DigitalOcean Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) vs. Vultr High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores)
Welcome to another round of the VPS Showdown. Today I've spun up brand new instance from DigitalOcean and Vultr 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. Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Tue, 02 Jun 2026 12:00:52 GMT | Sun, 31 May 2026 13:00:55 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 | $48.00 | $18.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 8 | 2 |
| CPU Cores | 4 | 2 |
| Storage (TB) | 160 | 80 |
| Storage Type | SSD | NVMe |
| Transfer (TB) | 5 | 3 |
CPU
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | GenuineIntel | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | DO-Regular | Intel Core Processor (Skylake, IBRS, no TSX) |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 2,494.13 | 3,791.98 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 4,096.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 4,988.26 | 7,583.95 |
| Events per Second | 849.54 | 1,552.05 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.91 | 0.62 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.18 | 0.64 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.42 | 4.61 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.42 | 0.69 |
Memory
Memory Read
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 3,950,075.58 | 7,875,668.83 |
| Mebibytes per second | 3,857.50 | 7,691.08 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.35 | 0.12 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 3,923,868.51 | 7,729,812.11 |
| Mebibytes per second | 3,831.90 | 7,548.64 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.33 | 0.16 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 3,587.28 | 4,671.85 |
| Writes per Second | 2,391.52 | 3,114.56 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 7,652.96 | 9,976.90 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 56.05 | 73.00 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 37.37 | 48.67 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.07 | 0.06 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 9.81 | 2.76 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.28 | 0.17 |
Mutex
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 699.95 | 543.27 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 814.66 | 554.74 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 911.13 | 563.70 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 909.80 | 559.50 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,599.00 | 10,621.00 |
| Queries per second | 35,990.00 | 106,210.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.41 | 0.86 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.77 | 0.94 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 75.96 | 2.5 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.96 | 1.03 |
MySQL Write-only
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,588.00 | 10,229.00 |
| Queries per second | 25,880.00 | 102,290.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.37 | 0.64 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.86 | 0.98 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 24.15 | 2.08 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 7.98 | 1.23 |
MySQL Read/Write
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,484.00 | 5,072.00 |
| Queries per second | 14,840.00 | 50,720.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 3.49 | 1.59 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 6.73 | 1.97 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 84.28 | 3.94 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 11.65 | 2.39 |
MySQL INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,648.00 | 16,038.00 |
| Queries per second | 26,480.00 | 160,380.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.93 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.77 | 0.62 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 54.12 | 13.18 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 8.43 | 0.8 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,055,467.00 | 2,424,342.00 |
| Queries per second | 10,554,670.00 | 24,243,420.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 488.93 | 205.81 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 109,652.00 | 241,313.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,096,520.00 | 2,413,130.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.09 | 0.04 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 13.86 | 0.76 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.13 | 0.05 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,831.00 | 12,080.00 |
| Queries per second | 28,310.00 | 120,800.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.82 | 0.21 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.53 | 0.83 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 41.39 | 3.31 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 8.43 | 1.04 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,881.00 | 10,527.00 |
| Queries per second | 38,810.00 | 105,270.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.62 | 0.16 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.57 | 0.95 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 26.19 | 3.25 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.74 | 1.23 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,006.00 | 17,123.00 |
| Queries per second | 40,060.00 | 171,230.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.64 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.49 | 0.58 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 14.18 | 2 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.91 | 0.78 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,594.00 | 16,979.00 |
| Queries per second | 35,940.00 | 169,790.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.73 | 0.38 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.78 | 0.59 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 28.54 | 4.13 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.77 | 0.8 |
MySQL DELETE
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 16,967.00 | 156,424.00 |
| Queries per second | 169,670.00 | 1,564,240.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.59 | 0.06 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 19.13 | 4.87 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.91 | 0.07 |
Redis
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 55,991.04 | 88,652.48 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 53,050.40 | 89,605.73 |
| SET per Second | 52,882.07 | 90,171.33 |
| GET per Second | 48,732.94 | 90,579.71 |
| INCR per Second | 51,072.52 | 90,744.10 |
| LPUSH per Second | 50,276.52 | 90,497.73 |
| RPUSH per Second | 48,402.71 | 90,415.91 |
| LPOP per Second | 47,415.84 | 90,909.09 |
| RPOP per Second | 55,493.89 | 90,661.83 |
| SADD per Second | 54,200.54 | 90,252.70 |
| HSET per Second | 54,764.51 | 90,415.91 |
| SPOP per Second | 47,014.57 | 89,928.05 |
| ZADD per Second | 55,248.62 | 90,415.91 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 54,288.82 | 90,009.01 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 27,548.21 | 66,533.60 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 15,467.90 | 36,179.45 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 10,514.14 | 26,239.83 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 8,056.72 | 22,547.91 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 45,475.22 | 88,105.73 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| DigitalOcean – Regular (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – High Frequency Intel (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.49 | 0.30 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.50 | 0.29 |
| SET | 0.51 | 0.29 |
| GET | 0.57 | 0.29 |
| INCR | 0.59 | 0.28 |
| LPUSH | 0.67 | 0.29 |
| RPUSH | 0.55 | 0.29 |
| LPOP | 0.56 | 0.28 |
| RPOP | 0.48 | 0.28 |
| SADD | 0.49 | 0.29 |
| HSET | 0.52 | 0.29 |
| SPOP | 0.63 | 0.29 |
| ZADD | 0.48 | 0.29 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.49 | 0.29 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 1.12 | 0.39 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 2.14 | 0.71 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 2.95 | 0.97 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 4.11 | 1.14 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.66 | 0.30 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
When comparing the DigitalOcean Regular instance (8GB RAM, 4 cores) and Vultr High Frequency Intel instance (2GB RAM, 2 cores), the DigitalOcean instance shows stronger overall performance, especially in memory operations and MySQL benchmarks, thanks to its higher RAM and CPU count, although it has marginally higher file I/O latency. The Vultr instance, on the other hand, excels in Redis benchmarks, demonstrating higher requests per second and lower latency, likely due to its more recent CPU model and optimizations for lower frequency, high-performance tasks. The DigitalOcean instance is ideal for CPU and memory-intensive workloads, while the Vultr instance is better suited for Redis-heavy applications and scenarios where lower cost and moderate performance are priorities.
From the friendly human:
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