DigitalOcean Premium Intel (2 GB) vs. UpCloud Balanced (1 GB)
New day, new benchmarks. Today I spun up fresh instances from DigitalOcean and UpCloud to run some benchmarks on. All instances were running Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64 and were created in the New York area (or close to it). Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Last Benchmarked
Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:08:17 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
$16.00
€7.00
RAM (GB)
2
1
CPU Cores
1
1
Storage (TB)
70
25
Storage Type
NVMe
SSD
Transfer (TB)
2
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)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Redis (GET/sec)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
Value (CPU events per $/mo)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB) takes 4 of 5 categories.
CPU
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Vendor
GenuineIntel
AuthenticAMD
Model Name
DO-Premium-Intel
AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor
Clock Speed (MHz)
1,995.31
3,295.42
CPU Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
512.00
BogoMips
3,990.62
6,590.84
Events per Second
1,383.84
4,771.17
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.5
0.19
Average Latency (ms)
0.72
0.21
Maximum Latency (ms)
26.1
4.26
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.35
0.23
Memory
Memory Read
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
4,333,625.92
6,936,402.22
Mebibytes per second
4,232.06
6,773.83
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
2.09
0.35
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
Memory Write
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
4,219,640.73
6,762,728.29
Mebibytes per second
4,120.74
6,604.23
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
1.16
5.65
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
File I/O
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Reads per Second
2,349.38
2,763.16
Writes per Second
1,566.26
1,842.11
Fsyncs per Second
5,019.91
5,897.24
Read Mebibytes per Second
36.71
43.17
Written Mebibytes per Second
24.47
28.78
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.11
0.09
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.32
44.23
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.41
0.3
Mutex
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms)
2,294.95
1,275.54
Average Latency (ms)
2,302.17
1,282.62
Maximum Latency (ms)
2,308.09
1,289.72
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2,320.55
1,280.93
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
8,290.00
0.00
Queries per second
82,900.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.02
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.2
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.93
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.82
0
MySQL Write-only
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
4,835.00
0.00
Queries per second
48,350.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.03
0
Average Latency (ms)
2.06
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
28.71
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.86
0
MySQL Read/Write
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
2,440.00
0.00
Queries per second
24,400.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.47
0
Average Latency (ms)
4.09
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
34.94
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
5.77
0
MySQL INSERT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
8,740.00
0.00
Queries per second
87,400.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.61
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.14
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
31.28
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.86
0
MySQL Bulk INSERT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
1,201,092.00
0.00
Queries per second
12,010,920.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.01
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
416.59
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
MySQL SELECT
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
233,729.00
0.00
Queries per second
2,337,290.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
1.09
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.06
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
5,487.00
0.00
Queries per second
54,870.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.53
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.82
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
7.49
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.76
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
6,975.00
0.00
Queries per second
69,750.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.49
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.43
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
4.05
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.11
0
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
8,563.00
0.00
Queries per second
85,630.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.61
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.17
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
31.11
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.86
0
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
7,986.00
0.00
Queries per second
79,860.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.64
0
Average Latency (ms)
1.25
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
33.18
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.96
0
MySQL DELETE
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
90,875.00
0.00
Queries per second
908,750.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.11
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
22.2
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.19
0
Redis
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second
65,876.16
36,218.76
PING_MBULK per Second
63,856.96
45,454.54
SET per Second
62,972.29
48,449.61
GET per Second
57,339.45
48,685.49
INCR per Second
61,538.46
48,449.61
LPUSH per Second
66,889.63
50,175.61
RPUSH per Second
64,892.93
48,828.12
LPOP per Second
65,359.48
50,942.43
RPOP per Second
63,572.79
49,603.17
SADD per Second
63,613.23
47,438.33
HSET per Second
66,489.37
48,685.49
SPOP per Second
54,112.55
46,403.71
ZADD per Second
65,487.89
47,687.18
ZPOPMIN per Second
64,557.78
47,103.16
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second
38,895.37
36,114.12
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second
18,539.12
23,266.64
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second
12,931.59
15,227.65
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second
11,428.57
11,837.12
MSET (10 keys) per Second
58,105.75
44,964.03
Redis Average Latency (ms)
DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE
0.48
0.88
PING_MBULK
0.49
0.64
SET
0.51
0.63
GET
0.55
0.61
INCR
0.51
0.62
LPUSH
0.48
0.61
RPUSH
0.49
0.62
LPOP
0.49
0.61
RPOP
0.50
0.62
SADD
0.50
0.63
HSET
0.48
0.62
SPOP
0.59
0.64
ZADD
0.49
0.65
ZPOPMIN
0.49
0.63
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
0.85
0.87
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
1.72
1.38
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
2.59
2.08
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
2.86
2.62
MSET (10 keys)
0.69
0.76
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
Based on the benchmark results, DigitalOcean's Premium Intel (2 GB) instance outperforms UpCloud's Balanced (1 GB) instance, particularly in CPU-intensive operations and memory throughput, where it registers significantly higher request per second (rps) rates across various Redis commands and superior memory operations per second. For applications requiring high CPU performance and memory efficiency, such as database management and high-frequency data processing tasks, the DigitalOcean instance is the better 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.
