DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) vs. Linode Nanode (1 GB)
Fresh benchmarks coming at ya. Today I've spun up some brand new instance from DigitalOcean and Linode and did some benchmarking. All instances were spun up with Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and were created in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Let's get into the numbers.
Overview
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Thu, 28 May 2026 05:00:52 GMT | Fri, 29 May 2026 15:00:53 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-71-generic | 6.8.0-111-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 | $18.00 | $5.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 2 | 1 |
| CPU Cores | 2 | 1 |
| Storage (TB) | 60 | 25 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 3 | 1 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | GenuineIntel | AuthenticAMD |
| Model Name | DO-Regular | AMD EPYC 7642 48-Core Processor |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 2,294.61 | 2,300.00 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 4,096.00 | 512.00 |
| BogoMips | 4,589.21 | 4,599.99 |
| Events per Second | 807.30 | 1,022.23 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.94 | 0.61 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.24 | 0.98 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.29 | 5.4 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.44 | 2.39 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 3,185,638.65 | 5,296,233.64 |
| Mebibytes per second | 3,110.98 | 5,172.10 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1.13 | 3.05 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 3,216,644.03 | 5,154,651.90 |
| Mebibytes per second | 3,141.25 | 5,033.84 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.62 | 3.06 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 1,049.00 | 2,055.76 |
| Writes per Second | 699.30 | 1,370.51 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 2,243.17 | 4,389.22 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 16.39 | 32.12 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 10.93 | 21.41 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.25 | 0.13 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 60.15 | 12.79 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.87 | 0.35 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1,886.16 | 1,633.32 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1,904.79 | 1,644.62 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1,918.38 | 1,653.29 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1,903.57 | 1,648.20 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,214.00 | 7,575.00 |
| Queries per second | 32,140.00 | 75,750.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.4 | 1.22 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.11 | 1.32 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 20.32 | 4.67 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.82 | 1.42 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,306.00 | 5,800.00 |
| Queries per second | 13,060.00 | 58,000.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 3.45 | 1.15 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 7.65 | 1.72 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 70.93 | 12.35 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 13.95 | 2.39 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 954.00 | 2,955.00 |
| Queries per second | 9,540.00 | 29,550.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 5.65 | 2.64 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 10.47 | 3.38 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 47.42 | 22.69 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 17.32 | 4.41 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,283.00 | 8,921.00 |
| Queries per second | 22,830.00 | 89,210.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.49 | 0.65 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 4.39 | 1.12 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 58.71 | 8.92 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.17 | 1.42 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 767,507.00 | 1,288,467.00 |
| Queries per second | 7,675,070.00 | 12,884,670.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 822.39 | 398.24 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 98,987.00 | 170,179.00 |
| Queries per second | 989,870.00 | 1,701,790.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.1 | 0.06 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 10.28 | 7.27 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.14 | 0.08 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,812.00 | 7,819.00 |
| Queries per second | 28,120.00 | 78,190.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.09 | 0.42 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.55 | 1.28 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 33.87 | 6.03 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.09 | 1.64 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,941.00 | 7,328.00 |
| Queries per second | 29,410.00 | 73,280.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.95 | 0.3 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.39 | 1.36 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 19.52 | 4.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5 | 1.76 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,087.00 | 8,603.00 |
| Queries per second | 20,870.00 | 86,030.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.43 | 0.69 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 4.79 | 1.16 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 60.74 | 6.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 8.28 | 1.7 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,090.00 | 7,719.00 |
| Queries per second | 20,900.00 | 77,190.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.26 | 0.65 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 4.78 | 1.29 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 35.52 | 54.76 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 8.58 | 1.73 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 11,298.00 | 80,451.00 |
| Queries per second | 112,980.00 | 804,510.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.05 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.88 | 0.12 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 22.88 | 16.14 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.57 | 0.42 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 42,517.01 | 44,052.86 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 44,150.11 | 44,563.28 |
| SET per Second | 47,755.49 | 44,072.28 |
| GET per Second | 47,824.00 | 44,345.89 |
| INCR per Second | 47,755.49 | 42,535.09 |
| LPUSH per Second | 47,801.15 | 41,545.49 |
| RPUSH per Second | 44,365.57 | 37,299.52 |
| LPOP per Second | 46,210.72 | 43,327.55 |
| RPOP per Second | 49,578.58 | 43,103.45 |
| SADD per Second | 47,596.38 | 43,994.72 |
| HSET per Second | 48,756.70 | 43,956.04 |
| SPOP per Second | 49,115.91 | 44,130.62 |
| ZADD per Second | 44,189.13 | 42,390.84 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 50,968.40 | 43,159.26 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 25,233.41 | 28,843.38 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 11,865.21 | 15,153.81 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 8,563.84 | 10,595.47 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 7,423.90 | 9,122.42 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 55,741.36 | 40,112.31 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Linode – Nanode (1 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.68 | 0.78 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.73 | 0.77 |
| SET | 0.78 | 0.78 |
| GET | 0.56 | 0.77 |
| INCR | 0.56 | 0.80 |
| LPUSH | 0.55 | 0.82 |
| RPUSH | 0.59 | 0.90 |
| LPOP | 0.57 | 0.80 |
| RPOP | 0.54 | 0.80 |
| SADD | 0.57 | 0.78 |
| HSET | 0.55 | 0.79 |
| SPOP | 0.53 | 0.77 |
| ZADD | 0.59 | 0.81 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.51 | 0.79 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 1.25 | 1.23 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 2.60 | 2.38 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 3.55 | 3.44 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 4.05 | 3.96 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.62 | 0.88 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
After analyzing the benchmark results of both instances, it is clear that the DigitalOcean Regular instance outperforms the Linode Nanode instance across a wide array of metrics, particularly in CPU and memory operations where it shows significantly higher request rates per second (rps) and lower latencies for most Redis commands, MySQL operations, and file I/O operations. This suggests that the DigitalOcean instance is better suited for CPU-intensive and I/O-heavy workloads. In contrast, the Linode Nanode, while providing a powerful CPU in a single-core configuration, lags behind in terms of overall throughput and lower request rates, indicating it might be more cost-effective but less powerful for high-demand scenarios. Therefore, for applications requiring high performance and throughput, the DigitalOcean instance is recommended, while the Linode Nanode could be suitable for more budget-conscious, lower-demand applications.
From the friendly human:
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