UpCloud Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) vs. Vultr Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores)
Same showdown, different day. Today I've spun up brand new instance from UpCloud 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 or around the New York / New Jersey area. Enough talk. Here's the data.
Overview
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Last Benchmarked | Fri, 22 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 | €52.00 | $40.00 |
| RAM (GB) | 8 | 8 |
| CPU Cores | 4 | 4 |
| Storage (TB) | 160 | 160 |
| Storage Type | SSD | SSD |
| Transfer (TB) | 5 | 4 |
CPU
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 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) | 3,295.45 | 2,593.90 |
| CPU Cache Size (KB) | 512.00 | 16,384.00 |
| BogoMips | 6,590.90 | 5,187.80 |
| Events per Second | 4,958.32 | 1,100.82 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.18 | 0.88 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.2 | 0.91 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 7.66 | 1.56 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.21 | 0.97 |
Memory
Memory Read
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 6,228,432.12 | 3,685,781.23 |
| Mebibytes per second | 6,082.45 | 3,599.40 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 1.06 | 1.03 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
Memory Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Operations per second | 6,266,237.06 | 3,590,629.63 |
| Mebibytes per second | 6,119.37 | 3,506.47 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 0.56 | 1.16 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
File I/O
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Reads per Second | 4,393.13 | 4,999.39 |
| Writes per Second | 2,928.76 | 3,332.93 |
| Fsyncs per Second | 9,372.12 | 10,670.47 |
| Read Mebibytes per Second | 68.64 | 78.12 |
| Written Mebibytes per Second | 45.76 | 52.08 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.06 | 0.05 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 35.18 | 37.52 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.26 | 0.18 |
Mutex
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 282.97 | 369.37 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 335.30 | 416.22 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 382.20 | 441.77 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 383.33 | 442.73 |
MySQL
MySQL Read-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 10,511.00 | 5,144.00 |
| Queries per second | 105,110.00 | 51,440.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.41 | 1.72 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.95 | 1.94 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 16.02 | 7.67 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.39 | 2.35 |
MySQL Write-only
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,531.00 | 5,108.00 |
| Queries per second | 25,310.00 | 51,080.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 1.01 | 1.15 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.95 | 1.96 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 73.91 | 12.52 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 9.06 | 2.71 |
MySQL Read/Write
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 1,358.00 | 2,247.00 |
| Queries per second | 13,580.00 | 22,470.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 2.1 | 3.08 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 7.35 | 4.45 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 56.45 | 29.7 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 15 | 5.28 |
MySQL INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,869.00 | 7,630.00 |
| Queries per second | 38,690.00 | 76,300.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.69 | 0.71 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.58 | 1.31 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 53.55 | 29.81 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.57 | 1.55 |
MySQL Bulk INSERT
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,045,717.00 | 898,571.00 |
| Queries per second | 20,457,170.00 | 8,985,710.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0 | 0.01 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 270.43 | 505.86 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0 | 0 |
MySQL SELECT
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 390,264.00 | 149,465.00 |
| Queries per second | 3,902,640.00 | 1,494,650.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.03 | 0.07 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 8.25 | 1.22 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 0.04 | 0.09 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Points)
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 8,860.00 | 4,249.00 |
| Queries per second | 88,600.00 | 42,490.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.29 | 0.83 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.13 | 2.35 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 13.57 | 6.6 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2 | 3.02 |
MySQL SELECT (Random Ranges)
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 7,973.00 | 2,637.00 |
| Queries per second | 79,730.00 | 26,370.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.26 | 0.94 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 1.25 | 3.79 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 22.9 | 6.3 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.86 | 5.09 |
MySQL UPDATE (Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 2,634.00 | 7,166.00 |
| Queries per second | 26,340.00 | 71,660.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.91 | 0.7 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 3.79 | 1.39 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 74.16 | 28.84 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 9.39 | 1.79 |
MySQL UPDATE (Non-Indexed)
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 3,636.00 | 7,661.00 |
| Queries per second | 36,360.00 | 76,610.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.93 | 0.7 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 2.75 | 1.3 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 64.83 | 33.97 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 5.47 | 1.58 |
MySQL DELETE
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| Transactions per second | 18,731.00 | 69,690.00 |
| Queries per second | 187,310.00 | 696,900.00 |
| Minimum Latency (ms) | 0.01 | 0.05 |
| Average Latency (ms) | 0.53 | 0.14 |
| Maximum Latency (ms) | 50.1 | 27.73 |
| 95th Percentile Latency (ms) | 2.86 | 0.87 |
Redis
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE per Second | 145,560.41 | 54,436.58 |
| PING_MBULK per Second | 139,082.06 | 48,828.12 |
| SET per Second | 186,915.88 | 51,572.98 |
| GET per Second | 177,304.97 | 48,239.27 |
| INCR per Second | 165,562.92 | 52,328.62 |
| LPUSH per Second | 133,689.83 | 45,454.54 |
| RPUSH per Second | 157,480.31 | 49,751.24 |
| LPOP per Second | 137,741.05 | 53,390.28 |
| RPOP per Second | 162,074.56 | 53,648.07 |
| SADD per Second | 112,485.94 | 48,285.85 |
| HSET per Second | 143,266.47 | 51,493.30 |
| SPOP per Second | 146,198.83 | 52,910.05 |
| ZADD per Second | 152,905.20 | 53,504.55 |
| ZPOPMIN per Second | 156,985.86 | 53,590.57 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) per Second | 61,236.99 | 28,645.09 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) per Second | 40,453.08 | 13,131.98 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) per Second | 27,925.16 | 8,529.51 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) per Second | 23,424.69 | 7,479.99 |
| MSET (10 keys) per Second | 144,927.53 | 49,212.60 |
Redis Average Latency (ms)
| UpCloud – Balanced (8 GB, 4 Cores) | Vultr – Cloud Compute (8 GB, 4 Cores) | |
|---|---|---|
| PING_INLINE | 0.20 | 0.47 |
| PING_MBULK | 0.21 | 0.53 |
| SET | 0.15 | 0.50 |
| GET | 0.15 | 0.54 |
| INCR | 0.18 | 0.49 |
| LPUSH | 0.22 | 0.58 |
| RPUSH | 0.18 | 0.52 |
| LPOP | 0.21 | 0.49 |
| RPOP | 0.17 | 0.48 |
| SADD | 0.26 | 0.54 |
| HSET | 0.21 | 0.53 |
| SPOP | 0.20 | 0.49 |
| ZADD | 0.20 | 0.48 |
| ZPOPMIN | 0.18 | 0.48 |
| LRANGE_100 (first 100 elements) | 0.55 | 0.91 |
| LRANGE_300 (first 300 elements) | 0.80 | 1.94 |
| LRANGE_500 (first 500 elements) | 1.14 | 3.00 |
| LRANGE_600 (first 600 elements) | 1.33 | 3.43 |
| MSET (10 keys) | 0.26 | 0.77 |
Conclusion
From the friendly robots:
Comparing the benchmark results, UpCloud's Balanced instance shows stronger performance in terms of Redis operations, CPU events per second, file I/O throughput, and memory operations per second, reflecting higher efficiency and potentially lower latencies across these metrics. On the other hand, Vultr's Cloud Compute instance exhibits comparable, yet somewhat lower, Redis performance, CPU handling, and memory transfer rates but excels in MySQL bulk insert operations and has a higher monthly cost. Therefore, UpCloud's instance is better suited for workloads that benefit from high throughput and low latency across various operations, making it ideal for applications requiring significant memory and file I/O operations. Conversely, Vultr's instance might be more advantageous for specific database-heavy workloads where bulk insert performance is a priority.
From the friendly human:
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