UpCloud Balanced (2 GB) vs. Vultr Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores)
New day, new benchmarks. Today I've spun up brand new instance from UpCloud and Vultr and did some benchmarking. Each instance was running Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 and were created in or around the New York / New Jersey area. Without further ado, here's the results.
Overview
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Wed, 13 May 2026 07:00:52 GMT | Mon, 11 May 2026 04:00:52 GMT |
| Linux Distro | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS x64 |
| Kernel Version | 6.8.0-111-generic | 6.8.0-111-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 | €13.00 | $15.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 2 | 2 |
| CPU Cores | 1 | 2 |
| Storage (TB) | 50 | 65 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 2 | 3 |
CPU
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | AuthenticAMD | GenuineIntel |
| Model Name | AMD EPYC 9575F 64-Core Processor | Intel Core Processor (Skylake, IBRS, no TSX) |
| Clock Speed (MHz) | 3,295.48 | 3,792.00 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 512.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 6,590.95 | 7,583.99 |
| Events per Second | 5,025.21 | 1,481.60 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.18 | 0.63 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.2 | 0.67 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.35 | 1.95 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.22 | 0.77 |
Memory
Memory Read
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 5,932,400.60 | 6,401,389.08 |
| Mebibytes per second | 5,793.36 | 6,251.36 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.22 | 0.23 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 6,706,599.41 | 6,411,085.35 |
| Mebibytes per second | 6,549.41 | 6,260.83 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1.56 | 0.18 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 3,214.64 | 4,345.71 |
| Writes per Second | 2,143.03 | 2,897.07 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 6,864.71 | 9,273.19 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 50.23 | 67.90 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 33.48 | 45.27 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.08 | 0.06 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 20.14 | 2.92 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.31 | 0.17 |
Mutex
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1,349.13 | 214.63 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1,353.60 | 569.72 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1,361.99 | 636.55 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1,352.03 | 634.66 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 19,090.00 | 8,015.00 |
| Queries per second | 190,900.00 | 80,150.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.31 | 0.92 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.52 | 1.25 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 5.34 | 5.5 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.64 | 1.86 |
MySQL Write-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,974.00 | 8,497.00 |
| Queries per second | 39,740.00 | 84,970.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.87 | 0.76 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.51 | 1.17 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 38.67 | 3.04 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5 | 1.55 |
MySQL Read/Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,830.00 | 3,726.00 |
| Queries per second | 28,300.00 | 37,260.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.29 | 1.78 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.53 | 2.68 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 56.72 | 5.82 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 6.32 | 3.43 |
MySQL INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,647.00 | 15,028.00 |
| Queries per second | 46,470.00 | 150,280.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.61 | 0.41 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.15 | 0.66 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 28.58 | 2.42 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 4.41 | 0.86 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,249,592.00 | 1,696,217.00 |
| Queries per second | 22,495,920.00 | 16,962,170.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 207.34 | 283.37 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 645,161.00 | 201,989.00 |
| Queries per second | 6,451,610.00 | 2,019,890.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.02 | 0.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 2.26 | 0.51 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.02 | 0.07 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 8,546.00 | 8,025.00 |
| Queries per second | 85,460.00 | 80,250.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.13 | 0.35 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.17 | 1.24 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 172.57 | 3.55 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.58 | 2.07 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 11,562.00 | 8,336.00 |
| Queries per second | 115,620.00 | 83,360.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.22 | 0.4 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.86 | 1.2 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 4.07 | 4.25 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 1.27 | 2.22 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 4,711.00 | 13,858.00 |
| Queries per second | 47,110.00 | 138,580.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.73 | 0.42 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.12 | 0.72 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 30.41 | 6.33 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.96 | 0.95 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 5,393.00 | 14,587.00 |
| Queries per second | 53,930.00 | 145,870.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.48 | 0.4 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.85 | 0.68 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 39 | 11.69 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 3.43 | 0.9 |
MySQL DELETE
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 101,195.00 | 129,013.00 |
| Queries per second | 1,011,950.00 | 1,290,130.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.03 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.1 | 0.08 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 39.3 | 2.61 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.17 | 0.09 |
Redis
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 130,208.34 | 78,247.26 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 130,208.34 | 74,738.41 |
| SET per Second | 130,890.05 | 77,041.60 |
| GET per Second | 129,198.97 | 83,333.33 |
| INCR per Second | 128,534.70 | 80,971.66 |
| LPUSH per Second | 128,040.97 | 79,113.92 |
| RPUSH per Second | 126,582.27 | 77,160.49 |
| LPOP per Second | 124,688.28 | 81,499.59 |
| RPOP per Second | 127,226.46 | 82,440.23 |
| SADD per Second | 129,198.97 | 80,192.46 |
| HSET per Second | 133,511.34 | 83,612.04 |
| SPOP per Second | 139,275.77 | 85,034.02 |
| ZADD per Second | 130,039.02 | 83,263.95 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 129,701.68 | 82,987.55 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 55,524.71 | 55,555.56 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 28,785.26 | 28,851.70 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 18,942.98 | 19,391.12 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 17,038.68 | 17,211.71 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 108,225.10 | 80,256.82 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| UpCloud – Balanced (2 GB) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.25 | 0.34 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.25 | 0.35 |
| SET | 0.26 | 0.34 |
| GET | 0.26 | 0.32 |
| INCR | 0.26 | 0.32 |
| LPUSH | 0.26 | 0.34 |
| RPUSH | 0.27 | 0.34 |
| LPOP | 0.27 | 0.32 |
| RPOP | 0.27 | 0.32 |
| SADD | 0.26 | 0.32 |
| HSET | 0.26 | 0.31 |
| SPOP | 0.24 | 0.30 |
| ZADD | 0.26 | 0.31 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.26 | 0.31 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 0.66 | 0.54 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 1.27 | 1.11 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 1.95 | 1.62 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 2.16 | 1.84 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.34 | 0.38 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
In comparing the benchmark performances of UpCloud's Balanced (2 GB) instance and Vultr's Cloud Compute (2 GB, 2 cores) instance, the UpCloud configuration shows higher performance in Redis benchmarks, with notably higher requests per second (rps) and lower latency across most operations, suggesting better suitability for CPU-intensive tasks and memory-heavy workloads. The Vultr instance, while also strong in Redis operations, lags slightly behind in raw performance but offers lower cost per month. Vultr's configuration exhibits superior throughput in file I/O operations, which could be beneficial for I/O-heavy workloads. For developers prioritizing cost, the Vultr instance is a strong contender, but for scenarios demanding higher CPU and memory performance, the UpCloud Balanced instance would be more appropriate.
From the friendly human:
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