DigitalOcean vs Vultr vs Hetzner: Real Homelab Cost Comparison
I'm going to be straightforwardly biased here in one way and honest in every other: I run this whole stack on Vultr, but Hetzner is objectively the cheapest option for raw specs. Here's the real comparison, trade-offs included.
I should say this upfront: I run everything on this site on Vultr, and that's the link I have to offer if you sign up through this post. That doesn't mean it's the cheapest option — it isn't — so here's the honest comparison of the three providers people ask me about most, at the tier most of the setups on this site actually use.
What the same money actually buys
| Provider | ~$12/month tier | Locations |
|---|---|---|
| DigitalOcean | 2GB RAM / 1 vCPU / 50GB SSD ($12/mo Basic Droplet) | ~15 regions |
| Vultr | 2GB RAM / High Frequency tier ($12/mo) | ~32 locations |
| Hetzner (CX22) | 4GB RAM / 2 vCPU / 40GB SSD ($4.59/mo) | 6 locations (Germany: Nuremberg & Falkenstein, Finland: Helsinki, US: Ashburn & Hillsboro, Singapore) |
Read that table again: Hetzner's $4.59/month tier has double the RAM and double the vCPUs of DigitalOcean's $12/month 2GB/1vCPU tier, for well under half the price — and it still beats Vultr's $12/month 2GB tier on RAM alone, for a third of the cost. On pure specs-per-dollar, it's not close, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise just because I don't have a Hetzner link to offer you.
Why I'm still on Vultr anyway
A few real reasons, not marketing ones:
- Signup friction. Hetzner runs identity verification on new accounts — government ID or video verification, sometimes a manual review delay — before your first server goes live. Vultr and DigitalOcean both let you spin up a server within minutes of signing up with a card. If you want to be running something tonight, that difference matters.
- Location coverage. Hetzner's 6 locations are excellent if your audience is in Europe or the US East/West coast (Ashburn and Hillsboro cover those now). Vultr's ~32 and DigitalOcean's ~15 locations give you more options if you need a specific region — closer to a specific audience, or specific data-residency needs.
- I was already set up before the CX line's current pricing existed. Migrating a working stack to save a few dollars a month, for zero difference my readers would ever notice, isn't worth the weekend. If I were starting from zero today, this section would probably look different.
My honest recommendation
If you're price-sensitive, comfortable with a short identity-verification step, and don't need a location outside Hetzner's six, Hetzner is the better raw deal — I'd say so even though I don't have a referral link for them. If you want to be running a server five minutes after you decide to, or you need a specific region they don't have, Vultr and DigitalOcean are functionally similar at this tier, and the deciding factor is usually which one has a data center where you actually need it.
Every setup on this site — n8n, Grafana + Loki, Vikunja, Ghost, BookStack, ntfy — runs comfortably in the $6–$12/month range on any of these three. The provider matters less than actually starting.
I run mine on Vultr.
Disclosure: this post contains an affiliate link to Vultr. If you sign up through it, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. I don't have referral links for DigitalOcean or Hetzner, which is part of why I could write the Hetzner section above as bluntly as I did.