Hetzner vs DigitalOcean for side projects

Updated 2026-10-26

If your users are in Europe, Hetzner gives you twice the RAM for the money: €11.99/month excl. VAT buys a 2 GB server with 20 TB of traffic, while DigitalOcean's 2 GiB Droplet is $12 with 2,000 GiB. If your users are in the US, DigitalOcean wins: Hetzner's cheapest US server is €17.99, and DigitalOcean's $6 Droplet (1 GiB RAM) still runs a small app at 1M visits a month for about $9.97.

The servers a side project actually uses

Hetzner prices are monthly caps in EUR excluding VAT and include a primary IPv4. DigitalOcean prices are USD monthly caps for Basic Regular Droplets, IPv4 included. Both bill by usage below the cap (Hetzner hourly, DigitalOcean per second since January 2026).

What you pay at 100k and 1M visits

Assumptions: one small web app plus its database on one server, about 1.5 MB transferred per visit. That's about 150 GB a month at 100k visits and about 1.5 TB (roughly 1,400 GiB) at 1M visits.

The Vercel figure comes from our standard model and leaves out function CPU and memory beyond the included credit.

What actually decides it

Where your users are. Hetzner's cheap line is in Germany and Finland. Its US servers are a separate line that starts at €17.99 with 1 TB of traffic. DigitalOcean charges the same price and the same $0.01/GiB overage in every region.

RAM per dollar. In the EU, Hetzner's €11.99 CPX12 has 2 GB, and that's the minimum Coolify and Dokploy ask for (see Coolify vs Dokploy). On DigitalOcean the same 2 GiB is $12, a little more once you count EUR versus USD and before VAT.

Traffic. Hetzner EU's 20 TB means bandwidth basically never shows up on the bill. DigitalOcean's allowance is smaller, but overage is only $0.01/GiB and the allowance is pooled across all your Droplets, so two $6 Droplets share 2,000 GiB.

Cheapest possible box. DigitalOcean's $4 Droplet (512 MiB) is the lowest entry price of the two. Hetzner's Cost-Optimized line starts at €5.99, but it was listed as currently not available when we checked.

Gotchas

• Hetzner's list prices exclude VAT. Inside the EU you'll pay more than the number on the page.
• Backups are extra on both. Hetzner's start at €1.198/month and depend on the server price. DigitalOcean's cost 20% of the Droplet price for weekly backups or 30% for daily, or usage-based from $0.01/GiB.
• On Hetzner's Regular Performance page, several server rows showed "This product is currently unavailable" when we checked, so a given size may be out of stock in a given location.
• Either way, you patch the OS and run the database yourself. If you'd rather not, look at managed options like Render vs Railway.

Verdict

For a side project with European users, Hetzner EU is the better deal: €6.49 for 1 GB or €11.99 for 2 GB, with traffic you won't use up. For US users, or if you just want USD pricing with no VAT surprise, DigitalOcean wins: $6 for 1 GiB, $12 for 2 GiB, and cheap overage if you go past the allowance. Either one costs a fraction of Vercel Pro at 1M visits.

Estimates only, checked 2026-10-26 against the official pricing pages and docs listed below. Hetzner shows extra traffic at €1.00 per additional TB in the EU and US but also labels it "per hour", so the overage billing unit is unclear.

Sources

• https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/ (checked 2026-10-26)
• https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/regular-performance (checked 2026-10-26)
• https://www.digitalocean.com/pricing/droplets (checked 2026-10-26)
• https://docs.digitalocean.com/platform/billing/bandwidth/ (checked 2026-10-26)
• https://vercel.com/pricing (checked 2026-10-26)