UpCloud Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) vs. Vultr Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores)
New day, new benchmarks. Today I've spun up some brand new instance from UpCloud and Vultr and ran some benchmarks. All instances were running Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and all resided in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Time to see who showed up today.
Overview
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Sat, 23 May 2026 15:00:52 GMT | Sat, 23 May 2026 11:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-111-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 | €18.00 | $40.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 2 | 8 |
| CPU Cores | 2 | 4 |
| Storage (TB) | 60 | 160 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 3 | 4 |
CPU
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | AuthenticAMD | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor | Intel Xeon Processor (Skylake, IBRS) |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 3,295.48 | 2,593.90 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 512.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 6,590.95 | 5,187.80 |
| Events per Second | 5,024.28 | 1,100.82 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.18 | 0.88 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.2 | 0.91 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.39 | 1.56 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.21 | 0.97 |
Memory
Memory Read
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 6,889,104.54 | 3,685,781.23 |
| Mebibytes per second | 6,727.64 | 3,599.40 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.92 | 1.03 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 6,881,303.50 | 3,590,629.63 |
| Mebibytes per second | 6,720.02 | 3,506.47 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.8 | 1.16 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 3,394.77 | 4,999.39 |
| Writes per Second | 2,263.18 | 3,332.93 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 7,253.70 | 10,670.47 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 53.04 | 78.12 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 35.36 | 52.08 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.08 | 0.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 29.15 | 37.52 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.28 | 0.18 |
Mutex
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 686.33 | 369.37 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 699.38 | 416.22 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 713.43 | 441.77 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 707.07 | 442.73 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 16,576.00 | 5,144.00 |
| Queries per second | 165,760.00 | 51,440.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.33 | 1.72 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.6 | 1.94 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.19 | 7.67 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.8 | 2.35 |
MySQL Write-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,358.00 | 5,108.00 |
| Queries per second | 33,580.00 | 51,080.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.92 | 1.15 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.97 | 1.96 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 22.82 | 12.52 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.67 | 2.71 |
MySQL Read/Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,460.00 | 2,247.00 |
| Queries per second | 24,600.00 | 22,470.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.54 | 3.08 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 4.06 | 4.45 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 36.69 | 29.7 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 8.28 | 5.28 |
MySQL INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,824.00 | 7,630.00 |
| Queries per second | 48,240.00 | 76,300.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.6 | 0.71 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.07 | 1.31 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 43.34 | 29.81 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.57 | 1.55 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,482,592.00 | 898,571.00 |
| Queries per second | 24,825,920.00 | 8,985,710.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 243.79 | 505.86 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 487,086.00 | 149,465.00 |
| Queries per second | 4,870,860.00 | 1,494,650.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.02 | 0.07 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.81 | 1.22 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.03 | 0.09 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 9,558.00 | 4,249.00 |
| Queries per second | 95,580.00 | 42,490.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.23 | 0.83 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.04 | 2.35 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 11.9 | 6.6 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.52 | 3.02 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 10,872.00 | 2,637.00 |
| Queries per second | 108,720.00 | 26,370.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.26 | 0.94 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.92 | 3.79 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 13.94 | 6.3 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.76 | 5.09 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,751.00 | 7,166.00 |
| Queries per second | 37,510.00 | 71,660.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.75 | 0.7 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.66 | 1.39 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 29.63 | 28.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.77 | 1.79 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,320.00 | 7,661.00 |
| Queries per second | 43,200.00 | 76,610.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.6 | 0.7 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.31 | 1.3 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 19.51 | 33.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5 | 1.58 |
MySQL DELETE
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 55,310.00 | 69,690.00 |
| Queries per second | 553,100.00 | 696,900.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.18 | 0.14 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 46.9 | 27.73 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.3 | 0.87 |
Redis
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 103,412.62 | 54,436.58 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 112,612.61 | 48,828.12 |
| SET per Second | 179,211.45 | 51,572.98 |
| GET per Second | 210,084.03 | 48,239.27 |
| INCR per Second | 215,517.25 | 52,328.62 |
| LPUSH per Second | 203,665.98 | 45,454.54 |
| RPUSH per Second | 123,915.74 | 49,751.24 |
| LPOP per Second | 190,476.20 | 53,390.28 |
| RPOP per Second | 210,970.47 | 53,648.07 |
| SADD per Second | 125,786.16 | 48,285.85 |
| HSET per Second | 209,643.61 | 51,493.30 |
| SPOP per Second | 196,463.66 | 52,910.05 |
| ZADD per Second | 108,225.10 | 53,504.55 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 104,384.13 | 53,590.57 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 96,525.09 | 28,645.09 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 42,034.47 | 13,131.98 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 24,336.82 | 8,529.51 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 22,346.37 | 7,479.99 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 161,290.33 | 49,212.60 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.27 | 0.47 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.24 | 0.53 |
| SET | 0.15 | 0.50 |
| GET | 0.13 | 0.54 |
| INCR | 0.12 | 0.49 |
| LPUSH | 0.13 | 0.58 |
| RPUSH | 0.21 | 0.52 |
| LPOP | 0.14 | 0.49 |
| RPOP | 0.13 | 0.48 |
| SADD | 0.21 | 0.54 |
| HSET | 0.13 | 0.53 |
| SPOP | 0.13 | 0.49 |
| ZADD | 0.25 | 0.48 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.25 | 0.48 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 0.29 | 0.91 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 0.70 | 1.94 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 1.26 | 3.00 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 1.31 | 3.43 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.22 | 0.77 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
After analyzing the benchmark results for both the UpCloud Balanced (2 GB, 2 Cores) and the Vultr Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) instances, it's evident that Vultr's configuration generally outperforms UpCloud's in terms of raw performance metrics, especially in CPU-intensive tasks, Redis operations, and memory throughput, thanks to its higher core count, larger RAM, and more extensive storage. However, UpCloud's instance demonstrates better thread fairness and lower latency in Redis operations, suggesting more efficient resource management per core. When choosing between these instances, one should consider the workload: for CPU-heavy and memory-intensive tasks, the Vultr instance would likely be more suitable due to its superior performance metrics, while UpCloud's instance could be preferable for tasks that require better per-core efficiency and lower latency, such as certain database operations.
From the friendly human:
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