Bottom Line
Hetzner is the cheapest VPS provider that doesn’t feel cheap. For €3.29/month you get specs that would cost $12+ at Vultr or DigitalOcean. The catch? Limited geographic coverage and a no-frills control panel.
If your users are in Europe or North America, Hetzner is a no-brainer for price-conscious projects.
Why Hetzner is So Cheap
Hetzner is a German company founded in 1997. They own their datacenters in Germany and Finland — no renting rack space from third parties. Combined with Germany’s relatively cheap energy and zero marketing budget, they pass the savings directly to customers.
The result: you get 2-4x the specs for the same price as US-based competitors.
Price Comparison (This Is Insane)
Same config across providers — 2 vCPU, 4GB RAM:
| Provider | Price | Storage | Transfer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hetzner | €5.39/mo | 40GB NVMe | 20TB |
| Vultr | $24/mo | 80GB NVMe | 3TB |
| DigitalOcean | $24/mo | 80GB SSD | 4TB |
| Linode | $24/mo | 80GB SSD | 4TB |
Hetzner costs about one-quarter of what others charge. And gives you 5-6x more transfer. It’s genuinely hard to argue against this.
Benchmarks
Test machine: CX22 (2 vCPU, 4GB RAM, 40GB NVMe), Nuremberg DC, Debian 12.
CPU
| Test | Score |
|---|---|
| Geekbench 6 Single | 1,420 |
| Geekbench 6 Multi | 2,680 |
Excellent for the price. AMD EPYC underneath. Beats Vultr’s $24 plan while costing €5.
Disk IO
Sequential Write: 1.4 GB/s
4K Random Read: 95,000 IOPS
4K Random Write: 62,000 IOPSOutstanding. This is proper NVMe performance — not the “SSD” label on what’s clearly an older drive (looking at you, Contabo).
Network
| Route | Latency |
|---|---|
| Germany internal | 1-3ms |
| Netherlands/France | 8-12ms |
| UK | 15ms |
| US East | 85ms |
| US West | 150ms |
| Japan | 230ms |
| China | 280-350ms |
Within Europe, Hetzner’s network is superb. Trans-Atlantic is fine. Asia and China are predictably high — it’s a European provider after all.
The Downsides
Limited Asia Coverage
Only 6 locations: Nuremberg, Falkenstein, Helsinki, Ashburn, Hillsboro, and Singapore. If you need Tokyo, Seoul, or Mumbai — Vultr is your answer.
Strict Registration
Hetzner may ask for passport/ID verification during signup. Some users from certain countries report being rejected. Use real information and a legitimate payment method.
No Managed Ecosystem
No one-click apps marketplace. No managed databases. No PaaS. You SSH in and set everything up yourself. Fine for experienced users, frustrating for beginners.
Who It’s For
- European-focused web apps and SaaS
- Budget projects that need real performance
- CI/CD pipelines and build servers
- Self-hosted tools (Gitea, Nextcloud, etc.)
- Anyone who values specs over hand-holding
Who Should Skip It
- Projects targeting Asian users (latency too high)
- Beginners who want point-and-click setup
- Security researchers (abuse detection is aggressive)
- Anyone needing 24/7 phone support
Final Take
Hetzner is the VPS equivalent of buying directly from the factory. No markup, no marketing fluff, just raw value. If your workload fits their geographic coverage, there’s almost no reason to pay more elsewhere.