Welcome to another round of the VPS Showdown. Today I spun up fresh instances from Linode and UpCloud and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. All instances were running Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64 and were created in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Last Benchmarked
Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:29:06 GMT
Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:32:51 GMT
Linux Distro
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS x64
Kernel Version
7.0.0-22-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
Newark, NJ
New York, NY
Monthly Price
$5.00
€13.00
RAM (GB)
1
2
CPU Cores
1
1
Storage (TB)
25
50
Storage Type
SSD
SSD
Transfer (TB)
1
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)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) takes 5 of 6 categories.
CPU
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Vendor
AuthenticAMD
AuthenticAMD
Model Name
AMD EPYC 7713 64-Core Processor
AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor
Clock Speed (MHz)
2,000.00
3,295.48
CPU Cache Size (KB)
512.00
512.00
BogoMips
4,000.00
6,590.95
Events per Second
2,995.79
4,956.10
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.3
0.18
Average Latency (ms)
0.33
0.2
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.68
2.23
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.34
0.21
Memory
Memory Read
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Operations per second
5,138,712.44
7,348,809.99
Mebibytes per second
5,018.27
7,176.57
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
0.36
0.4
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
Memory Write
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Operations per second
5,126,038.83
7,078,785.07
Mebibytes per second
5,005.90
6,912.88
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
2.06
1.2
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
File I/O
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Reads per Second
3,144.54
3,766.66
Writes per Second
2,096.29
2,511.11
Fsyncs per Second
6,714.53
8,036.14
Read Mebibytes per Second
49.13
58.85
Written Mebibytes per Second
32.75
39.24
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.08
0.07
Maximum Latency (ms)
40.23
19.19
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.19
0.24
Mutex
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Minimum Latency (ms)
1,726.97
1,248.77
Average Latency (ms)
1,752.52
1,256.62
Maximum Latency (ms)
1,763.59
1,260.30
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1,771.29
1,258.08
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
7,323.00
16,759.00
Queries per second
73,230.00
167,590.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.26
0.41
Average Latency (ms)
1.36
0.6
Maximum Latency (ms)
3.63
2.26
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.58
0.75
MySQL Write-only
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
4,970.00
6,115.00
Queries per second
49,700.00
61,150.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
1.15
0.73
Average Latency (ms)
2.02
1.63
Maximum Latency (ms)
99.24
30.18
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
3.19
2.76
MySQL Read/Write
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
3,294.00
4,692.00
Queries per second
32,940.00
46,920.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
2.51
1.24
Average Latency (ms)
3.03
2.13
Maximum Latency (ms)
24.98
23.43
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
3.68
2.86
MySQL INSERT
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
11,632.00
8,886.00
Queries per second
116,320.00
88,860.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.65
0.5
Average Latency (ms)
0.86
1.12
Maximum Latency (ms)
6.61
26.84
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.14
1.93
MySQL Bulk INSERT
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
1,201,092.00
2,278,717.00
Queries per second
12,010,920.00
22,787,170.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0
0
Average Latency (ms)
0.01
0
Maximum Latency (ms)
468.92
236.89
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0
0
MySQL SELECT
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
140,938.00
425,431.00
Queries per second
1,409,380.00
4,254,310.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.05
0.02
Average Latency (ms)
0.07
0.02
Maximum Latency (ms)
1.49
1.3
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.12
0.03
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
6,603.00
9,684.00
Queries per second
66,030.00
96,840.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.52
0.29
Average Latency (ms)
1.51
1.03
Maximum Latency (ms)
9.28
5.24
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.96
1.37
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
7,697.00
15,489.00
Queries per second
76,970.00
154,890.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.49
0.15
Average Latency (ms)
1.3
0.64
Maximum Latency (ms)
4.02
2.79
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.7
0.99
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
11,465.00
10,759.00
Queries per second
114,650.00
107,590.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.66
0.46
Average Latency (ms)
0.87
0.93
Maximum Latency (ms)
43.16
34.7
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.1
1.39
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
11,672.00
11,023.00
Queries per second
116,720.00
110,230.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.67
0.45
Average Latency (ms)
0.86
0.91
Maximum Latency (ms)
24.29
33.4
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
1.1
1.32
MySQL DELETE
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
Transactions per second
94,623.00
212,798.00
Queries per second
946,230.00
2,127,980.00
Minimum Latency (ms)
0.05
0.02
Average Latency (ms)
0.11
0.05
Maximum Latency (ms)
10.28
19.8
95th Percentile Latency (ms)
0.19
0.05
Redis
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
PING_INLINE per Second
38,446.75
55,126.79
PING_MBULK per Second
38,505.97
54,794.52
SET per Second
39,123.63
55,710.31
GET per Second
38,804.81
55,340.34
INCR per Second
39,169.61
54,734.54
LPUSH per Second
39,215.69
52,994.17
RPUSH per Second
39,184.95
56,689.34
LPOP per Second
39,323.63
57,240.98
RPOP per Second
39,093.04
57,110.22
SADD per Second
38,008.36
55,401.66
HSET per Second
40,160.64
55,218.11
SPOP per Second
38,714.67
55,524.71
ZADD per Second
40,064.10
56,561.09
ZPOPMIN per Second
39,169.61
53,191.49
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second
25,163.56
45,998.16
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second
13,114.75
24,987.51
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second
8,311.86
18,031.01
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second
7,606.30
16,369.29
MSET (10 keys) per Second
37,821.48
54,884.74
Redis Average Latency (ms)
Linode – Nanode (1 GB)
UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB)
PING_INLINE
0.78
0.54
PING_MBULK
0.78
0.53
SET
0.79
0.55
GET
0.77
0.55
INCR
0.78
0.56
LPUSH
0.79
0.58
RPUSH
0.79
0.54
LPOP
0.80
0.54
RPOP
0.80
0.54
SADD
0.81
0.55
HSET
0.78
0.56
SPOP
0.78
0.54
ZADD
0.78
0.55
ZPOPMIN
0.77
0.56
LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements)
1.27
0.71
LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements)
2.28
1.29
LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements)
3.35
1.77
LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements)
3.57
2.06
MSET (10 keys)
0.86
0.65
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
The UpCloud Balanced instance outperforms the Linode Nanode in most benchmarks, especially in Redis operations where it achieves higher request per second (rps) rates such as 55,710.31 rps for SET compared to Linode's 39,123.63 rps, and in MySQL bulk insert transactions with 226,686.27 transactions per second (tps) compared to Linode's 119,357.91 tps. These results suggest that for use cases that require high throughput and low latency, such as real-time data processing or high-traffic web applications, the UpCloud Balanced instance is the better choice.
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 Linode and UpCloud.
