DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) vs. UpCloud Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores)
Same showdown, different day. Today I've spun up some brand new instance from DigitalOcean and UpCloud to run some benchmarks on. Each instance was running 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) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Tue, 12 May 2026 23:00:52 GMT | Mon, 11 May 2026 07:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-71-generic | 6.8.0-111-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 | New York, NY |
| Monthly Price | $12.00 | €18.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 2 | 2 |
| CPU Cores | 1 | 2 |
| Storage (TB) | 50 | 60 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 2 | 3 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | GenuineIntel | AuthenticAMD |
| Model Name | DO-Regular | AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 2,294.61 | 3,295.48 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 4,096.00 | 512.00 |
| BogoMips | 4,589.21 | 6,590.95 |
| Events per Second | 408.72 | 5,300.78 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.98 | 0.17 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.44 | 0.19 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 30.57 | 0.99 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.1 | 0.21 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 1,633,276.41 | 7,390,852.19 |
| Mebibytes per second | 1,595.00 | 7,217.63 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.35 | 0.18 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 1,592,941.48 | 7,405,479.75 |
| Mebibytes per second | 1,555.61 | 7,231.91 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.53 | 0.53 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 1,584.78 | 876.47 |
| Writes per Second | 1,056.52 | 584.31 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 3,385.97 | 1,869.90 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 24.76 | 13.69 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 16.51 | 9.13 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.16 | 0.3 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 20.31 | 115.92 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.51 | 1.93 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2,434.32 | 611.59 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2,473.55 | 643.08 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2,489.41 | 670.63 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2,493.86 | 669.89 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,752.00 | 17,779.00 |
| Queries per second | 47,520.00 | 177,790.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.23 | 0.35 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.1 | 0.56 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.76 | 15.08 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.66 | 0.75 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,930.00 | 893.00 |
| Queries per second | 19,300.00 | 8,930.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.65 | 1.04 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 5.18 | 11.2 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 56.83 | 44.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.98 | 18.61 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,306.00 | 628.00 |
| Queries per second | 13,060.00 | 6,280.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 4.6 | 2.35 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 7.65 | 15.94 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 28.54 | 109.26 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 10.09 | 34.95 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,148.00 | 709.00 |
| Queries per second | 31,480.00 | 7,090.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.72 | 0.95 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.17 | 14.11 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 32.67 | 133.38 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.41 | 23.1 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 669,209.00 | 1,317,592.00 |
| Queries per second | 6,692,090.00 | 13,175,920.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.02 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 772.1 | 1451.73 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 136,020.00 | 526,986.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,360,200.00 | 5,269,860.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.01 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.07 | 0.02 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.33 | 14.74 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.11 | 0.03 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,617.00 | 13,152.00 |
| Queries per second | 36,170.00 | 131,520.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.82 | 0.21 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.76 | 0.76 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 12.27 | 68.06 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.82 | 1.08 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,087.00 | 13,493.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,870.00 | 134,930.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.67 | 0.21 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.23 | 0.74 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 8.52 | 5.51 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.18 | 1.14 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,586.00 | 560.00 |
| Queries per second | 25,860.00 | 5,600.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.8 | 9.28 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.86 | 17.86 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 45.13 | 373.22 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.21 | 26.68 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,094.00 | 1,042.00 |
| Queries per second | 30,940.00 | 10,420.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.83 | 0.93 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.23 | 9.59 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 35.75 | 75.01 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.65 | 18.61 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 19,562.00 | 2,685.00 |
| Queries per second | 195,620.00 | 26,850.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.01 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.51 | 3.72 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 32.94 | 138.1 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.02 | 15.83 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 39,729.84 | 123,304.56 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 42,176.30 | 117,647.05 |
| SET per Second | 40,833.00 | 181,818.17 |
| GET per Second | 34,590.11 | 221,238.94 |
| INCR per Second | 35,410.77 | 199,203.20 |
| LPUSH per Second | 39,184.95 | 228,310.50 |
| RPUSH per Second | 36,509.68 | 230,414.75 |
| LPOP per Second | 36,791.76 | 235,849.06 |
| RPOP per Second | 38,834.95 | 221,238.94 |
| SADD per Second | 35,727.05 | 226,244.34 |
| HSET per Second | 35,790.98 | 194,931.77 |
| SPOP per Second | 39,478.88 | 114,810.56 |
| ZADD per Second | 38,850.04 | 115,473.45 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 40,338.84 | 109,289.62 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 17,461.15 | 88,105.73 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 7,711.29 | 59,417.71 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 4,860.50 | 30,998.14 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 4,094.67 | 23,266.64 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 32,041.01 | 181,818.17 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB) | UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.83 | 0.25 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.78 | 0.23 |
| SET | 0.82 | 0.15 |
| GET | 0.94 | 0.12 |
| INCR | 0.93 | 0.13 |
| LPUSH | 0.85 | 0.12 |
| RPUSH | 0.91 | 0.12 |
| LPOP | 0.92 | 0.12 |
| RPOP | 0.87 | 0.12 |
| SADD | 0.92 | 0.12 |
| HSET | 0.93 | 0.14 |
| SPOP | 0.84 | 0.24 |
| ZADD | 0.86 | 0.24 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.82 | 0.24 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 2.05 | 0.37 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 4.59 | 0.57 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 7.19 | 1.08 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 8.42 | 1.37 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 1.12 | 0.21 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
After comparing the benchmarks for DigitalOcean's Regular (2 GB) instance and UpCloud's Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) instance, it's clear that UpCloud's instance outperforms in several key areas, especially in Redis operations where it achieves significantly higher requests per second and lower latencies for most commands. UpCloud's AMD EPYC processor also handles CPU-intensive tasks more efficiently, reflected in higher events per second and lower average latencies. While DigitalOcean excels in certain memory operations, such as reads and writes per second, UpCloud offers superior throughput in file I/O operations and generally lower latencies in MySQL benchmarks, making it more suitable for workloads that benefit from multiple cores and lower latency, such as high-traffic web applications or data-intensive processing tasks. DigitalOcean, however, might be preferred for memory-intensive tasks or scenarios where slightly lower costs are a deciding factor.
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.
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