DigitalOcean Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) vs. Vultr Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores)
Same showdown, different day. Today I've spun up some brand new instance from DigitalOcean and Vultr and did some benchmarking. Each instance was running Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and all resided in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Tue, 02 Jun 2026 06:00:52 GMT | Tue, 02 Jun 2026 06:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-71-generic | 6.8.0-117-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 | Newark, NJ |
| Monthly Price | $64.00 | $20.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 8 | 4 |
| CPU Cores | 4 | 2 |
| Storage (TB) | 240 | 80 |
| Storage Type | NVMe | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 6 | 3 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | GenuineIntel | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | DO-Premium-Intel | Intel Core Processor (Skylake, IBRS, no TSX) |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 1,995.31 | 3,792.06 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 4,096.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 3,990.61 | 7,584.11 |
| Events per Second | 2,100.00 | 1,576.98 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.46 | 0.61 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.48 | 0.63 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.77 | 1.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.49 | 0.67 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 4,031,036.30 | 7,849,685.24 |
| Mebibytes per second | 3,936.56 | 7,665.71 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.09 | 0.06 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 4,327,248.72 | 7,856,320.45 |
| Mebibytes per second | 4,225.83 | 7,672.19 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.18 | 0.06 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 1,848.36 | 8,095.12 |
| Writes per Second | 1,232.24 | 5,396.74 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 3,943.27 | 17,271.28 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 28.88 | 126.49 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 19.25 | 84.32 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.14 | 0.03 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 32.73 | 1.51 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.83 | 0.11 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 496.91 | 464.63 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 678.09 | 547.54 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 755.25 | 583.01 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 759.88 | 580.02 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 5,172.00 | 10,127.00 |
| Queries per second | 51,720.00 | 101,270.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.28 | 0.89 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.93 | 0.99 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 8.32 | 2.49 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.61 | 1.12 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,301.00 | 9,521.00 |
| Queries per second | 23,010.00 | 95,210.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.35 | 0.64 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 4.34 | 1.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 12.64 | 54.22 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.3 | 1.34 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,495.00 | 4,611.00 |
| Queries per second | 14,950.00 | 46,110.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.89 | 1.61 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 6.68 | 2.17 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 19.01 | 16.47 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 10.46 | 2.71 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,010.00 | 16,673.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,100.00 | 166,730.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.11 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.32 | 0.6 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 14.62 | 2.29 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.09 | 0.84 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,201,092.00 | 2,249,592.00 |
| Queries per second | 12,010,920.00 | 22,495,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 566.03 | 217.13 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 157,927.00 | 228,323.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,579,270.00 | 2,283,230.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.06 | 0.04 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.99 | 0.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.09 | 0.06 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 5,434.00 | 10,527.00 |
| Queries per second | 54,340.00 | 105,270.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.45 | 0.29 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.84 | 0.95 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 14.81 | 3.01 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.71 | 1.37 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 6,582.00 | 8,906.00 |
| Queries per second | 65,820.00 | 89,060.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.57 | 0.34 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.52 | 1.12 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.15 | 4.32 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.66 | 2.52 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,033.00 | 16,008.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,330.00 | 160,080.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.29 | 0.62 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 67.75 | 2.17 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.99 | 0.87 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,268.00 | 16,237.00 |
| Queries per second | 32,680.00 | 162,370.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.03 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.06 | 0.62 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 11.49 | 10.07 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.57 | 0.84 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 24,924.00 | 149,460.00 |
| Queries per second | 249,240.00 | 1,494,600.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.4 | 0.07 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 26.64 | 6.92 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.81 | 0.08 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 93,545.37 | 79,617.83 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 87,796.30 | 79,554.50 |
| SET per Second | 93,457.94 | 83,125.52 |
| GET per Second | 94,250.71 | 81,632.65 |
| INCR per Second | 85,106.38 | 81,366.97 |
| LPUSH per Second | 95,057.03 | 75,642.96 |
| RPUSH per Second | 86,505.19 | 80,321.28 |
| LPOP per Second | 89,285.71 | 85,251.49 |
| RPOP per Second | 100,100.10 | 86,355.79 |
| SADD per Second | 90,661.83 | 85,178.88 |
| HSET per Second | 90,415.91 | 84,245.99 |
| SPOP per Second | 96,432.02 | 85,470.09 |
| ZADD per Second | 97,751.71 | 86,730.27 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 97,751.71 | 85,689.80 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 58,997.05 | 63,051.70 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 26,191.72 | 29,940.12 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 15,961.69 | 24,390.24 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 14,390.56 | 21,353.83 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 73,152.89 | 84,175.09 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Premium Intel (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (4 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.28 | 0.33 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.31 | 0.32 |
| SET | 0.31 | 0.32 |
| GET | 0.28 | 0.32 |
| INCR | 0.31 | 0.32 |
| LPUSH | 0.29 | 0.34 |
| RPUSH | 0.32 | 0.32 |
| LPOP | 0.32 | 0.31 |
| RPOP | 0.27 | 0.30 |
| SADD | 0.32 | 0.30 |
| HSET | 0.29 | 0.31 |
| SPOP | 0.30 | 0.30 |
| ZADD | 0.31 | 0.30 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.28 | 0.30 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 0.46 | 0.43 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 1.05 | 0.96 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 2.04 | 1.11 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 2.12 | 1.23 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.49 | 0.31 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
Upon comparison, DigitalOcean's Premium Intel instance offers superior overall performance with higher RPS for Redis operations and better latency across most metrics, suggesting it is better suited for CPU-intensive and I/O-heavy workloads where sustained high throughput and low latency are critical. It also excels in MySQL benchmarks, especially for bulk inserts and complex OLTP operations. Conversely, Vultr's Cloud Compute instance, while providing respectable performance, particularly in memory operations and basic Redis tasks, falls short in CPU and file I/O benchmarks, indicating it is more suitable for less demanding applications that require lower resource consumption and modest throughput. Hence, the DigitalOcean instance is recommended for performance-critical applications, while the Vultr instance could be more cost-effective for simpler or less resource-intensive tasks.
From the friendly human:
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