8 of 52 providers reward us when you sign up through our links. It never changes a ranking. Which ones
DigitalOcean vs Hetzner
DigitalOcean starts $4.09 per month cheaper at the entry tier, counting the IPv4 address billed on top.
DigitalOcean
$4/mo entry
DigitalOcean pricingDevelopers who want a real server with predictable billing and no surprise egress invoice.
Hetzner
$8.09/mo entry$7.49 plus $0.60 for an IPv4 address
Hetzner pricingWorkloads with European users that move a lot of traffic each month.
DigitalOcean lists more regions, which matters if latency to a specific city is your constraint. Hetzner is the better pick for workloads with European users that move a lot of traffic each month.
Specification differences
Entry plans compared line by line. Rows marked with a dash are preferences rather than measurable wins, so we do not pick a side on them.
| Attribute | DigitalOcean | Hetzner | Better |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry plan price / month, with IPv4 where billed extra | $4 | $8.09 | DigitalOcean |
| Entry plan vCPU | 1 | 1 | |
| Entry plan RAM | 0.5 GB | 1 GB | Hetzner |
| Entry plan storage | 10 GB | 20 GB | Hetzner |
| Included transfer | 0.5 TB | 20 TB | Hetzner |
| Listed regions | 15 | 6 | DigitalOcean |
| Management model | Unmanaged (you run the OS) | Unmanaged (you run the OS) | |
| Support | Ticket support on all plans; paid support tiers for faster response. | Ticket support; no phone support on cloud plans. | |
| Billing | Hourly metering, capped at the listed monthly price. | Hourly metering, capped at the listed monthly price. | |
| Free tier | No permanent free tier. Trial credit is offered to new accounts from time to time. | No free tier. |
Same size, side by side
The cheapest plan from each provider that meets each size, so the comparison is between equal servers rather than two entry plans. Prices include a separately-billed IPv4 address where the provider charges for one.
| Size | DigitalOcean | Hetzner | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 vCPU / 1 GB | $6Basic 1GB · 1 vCPU · 1 GB · 25 GBEntry Droplet. Adequate for a single small app or a low-traffic site. | $8.09CPX02 · 1 vCPU · 1 GB · 20 GBSmallest Regular Performance type. Price excludes VAT and the IPv4 address ($0.60 a month extra). | DigitalOcean cheaper by $2.09 |
| 2 vCPU / 4 GB | $24Basic 4GB · 2 vCPU · 4 GB · 80 GBComfortable for a production app with a local database. | $23.59CPX22 · 2 vCPU · 4 GB · 80 GBRegular-performance AMD line. Price excludes VAT and IPv4. Was $9.49 before 15 June 2026. | Hetzner cheaper by $0.41 |
| 4 vCPU / 8 GB | $48Basic 8GB · 4 vCPU · 8 GB · 160 GBHeadroom for several services on one host. | $42.59CPX32 · 4 vCPU · 8 GB · 160 GBRegular-performance AMD line. Price excludes VAT and IPv4. Was $15.99 before 15 June 2026. | Hetzner cheaper by $5.41 |
| 8 vCPU / 16 GB | $96Basic 16GB · 8 vCPU · 16 GB · 320 GBEight shared cores and 16GB for a busy single-server stack. | $82.59CPX42 · 8 vCPU · 16 GB · 320 GBRegular-performance AMD line. Price excludes VAT and IPv4. Was $29.99 before 15 June 2026. | Hetzner cheaper by $13.41 |
Not in the table because they are sold out on the provider's own site today: Hetzner CX23 (2 vCPU, 4 GB, $7.09/mo), Hetzner CX33 (4 vCPU, 8 GB, $10.59/mo), Hetzner CX43 (8 vCPU, 16 GB, $19.09/mo). We check stock every day, and a plan returns to the table once it can be ordered again.
Every provider at these sizes, ranked: 1 GB RAM · 4 GB RAM · 8 GB RAM · 16 GB RAM
Where each one wins and loses
DigitalOcean
DigitalOcean built its reputation on flat monthly pricing and documentation that a solo developer can finish reading. Droplets are plain virtual machines: you get root access and you own the operating system, the patching and the backups. It is the usual first step off shared hosting for people who want control without a cloud-architecture certification.
Strengths
- Flat monthly price per Droplet size, so the invoice is predictable
- Generous included egress compared with the hyperscalers
- Documentation and community tutorials are unusually good
- Managed databases, object storage and Kubernetes available alongside
Weaknesses
- Unmanaged: OS updates, security hardening and backups are your job
- Fewer regions than AWS or Google Cloud
- Backups and snapshots are billed on top of the Droplet price
Support: Ticket support on all plans; paid support tiers for faster response.
Billing: Hourly metering, capped at the listed monthly price.
Free tier: No permanent free tier. Trial credit is offered to new accounts from time to time.
Hetzner
Hetzner made its name as the price floor for European cloud servers, with included traffic far larger than the US budget clouds. Two things have changed that: prices rose on 15 June 2026, by 25% to 204% depending on the server type, and Hetzner’s cheapest shared-vCPU lines (CX, and the Arm-based CAX) are sold out, which leaves the dearer CPX line as what you can buy today. Prices exclude VAT, the region map is Europe-heavy, and a public IPv4 address is billed separately.
Strengths
- Very large included traffic allowance
- Hourly billing, capped at the monthly price
- An official API, command-line tool and Terraform provider
Weaknesses
- Europe-weighted region map; thin coverage outside the EU and two US sites
- Prices rose by 25% to 204% on 15 June 2026, and the cheapest lines (CX, CAX) are sold out
- IPv4 addresses carry a separate monthly charge
- New-account identity verification can delay first provisioning
Support: Ticket support; no phone support on cloud plans.
Billing: Hourly metering, capped at the listed monthly price.
Free tier: No free tier.
The full cost stack
What a server costs beyond its sticker price, shown for 2 vCPU / 4 GB. Only figures read from each provider's own documentation appear; a gap says “not captured yet”.
| Item | DigitalOcean | Hetzner |
|---|---|---|
| Plan (2 vCPU / 4 GB) | $24 | $23.59 |
| Automatic backups | 20% = +$4.80 ($28.80 total) | 20% = +$4.72 ($28.31 total) |
| Outbound traffic beyond the allowance | $0.01/GB over allowance | Traffic beyond the included allowance is billed in 100 MB blocks; the per-TB price is not stated on the billing FAQ. |
| Smallest managed load balancer | $12/mo | not captured yet |
Sources: docs.digitalocean.com · docs.digitalocean.com · docs.digitalocean.com · docs.hetzner.com
Price changes we have logged
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CX23 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $4.99 → $6.49 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CX33 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $7.99 → $9.99 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CPX22 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $9.49 → $22.99 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CPX32 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $15.99 → $41.99 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CX43 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $13.99 → $18.49 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CX53 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $26.49 → $34.99 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CPX42 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $29.99 → $81.99 notice
- 15 Jun 2026 · Hetzner CPX62 (before the $0.60 IPv4 address): $59.49 → $152.99 notice
Full record at the change log.
Every plan
The complete plan ladders, with the date and source of every price, are on each provider's page: DigitalOcean and Hetzner.
These are the providers' own list prices, shown in US dollars and last updated 23 Oct 2026. Where a provider bills a public IPv4 address on top, it is added to the monthly price, the ranking and every cost per vCPU or per GB, and the row shows the parts: the server, any disk priced apart, and the IPv4 charge. Each row says when we read its price, and whether it excludes VAT or needs a term. Check the provider's page before you buy.
Related comparisons
Where both sell
DigitalOcean and Hetzner both have data centers in these places. Each page ranks every provider there at the price charged in that location.
DigitalOcean vs Hetzner — frequently asked
Every answer is computed from this pair's own prices and costs.
- Which is cheaper for 1 vCPU / 1 GB, DigitalOcean or Hetzner?
- DigitalOcean Basic 1GB at $6/mo, which is $2.09 (26%) less than Hetzner CPX02 at $8.09/mo.
- How many data center locations do DigitalOcean and Hetzner have?
- DigitalOcean lists 15 and Hetzner lists 6.
- What do backups add at DigitalOcean and Hetzner?
- DigitalOcean: 20% of the plan price; Hetzner: 20% of the plan price.