542 32-Core Processor
Vultr - Instance #1
Intel Core Processor (Broadwell, no TSX, IBRS)
Vultr - Instance #2
Intel Core Processor (Broadwell, no TSX, IBRS)
Vultr - Instance #3
Intel Core Processor (Haswell, no TSX, IBRS)
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
CPU MHz
2,494.12
2,400.09
2,433.33
2,894.56
2,400.00
Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
30,720.00
512.00
512.00
16,384.00
BogoMips
3,325.67
3,200.33
3,399.67
3,859.67
3,199.67
CPU
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Events per Second
922.64
751.07
1,253.04
1,672.84
750.40
Minimum (ms)
0.95
1.16
0.70
0.58
1.17
Average (ms)
1.09
1.33
0.83
0.60
1.33
Maximum (ms)
2.29
11.14
7.90
1.05
8.07
Memory
Read
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Ops per Second
4,369,557.57
517,395.47
3,695,153.06
5,589,210.90
3,668,693.60
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Maximum (ms)
0.46
4.82
8.55
0.24
4.29
Write
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Ops per Second
4,125,143.11
502,823.63
3,418,191.56
5,614,680.91
3,642,877.83
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Maximum (ms)
1.29
2.89
5.75
1.48
2.78
File I/O
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Reads per Second
1,743.19
997.90
1,621.95
2,662.09
1,684.34
Writes per Second
1,162.12
665.27
1,081.25
1,774.71
1,122.89
Fsyncs per Second
3,722.16
2,134.61
3,468.53
5,685.07
3,601.42
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.15
0.26
0.17
0.10
0.16
Maximum (ms)
11.36
14.14
19.79
9.71
13.18
MySQL
Read Only
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Transactions per Second
5,441.33
4,588.67
4,198.33
8,399.00
4,323.33
Queries per Second
87,061.33
73,418.67
67,173.33
134,384.00
69,173.33
Minimum (ms)
1.26
1.72
1.78
0.96
1.77
Average (ms)
1.93
2.18
2.77
1.19
2.31
Maximum (ms)
20.65
34.40
69.27
9.96
20.22
Write Only
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Transactions per Second
3,174.00
1,616.00
2,959.33
4,440.67
3,122.33
Queries per Second
19,044.00
9,696.00
17,756.00
26,644.00
18,734.00
Minimum (ms)
1.22
3.24
1.39
1.33
1.56
Average (ms)
3.33
6.23
4.44
2.25
3.22
Maximum (ms)
22.62
41.27
38.40
14.95
31.97
Read Write
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
Transactions per Second
1,726.67
1,094.00
1,138.00
2,551.00
1,482.33
Queries per Second
34,533.33
21,880.00
22,760.00
51,020.00
29,646.67
Minimum (ms)
3.04
5.42
4.68
2.47
4.07
Average (ms)
5.84
9.15
10.82
3.92
6.76
Maximum (ms)
23.72
60.66
82.62
19.78
58.64
Redis
DigitalOcean
Lightsail
Linode
UpCloud
Vultr
PING_INLINE
41,018.45
45,503.58
47,108.08
68,880.60
36,080.40
PING_BULK
40,474.86
45,161.48
44,618.86
64,559.29
32,869.36
SET
42,875.13
45,214.88
47,813.18
69,314.92
35,889.17
GET
43,993.63
45,144.22
50,719.97
67,381.84
35,063.23
INCR
43,637.23
45,059.30
54,523.07
68,715.76
35,644.40
LPUSH
42,622.90
45,387.11
40,575.15
73,970.19
36,580.37
RPUSH
43,192.03
45,265.56
44,145.49
72,797.92
37,467.81
LPOP
40,941.63
45,137.52
38,048.64
71,727.54
37,153.76
RPOP
39,034.33
45,390.67
41,099.52
71,588.16
36,637.78
SADD
40,119.36
45,043.98
52,090.67
67,961.60
35,464.56
HSET
43,910.59
45,668.26
45,959.65
73,030.21
37,466.12
SPOP
41,689.06
45,254.95
53,886.69
66,652.25
34,906.65
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
25,251.05
29,785.83
19,648.15
32,333.99
24,699.86
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
11,116.74
12,874.86
7,412.59
12,096.20
10,102.74
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
7,845.00
9,340.82
5,551.22
9,516.40
6,989.01
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
6,504.51
7,622.34
4,465.80
7,778.69
5,618.42
MSET (10 keys)
33,784.36
37,131.94
24,537.53
69,241.47
27,204.32
$6 VPS Showdown - DigitalOcean - Premium Intel vs. DigitalOcean - Premium AMD vs. Vultr - High Frequency Intel vs. Vultr - High Performance AMD vs. Vultr - High Performance Intel
Overview
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Location
New York 1
New York 1
New York (NJ)
New York (NJ)
New York (NJ)
Distro
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Kernel
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
5.4.0
MySQL
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
8.0.28
Redis
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
5.0.7
Base Price
$6/month
$6/month
$6/month
$6/month
$6/month
Hourly Price
$0.009/hour
$0.009/hour
$0.009/hour
$0.009/hour
$0.009/hour
RAM
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
1 GB
CPU
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
1 Core
Storage
25 GB
25 GB
25 GB
25 GB
25 GB
Storage Type
NVMe
NVMe
NVMe
NVMe
NVMe
Transfer
1 TB
1 TB
1 TB
1 TB
1 TB
Transfer Overage
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
$0.01/GB
Backups
$1.2/month
$1.2/month
$1.2/month
$1.2/month
$1.2/month
DNS
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Firewall
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Load Balancer
$10/month
$10/month
$10/month
$10/month
$10/month
Block Storage
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
$0.1/GB
Object Storage
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
$5/month
Managed Databases
MongoDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis
MongoDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis
No
No
No
2FA/MFA
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
One-click Apps
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Custom Images
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Kubernetes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Container Registry
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Container Hosting
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Serverless Functions
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
CPU Info
Model Name
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel - All Instances
DO-Premium-Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD - All Instances
DO-Premium-AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel - All Instances
Intel Core Processor (Skylake, IBRS)
Vultr - High Performance AMD - All Instances
AMD EPYC-Rome Processor
Vultr - High Performance Intel - All Instances
Intel Xeon Processor (Cascadelake)
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
CPU MHz
2,494.13
1,996.24
3,696.00
1,996.25
2,959.71
Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
512.00
16,384.00
512.00
16,384.00
BogoMips
3,325.67
2,661.67
4,927.67
2,661.67
3,924.00
CPU
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Events per Second
1,009.36
1,232.48
1,412.51
3,470.55
1,106.55
Minimum (ms)
0.95
0.68
0.70
0.28
0.85
Average (ms)
0.99
0.81
0.72
0.29
0.90
Maximum (ms)
3.01
6.49
3.17
3.37
5.39
Memory
Read
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Ops per Second
4,426,735.70
3,482,598.76
6,780,005.90
5,240,188.07
5,101,104.18
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Maximum (ms)
0.34
2.19
0.19
3.39
2.84
Write
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Ops per Second
4,640,999.42
3,691,434.03
6,810,275.63
5,242,333.33
5,148,469.65
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Maximum (ms)
0.27
2.50
0.20
1.56
3.51
File I/O
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Reads per Second
1,920.02
1,385.23
4,766.18
1,129.47
4,111.21
Writes per Second
1,280.02
923.48
3,177.45
752.99
2,740.78
Fsyncs per Second
4,103.98
2,958.93
10,177.20
2,413.03
8,781.88
Minimum (ms)
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Average (ms)
0.14
0.20
0.05
0.23
0.06
Maximum (ms)
10.61
16.25
4.62
226.54
5.70
MySQL
Read Only
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Transactions per Second
6,208.00
4,427.67
9,136.67
7,582.33
6,120.00
Queries per Second
99,328.00
70,842.67
146,186.67
121,317.33
97,920.00
Minimum (ms)
1.16
1.55
0.92
0.97
1.17
Average (ms)
1.64
2.27
1.12
1.41
1.65
Maximum (ms)
12.48
17.38
9.88
51.36
15.75
Write Only
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Transactions per Second
3,955.67
2,876.33
9,937.67
1,454.00
7,054.67
Queries per Second
23,734.00
17,258.00
59,626.00
8,724.00
42,328.00
Minimum (ms)
0.92
1.23
0.60
1.10
0.69
Average (ms)
2.61
3.53
1.04
6.89
1.46
Maximum (ms)
34.81
29.90
9.93
662.01
14.55
Read Write
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
Transactions per Second
1,820.33
1,433.67
4,093.00
1,332.67
2,530.33
Queries per Second
36,406.67
28,673.33
81,860.00
26,653.33
50,606.67
Minimum (ms)
2.79
3.43
1.69
2.33
2.31
Average (ms)
5.51
6.98
2.52
7.95
4.07
Maximum (ms)
25.50
31.59
19.42
238.13
19.36
Redis
DigitalOcean - Premium Intel
DigitalOcean - Premium AMD
Vultr - High Frequency Intel
Vultr - High Performance AMD
Vultr - High Performance Intel
PING_INLINE
78,627.45
54,991.15
65,807.29
90,235.25
49,271.71
PING_BULK
76,837.57
52,738.33
64,322.61
86,532.39
48,282.91
SET
80,359.37
50,759.23
65,378.56
90,589.42
49,769.65
GET
77,845.56
51,637.48
64,260.24
88,023.02
49,292.04
INCR
75,633.93
52,247.29
65,210.97
89,428.15
49,694.87
LPUSH
79,280.23
42,475.95
66,747.28
87,001.54
50,647.72
RPUSH
80,292.21
46,515.89
64,231.75
86,533.00
50,758.47
LPOP
80,044.33
48,163.67
64,858.35
81,528.54
49,855.62
RPOP
83,512.99
52,557.16
63,293.25
88,947.32
49,440.60
SADD
80,036.32
55,733.86
63,988.02
91,142.36
48,527.86
HSET
79,930.29
48,318.91
63,316.36
85,362.07
50,823.91
SPOP
72,643.42
54,190.98
61,664.19
89,199.11
50,331.20
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
36,095.98
23,699.77
45,323.01
31,826.97
32,951.20
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
13,834.85
10,926.44
19,020.63
14,186.30
13,875.14
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
9,638.71
6,588.53
13,162.55
10,405.82
10,193.95
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
7,746.12
5,575.25
10,636.11
8,167.65
8,386.98
MSET (10 keys)
46,047.16
25,572.89
54,247.25
56,555.80
44,236.59
Conclusion
Fairly consistent results with previous months with UpCloud leading the pack at
the $5 price point and Vultr doing the same at the $6 price. What's interesting
is that the Vultr "High *" plans were a bit all over the place in terms of one
of them being a very clear leader of the pack.
As I always mention, it's always a good idea to spin up multiple instances with
a provider and run your own benchmarks to make sure you're getting your money's
worth. Always factor in your own needs when picking a provider and don't be
fooled by marketing jargon.
Also, if you've found this review helpful in your search for a new hosting
provider, please use one of my referral links below.
If you have found these posts informative and helpful in searching for a new
hosting provider, please consider using one of the links below when signing up:
DigitalOcean, new accounts receive $200 in credit (good for 60 days)
Linode, new accounts receive $100 in credit (also good for 60 days)
UpCloud, new accounts receive €25 in credit (yes, that’s in Euros)
Vultr, new accounts also receive $100 in credit (good for only 14 days)
