DigitalOcean Premium AMD (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores)
Same showdown, different day. Today I've spun up brand new instance from DigitalOcean and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. All instances were spun up with Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and were created in the New York area (or close to it). Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Tue, 02 Jun 2026 03:00:52 GMT | Sun, 31 May 2026 20:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-71-generic | 6.8.0-71-generic |
| MySQL Version | 8.0.45-0ubuntu0.24.04.1 | 8.0.45-0ubuntu0.24.04.1 |
| Redis Version | 7.0.15 | 7.0.15 |
| Location | New York, NY | New York, NY |
| Monthly Price | $7.00 | $56.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 1 | 8 |
| CPU Cores | 1 | 4 |
| Storage (TB) | 25 | 160 |
| Storage Type | NVMe | NVMe |
| Transfer (TB) | 1 | 5 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | AuthenticAMD | AuthenticAMD |
| Model Name | DO-Premium-AMD | DO-Premium-AMD |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 1,996.25 | 1,996.25 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 512.00 | 512.00 |
| BogoMips | 3,992.49 | 3,992.50 |
| Events per Second | 769.79 | 1,535.42 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.59 | 0.59 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.3 | 0.65 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.42 | 0.89 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.57 | 0.69 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 4,782,592.86 | 4,867,578.39 |
| Mebibytes per second | 4,670.50 | 4,753.49 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.2 | 0.19 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 5,249,396.08 | 4,347,879.44 |
| Mebibytes per second | 5,126.36 | 4,245.98 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1.59 | 0.56 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 1,730.28 | 2,384.51 |
| Writes per Second | 1,153.52 | 1,589.67 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 3,691.26 | 5,095.64 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 27.04 | 37.26 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 18.02 | 24.84 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.15 | 0.11 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 12.49 | 9.42 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.5 | 0.58 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1,618.21 | 325.10 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1,629.75 | 435.66 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1,641.18 | 487.90 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1,648.20 | 484.44 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 6,365.00 | 5,392.00 |
| Queries per second | 63,650.00 | 53,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.43 | 1.37 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.57 | 1.85 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 9.05 | 3 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.79 | 2.35 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,031.00 | 3,296.00 |
| Queries per second | 40,310.00 | 32,960.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.5 | 1.47 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.48 | 3.03 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 14.51 | 19.45 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.62 | 4.41 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,979.00 | 1,930.00 |
| Queries per second | 19,790.00 | 19,300.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 3.33 | 3.41 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 5.05 | 5.18 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 38.41 | 26.77 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.04 | 6.55 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 6,206.00 | 4,756.00 |
| Queries per second | 62,060.00 | 47,560.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.82 | 1.08 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.61 | 2.1 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 14.37 | 40.66 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.57 | 3.25 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,259,342.00 | 1,434,092.00 |
| Queries per second | 12,593,420.00 | 14,340,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 474.62 | 418.16 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 137,982.00 | 125,686.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,379,820.00 | 1,256,860.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.06 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.07 | 0.08 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1.85 | 0.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.1 | 0.11 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 7,054.00 | 7,055.00 |
| Queries per second | 70,540.00 | 70,550.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.54 | 0.33 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.42 | 1.42 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 7.03 | 7.12 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.89 | 2.07 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 7,291.00 | 6,592.00 |
| Queries per second | 72,910.00 | 65,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.43 | 0.43 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.37 | 1.52 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.61 | 3.28 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.79 | 2.03 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 5,834.00 | 5,138.00 |
| Queries per second | 58,340.00 | 51,380.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.9 | 1.07 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.71 | 1.94 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 27.72 | 39.78 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.66 | 2.81 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 6,219.00 | 4,781.00 |
| Queries per second | 62,190.00 | 47,810.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.81 | 1.13 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.61 | 2.09 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 21.32 | 19.23 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.3 | 3.07 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 43,774.00 | 41,513.00 |
| Queries per second | 437,740.00 | 415,130.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.06 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.23 | 0.24 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 18.4 | 11.7 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.44 | 1.67 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 39,401.10 | 62,073.25 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 37,411.15 | 58,719.91 |
| SET per Second | 39,682.54 | 54,171.18 |
| GET per Second | 39,354.59 | 64,308.68 |
| INCR per Second | 39,714.06 | 55,648.30 |
| LPUSH per Second | 39,714.06 | 55,493.89 |
| RPUSH per Second | 40,371.42 | 52,938.06 |
| LPOP per Second | 39,401.10 | 62,539.09 |
| RPOP per Second | 38,299.50 | 66,269.05 |
| SADD per Second | 38,008.36 | 62,189.05 |
| HSET per Second | 39,200.31 | 55,157.20 |
| SPOP per Second | 38,491.14 | 54,674.69 |
| ZADD per Second | 39,032.00 | 55,035.77 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 39,572.62 | 55,035.77 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 26,609.90 | 37,355.25 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 14,823.60 | 21,715.53 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 10,390.69 | 16,084.93 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 9,089.26 | 14,990.26 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 36,179.45 | 57,770.08 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (1 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.87 | 0.42 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.90 | 0.44 |
| SET | 0.87 | 0.48 |
| GET | 0.87 | 0.40 |
| INCR | 0.86 | 0.47 |
| LPUSH | 0.87 | 0.47 |
| RPUSH | 0.85 | 0.49 |
| LPOP | 0.88 | 0.42 |
| RPOP | 0.90 | 0.39 |
| SADD | 0.90 | 0.42 |
| HSET | 0.88 | 0.47 |
| SPOP | 0.89 | 0.47 |
| ZADD | 0.88 | 0.48 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.86 | 0.47 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 1.31 | 0.78 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 2.41 | 1.26 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 3.43 | 1.71 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 3.92 | 1.91 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.98 | 0.47 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
After comparing the two DigitalOcean instances, it's clear that the Premium AMD (8 GB, 4 Cores) significantly outperforms the Premium AMD (1 GB) in most benchmarks, especially in CPU-intensive and multi-threaded operations, likely due to the increased number of CPU cores and memory. The 4-core instance excels in Redis operations, achieving higher requests per second with lower latency, and demonstrates superior performance in CPU and file I/O benchmarks. However, the 1 GB instance, while less powerful in raw performance metrics, might still be suitable for lighter workloads, small applications, or development environments where the cost savings and resource constraints are acceptable. The 8 GB instance is ideal for demanding applications requiring high concurrency, large memory usage, or intensive computation tasks.
From the friendly human:
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