DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) vs. DigitalOcean Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores)
Fresh benchmarks coming at ya. Today I've spun up some brand new instance from DigitalOcean and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. Each instance was running 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 – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Tue, 12 May 2026 23:00:52 GMT | Mon, 11 May 2026 22:00:52 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 | $12.00 | $32.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 2 | 4 |
| CPU Cores | 1 | 2 |
| Storage (TB) | 50 | 120 |
| Storage Type | SSD | NVMe |
| Transfer (TB) | 2 | 4 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | GenuineIntel | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | DO-Regular | DO-Premium-Intel |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 2,294.61 | 2,494.14 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 4,096.00 | 4,096.00 |
| BogoMips | 4,589.21 | 4,988.27 |
| Events per Second | 408.72 | 992.83 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.98 | 0.86 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.44 | 1.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 30.57 | 7.23 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.1 | 1.25 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 1,633,276.41 | 4,905,242.82 |
| Mebibytes per second | 1,595.00 | 4,790.28 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.35 | 0.19 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 1,592,941.48 | 4,815,991.25 |
| Mebibytes per second | 1,555.61 | 4,703.12 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.53 | 0.18 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 1,584.78 | 4,785.00 |
| Writes per Second | 1,056.52 | 3,190.00 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 3,385.97 | 10,212.70 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 24.76 | 74.77 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 16.51 | 49.84 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.16 | 0.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 20.31 | 7.33 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.51 | 0.18 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2,434.32 | 822.70 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2,473.55 | 935.98 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2,489.41 | 1,001.22 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2,493.86 | 995.51 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,752.00 | 7,787.00 |
| Queries per second | 47,520.00 | 77,870.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.23 | 1.11 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.1 | 1.28 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.76 | 2.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.66 | 1.44 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,930.00 | 6,999.00 |
| Queries per second | 19,300.00 | 69,990.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.65 | 0.79 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 5.18 | 1.43 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 56.83 | 13.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.98 | 2 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,306.00 | 3,678.00 |
| Queries per second | 13,060.00 | 36,780.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 4.6 | 1.93 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 7.65 | 2.72 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 28.54 | 12.01 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 10.09 | 3.68 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,148.00 | 12,193.00 |
| Queries per second | 31,480.00 | 121,930.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.72 | 0.46 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.17 | 0.82 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 32.67 | 14.57 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.41 | 1.18 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 669,209.00 | 1,550,592.00 |
| Queries per second | 6,692,090.00 | 15,505,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.02 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 772.1 | 364.28 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 136,020.00 | 201,090.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,360,200.00 | 2,010,900.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.07 | 0.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.33 | 1.3 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.11 | 0.07 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,617.00 | 7,612.00 |
| Queries per second | 36,170.00 | 76,120.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.82 | 0.46 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.76 | 1.31 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 12.27 | 4.34 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.82 | 1.67 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,087.00 | 7,371.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,870.00 | 73,710.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.67 | 0.46 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.23 | 1.36 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 8.52 | 3.43 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.18 | 1.82 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,586.00 | 11,702.00 |
| Queries per second | 25,860.00 | 117,020.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.8 | 0.47 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.86 | 0.85 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 45.13 | 18.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.21 | 1.21 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,094.00 | 11,879.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,940.00 | 118,790.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.83 | 0.45 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.23 | 0.84 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 35.75 | 13.93 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.65 | 1.16 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 19,562.00 | 123,827.00 |
| Queries per second | 195,620.00 | 1,238,270.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.51 | 0.08 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 32.94 | 15.57 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.02 | 0.1 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 39,729.84 | 91,157.70 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 42,176.30 | 97,847.36 |
| SET per Second | 40,833.00 | 102,774.92 |
| GET per Second | 34,590.11 | 102,040.81 |
| INCR per Second | 35,410.77 | 102,354.15 |
| LPUSH per Second | 39,184.95 | 100,908.17 |
| RPUSH per Second | 36,509.68 | 100,704.94 |
| LPOP per Second | 36,791.76 | 98,619.32 |
| RPOP per Second | 38,834.95 | 97,847.36 |
| SADD per Second | 35,727.05 | 99,403.58 |
| HSET per Second | 35,790.98 | 99,502.48 |
| SPOP per Second | 39,478.88 | 99,009.90 |
| ZADD per Second | 38,850.04 | 102,564.10 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 40,338.84 | 102,354.15 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 17,461.15 | 65,445.03 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 7,711.29 | 30,571.69 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 4,860.50 | 19,650.22 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 4,094.67 | 16,854.88 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 32,041.01 | 106,837.61 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.83 | 0.28 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.78 | 0.27 |
| SET | 0.82 | 0.26 |
| GET | 0.94 | 0.26 |
| INCR | 0.93 | 0.26 |
| LPUSH | 0.85 | 0.26 |
| RPUSH | 0.91 | 0.26 |
| LPOP | 0.92 | 0.26 |
| RPOP | 0.87 | 0.32 |
| SADD | 0.92 | 0.26 |
| HSET | 0.93 | 0.26 |
| SPOP | 0.84 | 0.27 |
| ZADD | 0.86 | 0.26 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.82 | 0.25 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 2.05 | 0.44 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 4.59 | 0.95 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 7.19 | 1.50 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 8.42 | 1.71 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 1.12 | 0.31 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
In terms of raw performance, the DigitalOcean Premium Intel instance (4 GB, 2 cores) significantly outperforms the Regular instance (2 GB, 1 core) in all benchmark metrics, with higher RPS rates, lower latency across all Redis commands, faster CPU and memory throughput, and better file I/O operations. This is primarily due to the additional CPU cores, higher RAM, and NVMe storage, which translate to faster processing speeds and lower wait times for both basic operations and more complex tasks like bulk inserts in MySQL. For users needing high concurrency and rapid data access, such as those running high-traffic web applications or demanding databases, the Premium Intel instance would be the better choice. Conversely, the Regular instance may suffice for less demanding workloads, offering adequate performance for smaller applications or those prioritizing cost efficiency over absolute speed.
From the friendly human:
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