VPS Showdown VPS Showdown

DigitalOcean Premium Intel (2 GB) vs. Vultr High Frequency Intel (1 GB)

vs.

New day, new benchmarks. Today I've got brand new instances from DigitalOcean and Vultr and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. All instances were running Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64 and all resided in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Without further ado, here's the results.

Overview

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Last Benchmarked Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:08:17 GMT Tue, 01 Sep 2026 05:07:32 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 Newark, NJ
Monthly Price $16.00 $6.00
RAM (GB) 2 1
CPU Cores 1 1
Storage (TB) 70 32
Storage Type NVMe NVMe
Transfer (TB) 2 1

Head-to-head

Category winners from the latest benchmarks.

CategoryWinner
CPU (events/sec)Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Memory (read MiB/s)Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Disk I/O (MiB/s)Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
MySQL (read/write tps)Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Redis (GET/sec)DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB)
Value (CPU events per $/mo)Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)

Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB) takes 5 of 6 categories.

CPU

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Vendor GenuineIntel GenuineIntel
Model Name DO-Premium-Intel Intel Core Processor (Skylake, IBRS, no TSX)
Clock Speed (MHz) 1,995.31 3,792.05
CPU Cache Size (KB) 4,096.00 16,384.00
BogoMips 3,990.62 7,584.09
Events per Second 1,383.84 1,436.31
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.5 0.67
Average Latency (ms) 0.72 0.7
Maximum Latency (ms) 26.1 2.3
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 2.35 0.74

Memory

Memory Read

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Operations per second 4,333,625.92 7,256,990.82
Mebibytes per second 4,232.06 7,086.91
Minimum Latency (ms) 0 0
Average Latency (ms) 0 0
Maximum Latency (ms) 2.09 0.25
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0 0

Memory Write

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Operations per second 4,219,640.73 7,404,343.90
Mebibytes per second 4,120.74 7,230.80
Minimum Latency (ms) 0 0
Average Latency (ms) 0 0
Maximum Latency (ms) 1.16 0.55
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0 0

File I/O

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Reads per Second 2,349.38 4,611.83
Writes per Second 1,566.26 3,074.55
Fsyncs per Second 5,019.91 9,847.36
Read Mebibytes per Second 36.71 72.06
Written Mebibytes per Second 24.47 48.04
Minimum Latency (ms) 0 0
Average Latency (ms) 0.11 0.06
Maximum Latency (ms) 3.32 15.14
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0.41 0.15

Mutex

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms) 2,294.95 1,126.89
Average Latency (ms) 2,302.17 1,134.74
Maximum Latency (ms) 2,308.09 1,139.62
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 2,320.55 1,149.76

MySQL

MySQL Read-only

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 8,290.00 9,766.00
Queries per second 82,900.00 97,660.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 1.02 0.94
Average Latency (ms) 1.2 1.02
Maximum Latency (ms) 3.93 5.44
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 1.82 1.16

MySQL Write-only

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 4,835.00 12,445.00
Queries per second 48,350.00 124,450.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 1.03 0.62
Average Latency (ms) 2.06 0.8
Maximum Latency (ms) 28.71 9.27
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 2.86 1.08

MySQL Read/Write

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 2,440.00 5,049.00
Queries per second 24,400.00 50,490.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 2.47 1.67
Average Latency (ms) 4.09 1.98
Maximum Latency (ms) 34.94 9.4
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 5.77 2.43

MySQL INSERT

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 8,740.00 21,580.00
Queries per second 87,400.00 215,800.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.61 0.36
Average Latency (ms) 1.14 0.46
Maximum Latency (ms) 31.28 4.92
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 1.86 0.56

MySQL Bulk INSERT

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 1,201,092.00 1,900,092.00
Queries per second 12,010,920.00 19,000,920.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0 0
Average Latency (ms) 0.01 0.01
Maximum Latency (ms) 416.59 240.35
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0 0

MySQL SELECT

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 233,729.00 210,450.00
Queries per second 2,337,290.00 2,104,500.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.04 0.04
Average Latency (ms) 0.04 0.05
Maximum Latency (ms) 1.09 0.97
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0.06 0.06

MySQL SELECT (Random Points)

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 5,487.00 8,142.00
Queries per second 54,870.00 81,420.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.53 0.37
Average Latency (ms) 1.82 1.23
Maximum Latency (ms) 7.49 3.35
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 2.76 1.86

MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 6,975.00 11,378.00
Queries per second 69,750.00 113,780.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.49 0.29
Average Latency (ms) 1.43 0.88
Maximum Latency (ms) 4.05 6.18
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 2.11 1.14

MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 8,563.00 21,383.00
Queries per second 85,630.00 213,830.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.61 0.37
Average Latency (ms) 1.17 0.47
Maximum Latency (ms) 31.11 4.39
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 1.86 0.62

MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 7,986.00 21,598.00
Queries per second 79,860.00 215,980.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.64 0.36
Average Latency (ms) 1.25 0.46
Maximum Latency (ms) 33.18 11.24
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 1.96 0.62

MySQL DELETE

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
Transactions per second 90,875.00 156,197.00
Queries per second 908,750.00 1,561,970.00
Minimum Latency (ms) 0.04 0.04
Average Latency (ms) 0.11 0.06
Maximum Latency (ms) 22.2 5.53
95th Percentile Latency (ms) 0.19 0.1

Redis

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second 65,876.16 51,098.62
PING_MBULK per Second 63,856.96 50,890.59
SET per Second 62,972.29 50,632.91
GET per Second 57,339.45 50,813.01
INCR per Second 61,538.46 50,632.91
LPUSH per Second 66,889.63 50,942.43
RPUSH per Second 64,892.93 51,020.41
LPOP per Second 65,359.48 51,229.51
RPOP per Second 63,572.79 51,493.30
SADD per Second 63,613.23 51,840.33
HSET per Second 66,489.37 52,301.26
SPOP per Second 54,112.55 52,410.90
ZADD per Second 65,487.89 51,921.08
ZPOPMIN per Second 64,557.78 51,948.05
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second 38,895.37 35,410.77
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second 18,539.12 20,881.19
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second 12,931.59 15,010.51
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second 11,428.57 12,975.22
MSET (10 keys) per Second 58,105.75 49,701.79

Redis Average Latency (ms)

DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (2 GB) Vultr – High Frequency Intel (1 GB)
PING_INLINE0.480.60
PING_MBULK0.490.59
SET0.510.60
GET0.550.60
INCR0.510.60
LPUSH0.480.60
RPUSH0.490.60
LPOP0.490.60
RPOP0.500.60
SADD0.500.59
HSET0.480.59
SPOP0.590.59
ZADD0.490.60
ZPOPMIN0.490.59
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)0.850.89
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)1.721.54
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)2.592.16
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)2.862.42
MSET (10 keys)0.690.66

Conclusion

From the friendly robots:

The DigitalOcean Premium Intel instance outperforms the Vultr High Frequency Intel instance in most benchmarks. The DigitalOcean instance, with 2 GB of RAM vs Vultr's 1 GB, achieves significantly higher rates in Redis operations such as GET rps at 67114.09 vs 50813.01, and in MySQL bulk insert with 119489.7 tps compared to Vultr's 188840.73 tps. While both offer strong performance, DigitalOcean's higher RAM and consistent performance across various benchmarks make it the better choice for applications requiring robust memory and CPU performance, especially those that are CPU-heavy.

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 Vultr.

You can also support me next time you shop on Amazon.

Providers & pricing

DigitalOcean overview Vultr overviewDigitalOcean Premium Intel (2 GB) pricing Vultr High Frequency Intel (1 GB) pricing

Related comparisons

vs. DigitalOcean Regular (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Regular (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium Intel (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium Intel (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium AMD (1 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium AMD (2 GB)