DigitalOcean Regular (1 GB) vs. UpCloud Balanced (1 GB)
Fresh benchmarks coming at ya. Today I've got brand new 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 – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Last Benchmarked
Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:28:23 GMT
Thu, 09 Jul 2026 00:42:22 GMT
Linux Distro
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Kernel Version
7.0.0-27-generic
7.0.0-14-generic
MySQL Version
8.4.10-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
8.4.10-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
Redis Version
8.0.5
8.0.5
Location
New York, NY
New York, NY
Monthly Price
$6.00
€7.00
RAM (GB)
1
1
CPU Cores
1
1
Storage (TB)
25
25
Storage Type
SSD
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)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Redis (GET/sec)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Value (CPU events per $/mo)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB) takes 5 of 5 categories.
CPU
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Vendor
GenuineIntel
AuthenticAMD
Model Name
DO-Regular
AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor
Clock Speed (MHz)
2,294.60
3,295.46
CPU Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
512.00
BogoMips
4,589.20
6,590.91
Events per Second
843.27
5,281.40
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.05
0.17
Average Latency (ms)
1.18
0.19
Maximum Latency (ms)
2.34
5.63
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.47
0.21
Memory
Memory Read
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
3,368,867.41
7,916,721.84
Mebibytes per second
3,289.91
7,731.17
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
5.83
0.56
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
Memory Write
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Operations per second
3,248,162.62
7,831,276.08
Mebibytes per second
3,172.03
7,647.73
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
4.26
0.33
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
File I/O
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Reads per Second
545.13
3,918.58
Writes per Second
363.42
2,612.35
Fsyncs per Second
1,169.66
8,362.41
Read Mebibytes per Second
8.52
61.23
Written Mebibytes per Second
5.68
40.82
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.48
0.07
Maximum Latency (ms)
78.76
56.19
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.79
0.2
Mutex
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms)
2,099.34
1,149.76
Average Latency (ms)
2,145.49
1,155.73
Maximum Latency (ms)
2,160.95
1,166.28
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2,159.29
1,170.65
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
5,001.00
0.00
Queries per second
50,010.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.21
0
Average Latency (ms)
2
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
17.66
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.66
0
MySQL Write-only
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
738.00
0.00
Queries per second
7,380.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
4.83
0
Average Latency (ms)
13.55
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
58.05
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
25.28
0
MySQL Read/Write
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
613.00
0.00
Queries per second
6,130.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
7.34
0
Average Latency (ms)
16.32
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
67.72
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
30.81
0
MySQL INSERT
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
1,035.00
0.00
Queries per second
10,350.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
3.79
0
Average Latency (ms)
9.65
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
48.93
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
16.71
0
MySQL Bulk INSERT
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
734,741.00
0.00
Queries per second
7,347,410.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.01
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
888.59
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
MySQL SELECT
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
128,886.00
0.00
Queries per second
1,288,860.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.05
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.08
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
4.52
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.12
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
2,691.00
0.00
Queries per second
26,910.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.22
0
Average Latency (ms)
3.71
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
15.34
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
5.28
0
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
3,433.00
0.00
Queries per second
34,330.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.79
0
Average Latency (ms)
2.91
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
7.06
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
5
0
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
1,000.00
0.00
Queries per second
10,000.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
3.62
0
Average Latency (ms)
9.99
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
38.48
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
18.28
0
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
835.00
0.00
Queries per second
8,350.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
3.33
0
Average Latency (ms)
11.98
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
340.24
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
24.38
0
MySQL DELETE
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
Transactions per second
3,488.00
0.00
Queries per second
34,880.00
0.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.04
0
Average Latency (ms)
2.87
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
57.43
0
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
14.73
0
Redis
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second
32,051.28
45,871.56
PING_MBULK per Second
29,629.63
57,870.37
SET per Second
30,571.69
60,096.15
GET per Second
26,511.13
59,347.18
INCR per Second
36,469.73
58,997.05
LPUSH per Second
26,709.40
60,024.01
RPUSH per Second
23,741.69
59,206.63
LPOP per Second
29,700.03
59,952.04
RPOP per Second
28,985.51
59,206.63
SADD per Second
29,700.03
58,754.41
HSET per Second
29,770.77
58,275.06
SPOP per Second
28,473.80
59,559.26
ZADD per Second
29,806.26
61,312.08
ZPOPMIN per Second
31,104.20
61,050.06
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second
17,519.27
45,392.64
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second
7,340.53
25,859.84
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second
5,113.52
16,854.88
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second
4,561.42
17,455.05
MSET (10 keys) per Second
30,562.35
49,578.58
Redis Average Latency (ms)
DigitalOcean – Regular (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (1 GB)
PING_INLINE
0.97
0.73
PING_MBULK
1.03
0.51
SET
1.03
0.51
GET
1.18
0.51
INCR
0.85
0.52
LPUSH
1.18
0.52
RPUSH
1.31
0.52
LPOP
1.05
0.52
RPOP
1.08
0.53
SADD
1.04
0.52
HSET
1.05
0.53
SPOP
1.08
0.50
ZADD
1.05
0.51
ZPOPMIN
0.99
0.50
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
1.84
0.72
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
4.07
1.24
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
5.66
1.89
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
6.31
1.79
MSET (10 keys)
1.25
0.71
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
In the benchmarks, UpCloud's Balanced (1 GB) instance outperforms DigitalOcean's Regular (1 GB) instance, especially in CPU and Redis benchmarks, with significantly higher request per second (RPS) and lower latency across various operations, driven by the higher clock speed and larger cache size of the AMD EPYC processor. For use cases prioritizing high throughput and low latency, such as high-traffic web applications and real-time data processing, UpCloud's offering is superior; however, for scenarios where cost is a primary concern and the workload does not demand extreme performance, DigitalOcean's instance provides a viable alternative.
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.
