DigitalOcean Premium Intel (1 GB) vs. UpCloud Balanced (1 GB)
Welcome to another round of the VPS Showdown. Today I spun up fresh instances from DigitalOcean and UpCloud and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. Each instance was running Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64 and were created in the New York area (or close to it). Let's get into the numbers.
Overview
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Last Benchmarked
Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:06:48 GMT
Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:02:17 GMT
Linux Distro
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Kernel Version
7.0.0-31-generic
7.0.0-29-generic
MySQL Version
8.4.11-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
8.4.11-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
Redis Version
8.0.5
8.0.5
Location
New York, NY
New York, NY
Monthly Price
$8.00
€7.00
RAM (GB)
1
1
CPU Cores
1
1
Storage (TB)
35
25
Storage Type
NVMe
SSD
Transfer (TB)
1
1
Head-to-head
Category winners from the latest benchmarks.
Category
Winner
CPU (events/sec)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Memory (read MiB/s)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Disk I/O (MiB/s)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
Redis (GET/sec)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
Value (CPU events per $/mo)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB) takes 3 of 5 categories.
CPU
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Vendor
GenuineIntel
AuthenticAMD
Model Name
DO-Premium-Intel
AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor
Clock Speed (MHz)
2,494.14
3,295.42
CPU Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
512.00
BogoMips
4,988.27
6,590.84
Events per Second
990.53
4,771.17
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.93
0.19
Average Latency (ms)
1.01
0.21
Maximum Latency (ms)
1.75
4.26
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.12
0.23
Memory
Memory Read
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
4,986,667.23
6,936,402.22
Mebibytes per second
4,869.79
6,773.83
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
0.41
0.35
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
Memory Write
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
4,811,794.28
6,762,728.29
Mebibytes per second
4,699.02
6,604.23
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
2.38
5.65
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
File I/O
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Reads per Second
3,138.93
2,763.16
Writes per Second
2,092.55
1,842.11
Fsyncs per Second
6,701.92
5,897.24
Read Mebibytes per Second
49.05
43.17
Written Mebibytes per Second
32.70
28.78
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.08
0.09
Maximum Latency (ms)
7.98
44.23
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.24
0.3
Mutex
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms)
1,655.46
1,275.54
Average Latency (ms)
1,661.19
1,282.62
Maximum Latency (ms)
1,666.55
1,289.72
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1,678.14
1,280.93
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
8,768.00
0.00
Queries per second
87,680.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.01
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.14
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
26.98
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.39
0
MySQL Write-only
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
7,876.00
0.00
Queries per second
78,760.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.8
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.27
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
10.49
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.76
0
MySQL Read/Write
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
3,893.00
0.00
Queries per second
38,930.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.06
0
Average Latency (ms)
2.57
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
13.44
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
3.13
0
MySQL INSERT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
14,470.00
0.00
Queries per second
144,700.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.46
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.69
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
10.41
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.99
0
MySQL Bulk INSERT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
1,346,717.00
0.00
Queries per second
13,467,170.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.01
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
324.88
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
MySQL SELECT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
232,319.00
0.00
Queries per second
2,323,190.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.67
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.06
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
5,586.00
0.00
Queries per second
55,860.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.37
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.79
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
9.16
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.39
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
7,682.00
0.00
Queries per second
76,820.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.51
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.3
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.94
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.73
0
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
13,782.00
0.00
Queries per second
137,820.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.48
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.72
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
10.11
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.03
0
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
14,614.00
0.00
Queries per second
146,140.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.47
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.68
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
7.04
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.95
0
MySQL DELETE
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
157,825.00
0.00
Queries per second
1,578,250.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.03
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.06
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
19.19
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.1
0
Redis
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second
64,850.84
36,218.76
PING_MBULK per Second
66,711.14
45,454.54
SET per Second
70,175.44
48,449.61
GET per Second
71,684.59
48,685.49
INCR per Second
72,411.30
48,449.61
LPUSH per Second
69,832.40
50,175.61
RPUSH per Second
71,839.09
48,828.12
LPOP per Second
71,377.59
50,942.43
RPOP per Second
71,942.45
49,603.17
SADD per Second
71,428.57
47,438.33
HSET per Second
67,934.78
48,685.49
SPOP per Second
72,358.90
46,403.71
ZADD per Second
71,123.76
47,687.18
ZPOPMIN per Second
73,746.31
47,103.16
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second
38,476.34
36,114.12
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second
18,198.36
23,266.64
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second
12,655.02
15,227.65
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second
10,430.79
11,837.12
MSET (10 keys) per Second
63,816.21
44,964.03
Redis Average Latency (ms)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE
0.49
0.88
PING_MBULK
0.47
0.64
SET
0.45
0.63
GET
0.44
0.61
INCR
0.44
0.62
LPUSH
0.45
0.61
RPUSH
0.44
0.62
LPOP
0.44
0.61
RPOP
0.44
0.62
SADD
0.44
0.63
HSET
0.47
0.62
SPOP
0.43
0.64
ZADD
0.44
0.65
ZPOPMIN
0.42
0.63
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
0.87
0.87
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
1.78
1.38
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
2.69
2.08
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
3.07
2.62
MSET (10 keys)
0.63
0.76
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
The DigitalOcean Premium Intel (1 GB) instance outperforms the UpCloud Balanced (1 GB) in nearly all benchmark metrics, especially in Redis operations and MySQL bulk insert performance, with significantly higher requests per second (rps) and lower latencies. DigitalOcean's instance provides superior CPU performance with higher events per second and better thread fairness, along with better memory and file I/O operations. For users prioritizing CPU-intensive tasks, low-latency database operations, and efficient file handling, the DigitalOcean instance is the recommended choice.
From the friendly human:
If you found this VPS Showdown helpful in your search for a hosting provider, please consider supporting my efforts by signing up using my referral links for DigitalOcean and UpCloud.
