DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) vs. UpCloud Balanced (2 GB)
Welcome to another round of the VPS Showdown. Today I spun up fresh instances from DigitalOcean and UpCloud and ran some benchmarks. Each instance was spun up with Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64 and were created in the New York area (or close to it). Without further ado, here's the results.
Overview
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Last Benchmarked
Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:03:47 GMT
Thu, 01 Oct 2026 05:05:17 GMT
Linux Distro
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Kernel Version
7.0.0-31-generic
7.0.0-29-generic
MySQL Version
8.4.11-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
8.4.11-0ubuntu0.26.04.1
Redis Version
8.0.5
8.0.5
Location
New York, NY
New York, NY
Monthly Price
$12.00
€13.00
RAM (GB)
2
2
CPU Cores
1
1
Storage (TB)
50
50
Storage Type
SSD
SSD
Transfer (TB)
2
2
Head-to-head
Category winners from the latest benchmarks.
Category
Winner
CPU (events/sec)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Memory (read MiB/s)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Disk I/O (MiB/s)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
MySQL (read/write tps)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Redis (GET/sec)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Value (CPU events per $/mo)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) takes 6 of 6 categories.
CPU
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Vendor
GenuineIntel
AuthenticAMD
Model Name
DO-Regular
AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor
Clock Speed (MHz)
2,294.61
3,295.42
CPU Cache Size (KB)
4,096.00
512.00
BogoMips
4,589.21
6,590.84
Events per Second
370.52
4,733.64
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.05
0.19
Average Latency (ms)
2.69
0.21
Maximum Latency (ms)
14.47
2.28
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
4.57
0.24
Memory
Memory Read
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Operations per second
1,545,738.03
6,924,337.90
Mebibytes per second
1,509.51
6,762.05
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
40.5
0.39
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
Memory Write
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Operations per second
2,729,753.92
6,734,576.12
Mebibytes per second
2,665.78
6,576.73
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
149.26
3.06
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
File I/O
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Reads per Second
475.95
2,742.06
Writes per Second
317.30
1,828.04
Fsyncs per Second
1,017.81
5,852.11
Read Mebibytes per Second
7.44
42.84
Written Mebibytes per Second
4.96
28.56
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.55
0.1
Maximum Latency (ms)
115.24
43.15
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.08
0.35
Mutex
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms)
2,875.76
1,334.65
Average Latency (ms)
2,899.88
1,340.93
Maximum Latency (ms)
2,919.44
1,347.94
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2,932.60
1,352.03
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
4,374.00
14,724.00
Queries per second
43,740.00
147,240.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.26
0.44
Average Latency (ms)
2.28
0.68
Maximum Latency (ms)
40.05
2.7
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
2.81
0.83
MySQL Write-only
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
273.00
4,255.00
Queries per second
2,730.00
42,550.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
4.19
0.85
Average Latency (ms)
36.89
2.35
Maximum Latency (ms)
358.42
65.45
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
130.13
3.89
MySQL Read/Write
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
258.00
2,815.00
Queries per second
2,580.00
28,150.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
6.26
1.68
Average Latency (ms)
38.75
3.55
Maximum Latency (ms)
259.21
63.07
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
123.28
5.57
MySQL INSERT
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
796.00
6,031.00
Queries per second
7,960.00
60,310.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.03
0.68
Average Latency (ms)
12.55
1.65
Maximum Latency (ms)
223.21
51.97
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
63.32
2.91
MySQL Bulk INSERT
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
374,315.00
1,870,967.00
Queries per second
3,743,150.00
18,709,670.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.03
0.01
Maximum Latency (ms)
3489.66
243.66
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
MySQL SELECT
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
124,757.00
366,555.00
Queries per second
1,247,570.00
3,665,550.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.04
0.02
Average Latency (ms)
0.08
0.03
Maximum Latency (ms)
168.4
1.64
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.12
0.04
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
2,721.00
6,679.00
Queries per second
27,210.00
66,790.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.36
0.43
Average Latency (ms)
3.67
1.5
Maximum Latency (ms)
34.76
6.15
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
5
2.07
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
2,783.00
10,571.00
Queries per second
27,830.00
105,710.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.51
0.3
Average Latency (ms)
3.59
0.94
Maximum Latency (ms)
10.87
2.5
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
5.28
1.25
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
454.00
6,592.00
Queries per second
4,540.00
65,920.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.46
0.64
Average Latency (ms)
22.01
1.52
Maximum Latency (ms)
345.88
73.34
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
102.97
2.43
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
263.00
6,361.00
Queries per second
2,630.00
63,610.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.54
0.66
Average Latency (ms)
38
1.57
Maximum Latency (ms)
442.22
65.52
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
110.66
2.57
MySQL DELETE
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
1,343.00
101,477.00
Queries per second
13,430.00
1,014,770.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.06
0.02
Average Latency (ms)
7.46
0.1
Maximum Latency (ms)
266.15
48.04
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
34.33
0.17
Redis
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second
35,701.54
48,899.75
PING_MBULK per Second
40,338.84
48,520.13
SET per Second
37,119.52
48,473.10
GET per Second
38,343.56
48,567.27
INCR per Second
36,710.72
48,216.01
LPUSH per Second
35,637.92
48,947.62
RPUSH per Second
34,891.84
48,828.12
LPOP per Second
33,400.13
46,446.82
RPOP per Second
32,615.79
45,808.52
SADD per Second
25,246.15
45,934.77
HSET per Second
28,645.09
45,871.56
SPOP per Second
30,138.64
44,964.03
ZADD per Second
31,735.96
45,955.88
ZPOPMIN per Second
34,770.52
44,306.60
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second
17,424.64
32,530.91
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second
7,678.13
20,462.45
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second
5,190.49
15,964.24
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second
4,344.61
14,490.65
MSET (10 keys) per Second
27,434.84
48,638.13
Redis Average Latency (ms)
DigitalOcean – Regular (2 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
PING_INLINE
0.87
0.60
PING_MBULK
0.75
0.60
SET
0.84
0.62
GET
0.81
0.61
INCR
0.85
0.62
LPUSH
0.88
0.61
RPUSH
0.90
0.62
LPOP
0.94
0.67
RPOP
0.96
0.67
SADD
1.23
0.65
HSET
1.09
0.66
SPOP
1.03
0.66
ZADD
0.98
0.66
ZPOPMIN
0.89
0.67
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
1.84
0.95
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
3.92
1.55
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
5.58
2.01
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
6.57
2.26
MSET (10 keys)
1.39
0.71
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
The UpCloud Balanced (2 GB) instance wins overall due to superior performance in CPU benchmarks, specifically the events per second at 5201.01 compared to the DigitalOcean Regular (2 GB) at 1293.78. While both instances offer similar memory and I/O speeds, the AMD EPYC 9575F on UpCloud provides significantly better processing power which is crucial for CPU-intensive tasks. Opt for the UpCloud instance if you need high processing capabilities, otherwise, DigitalOcean might suffice for more balanced workloads.
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.
