Linode Linode (4 GB) vs. Vultr Cloud Compute (2 GB)
My friend, I'm so glad you're here! Today I've spun up brand new instance from Linode and Vultr and ran my world famous suite of benchmarking scripts. Each instance was spun up with Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and were created in the New York area (or close to it). Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Thu, 02 Apr 2026 23:00:52 GMT | Fri, 03 Apr 2026 08:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-71-generic | 6.8.0-107-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 | Newark, NJ | Newark, NJ |
| Monthly Price | $24.00 | $10.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 4 | 2 |
| CPU Cores | 2 | 1 |
| Storage (TB) | 80 | 50 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 4 | 2 |
CPU
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | AuthenticAMD | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | AMD EPYC 7642 48-Core Processor | Intel Xeon Processor (Skylake, IBRS) |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 2,300.00 | 2,593.90 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 512.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 4,600.00 | 5,187.80 |
| Events per Second | 1,369.77 | 985.28 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.6 | 0.89 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.73 | 1.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 10.63 | 3.62 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.14 | 1.18 |
Memory
Memory Read
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 5,252,717.06 | 3,083,676.36 |
| Mebibytes per second | 5,129.61 | 3,011.40 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.34 | 1.03 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 5,229,826.82 | 3,083,999.66 |
| Mebibytes per second | 5,107.25 | 3,011.72 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.17 | 0.46 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 2,551.55 | 3,306.49 |
| Writes per Second | 1,701.00 | 2,204.30 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 5,446.72 | 7,059.82 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 39.87 | 51.66 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 26.58 | 34.44 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.1 | 0.08 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.64 | 8.24 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.38 | 0.21 |
Mutex
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 587.14 | 1,626.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 792.99 | 1,635.60 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 847.02 | 1,643.44 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 846.57 | 1,648.20 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 6,593.00 | 5,703.00 |
| Queries per second | 65,930.00 | 57,030.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.22 | 1.63 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.52 | 1.75 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.82 | 5.68 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.7 | 1.96 |
MySQL Write-only
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 7,165.00 | 5,173.00 |
| Queries per second | 71,650.00 | 51,730.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.98 | 1.27 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.39 | 1.93 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.65 | 16.79 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.82 | 2.86 |
MySQL Read/Write
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,558.00 | 2,425.00 |
| Queries per second | 35,580.00 | 24,250.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.23 | 3.28 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.81 | 4.12 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 6.25 | 8.93 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.36 | 5.28 |
MySQL INSERT
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 9,745.00 | 8,969.00 |
| Queries per second | 97,450.00 | 89,690.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.63 | 0.63 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.02 | 1.11 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.78 | 11.66 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.27 | 1.61 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,696,217.00 | 767,507.00 |
| Queries per second | 16,962,170.00 | 7,675,070.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 288.85 | 591.25 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 143,954.00 | 169,580.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,439,540.00 | 1,695,800.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.07 | 0.06 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 3.42 | 1.49 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.09 | 0.08 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 8,738.00 | 3,885.00 |
| Queries per second | 87,380.00 | 38,850.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.43 | 0.91 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.14 | 2.57 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.54 | 7.18 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.47 | 3.36 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 7,426.00 | 2,599.00 |
| Queries per second | 74,260.00 | 25,990.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.27 | 1.1 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.35 | 3.84 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.64 | 11.36 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.73 | 5.18 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 8,846.00 | 8,598.00 |
| Queries per second | 88,460.00 | 85,980.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.62 | 0.64 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.13 | 1.16 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 40.13 | 28.8 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.42 | 1.73 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 10,257.00 | 9,190.00 |
| Queries per second | 102,570.00 | 91,900.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.62 | 0.62 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.97 | 1.09 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 19.36 | 32.83 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.18 | 1.39 |
MySQL DELETE
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 79,900.00 | 77,523.00 |
| Queries per second | 799,000.00 | 775,230.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.12 | 0.13 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 18.09 | 7.88 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.31 | 0.73 |
Redis
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 58,004.64 | 36,036.04 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 67,024.13 | 37,037.04 |
| SET per Second | 62,189.05 | 35,137.04 |
| GET per Second | 60,569.35 | 37,864.45 |
| INCR per Second | 55,493.89 | 36,845.98 |
| LPUSH per Second | 60,132.29 | 36,845.98 |
| RPUSH per Second | 59,066.75 | 32,020.49 |
| LPOP per Second | 59,772.86 | 33,057.85 |
| RPOP per Second | 59,988.00 | 32,637.08 |
| SADD per Second | 60,168.47 | 37,119.52 |
| HSET per Second | 59,952.04 | 37,565.74 |
| SPOP per Second | 57,339.45 | 36,724.20 |
| ZADD per Second | 59,311.98 | 36,954.91 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 58,719.91 | 35,637.92 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 45,004.50 | 14,880.95 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 25,568.91 | 6,692.54 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 20,132.88 | 4,380.59 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 17,412.50 | 3,662.47 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 59,988.00 | 27,382.26 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| Linode – Linode (4 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.45 | 0.91 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.39 | 0.87 |
| SET | 0.42 | 0.93 |
| GET | 0.43 | 0.87 |
| INCR | 0.51 | 0.89 |
| LPUSH | 0.43 | 0.89 |
| RPUSH | 0.44 | 1.01 |
| LPOP | 0.43 | 0.99 |
| RPOP | 0.43 | 1.03 |
| SADD | 0.43 | 0.89 |
| HSET | 0.43 | 0.88 |
| SPOP | 0.45 | 0.89 |
| ZADD | 0.44 | 0.90 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.44 | 0.91 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 0.58 | 2.36 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 1.11 | 5.08 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 1.41 | 7.57 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 1.66 | 8.90 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.45 | 1.34 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
After analyzing the benchmarks for both Linode (4 GB) and Vultr Cloud Compute (2 GB) instances, it is evident that Linode's instance performs significantly better in terms of CPU, memory, and I/O operations, which makes it ideal for CPU-intensive and I/O-heavy workloads. Linode's instance boasts higher rates of read and write operations per second, lower latency in Redis commands, and more efficient CPU performance, making it a better choice for high-demand applications requiring quick response times and high throughput. Conversely, the Vultr instance, while still competent, shows lower performance metrics, especially when handling larger data sets in Redis operations and memory-intensive tasks, making it more suitable for less demanding applications where cost is a primary concern. Thus, Linode's instance is recommended for performance-critical tasks, while Vultr's might be more appropriate for cost-sensitive use cases with lower performance requirements.
From the friendly human:
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