Hetzner vs DigitalOcean

Why Switch from DigitalOcean to Hetzner?

DigitalOcean is the popular US-headquartered developer-friendly cloud, with strong managed services and an extensive documentation library. For European developers and businesses, the trade-offs are increasingly visible: DigitalOcean is US-jurisdiction, the pricing has scaled meaningfully at moderate-volume tiers, and the underlying infrastructure (despite EU regions) operates under US corporate control.

Hetzner is the German alternative. Gunzenhausen-headquartered, 27+ years of European cloud-infrastructure operation, with dramatically better price/performance than DigitalOcean and full German jurisdiction throughout. Multiple EU data centres (Nuremberg, Falkenstein, Helsinki). The structural choice for European workloads where data sovereignty and economics both matter.

Feature Comparison

Feature	Hetzner	DigitalOcean
Jurisdiction	Germany 🇩🇪	United States 🇺🇸
Data centres	Nuremberg, Falkenstein, Helsinki (+ cloud in USA, Singapore)	US/EU/Asia regions
GDPR	✅ Native	⚠️ Provider claims
CLOUD Act exposure	❌ None (no US parent)	⚠️ Yes
Cloud VPS	✅	✅
Dedicated servers	✅	❌
S3-compatible object storage	✅ Object Storage	✅ Spaces
Managed Kubernetes	❌ (use your own)	✅
Managed databases	❌ (use your own)	✅
One-click apps	Limited	✅ Marketplace
Price (2vCPU/4GB VPS)	€5.99/month excl. VAT	$24/month
Renewable energy	✅ Native	Partial

For raw infrastructure economics and EU sovereignty, Hetzner wins decisively. For managed services and developer-portal polish, DigitalOcean still has advantages.

Pricing

Hetzner pricing:

• Cloud VPS CX23 (2 vCPU, 4 GB): €5.99/month excl. VAT
• Cloud VPS CX43 (8 vCPU, 16 GB): €16.49/month excl. VAT
• Dedicated servers (AX/EX lines) and Storage Box: check current prices on hetzner.com

Cloud prices are for Germany/Finland, excluding VAT and IPv4, as of October 2026 (Hetzner raised cloud prices on 15 June 2026).

DigitalOcean for comparison:

• Basic Droplet (2vCPU, 4GB): $24/month
• CPU-Optimized (8vCPU, 16GB): $168/month
• Spaces Object Storage: $5/month + transfer

For European workloads at equivalent specs, Hetzner is typically 3-10x cheaper than DigitalOcean. The price gap matters most at sustained moderate-to-heavy workloads.

Privacy & Data Sovereignty

Hetzner’s structural advantages:

• German corporate jurisdiction — Hetzner Online GmbH subject to German and EU law
• Own EU data centres — Nuremberg, Falkenstein, Helsinki (Hetzner Cloud also has US and Singapore locations; choose a German or Finnish location to keep data in the EU)
• GDPR-native with comprehensive Article 28 DPA
• No US parent company — no CLOUD Act exposure via ownership
• Renewable-energy infrastructure with published CO2 metrics
• NIS2-aligned for digital infrastructure services
• 27 years of European cloud operation track record

For European developers and businesses, this is a structurally cleaner foundation than any US-headquartered cloud provider can match.

Migration Guide

Moving a typical DigitalOcean droplet workload to Hetzner:

1. Hetzner account setup with payment method (15 min)
2. Provision equivalent cloud server matching your droplet specs (10 min)
3. Configure SSH keys, security groups, networking (30 min)
4. Migrate data — rsync files, database dumps, configuration (1-4 hours)
5. Update DNS to Hetzner IP addresses (TTL-dependent, ~hours)
6. Verify application at new host (1 hour)
7. Decommission DigitalOcean droplet (administrative)

Estimated total time: 4-8 hours for moderate complexity; longer for complex multi-server deployments. Difficulty: Easy-moderate; if you’re comfortable with Linux server administration, the migration is straightforward.

Example Scenarios

Illustrative scenarios of how teams typically use these tools — not documented customer case studies.

A Berlin SaaS startup runs their entire production stack on Hetzner dedicated servers. Annual infrastructure cost came in well below an equivalent DigitalOcean deployment; performance improved (dedicated CPU vs shared); EU jurisdiction simplified GDPR conversations with enterprise customers.

A French e-commerce platform uses Hetzner cloud VPS for development and staging, with dedicated servers for production. The combination of price/performance and EU jurisdiction matched their growth-stage economics where DigitalOcean’s managed services would have over-invested at their stage.

A privacy-focused European SaaS runs entirely on Hetzner infrastructure for sovereignty reasons. The decades-long track record of German operation provides operational confidence that newer European clouds cannot match.

Company Background

Hetzner Online GmbH was founded in 1997 in Gunzenhausen, Bavaria, by Martin Hetzner. The company has remained privately held and German-owned throughout, with consistent profitability and infrastructure investment over nearly three decades. By 2026, Hetzner operates one of the largest dedicated and cloud infrastructure footprints in Europe with hundreds of thousands of customers worldwide.

Hetzner has invested heavily in renewable-energy infrastructure — the Falkenstein and Helsinki data centres operate on renewable energy with detailed CO2 reporting. The German engineering and operations team has been a structural advantage in providing consistent European-language support for European customers.

The 27+ year operational track record matters: Hetzner predates the modern cloud era and brings dedicated-server expertise that pure-cloud-native operators cannot match.

Security & Compliance

• ISO 27001 certified across operations
• GDPR-native with comprehensive Article 28 DPA
• Own data centres in Germany and Finland (cloud also in the USA and Singapore via colocation)
• TLS 1.3 for management API and web traffic
• TPM 2.0 support on modern hardware
• DDoS protection included on cloud servers
• NIS2-aligned for digital infrastructure
• Renewable energy with published CO2 metrics

Integration Ecosystem

• Cloud API: comprehensive REST API for automation
• Terraform provider: official, well-maintained
• Ansible modules: official integration
• Kubernetes: deploy your own (kubeadm, k3s, RKE2) — managed not offered
• Docker: full container support on cloud servers
• Snapshots and backups: native at API level
• Floating IPs and private networks: included
• Load balancers: native (Cloud Load Balancer)
• Object storage: Hetzner Object Storage (S3-compatible); Storage Box for FTP/SFTP/SMB/WebDAV/rsync/Borg backups

Who Should Switch?

Hetzner is ideal for:

• European developers and SaaS startups with infrastructure-cost sensitivity
• EU-jurisdiction-conscious procurement at any organisation
• Workloads not requiring managed Kubernetes or DigitalOcean Marketplace one-clicks
• Dedicated-server requirements — best-in-class for raw performance/euro
• Privacy-sensitive applications wanting structural EU sovereignty at infrastructure layer

The Bottom Line

DigitalOcean remains the right choice for teams that depend on its managed Kubernetes, managed databases, App Platform, and Marketplace ecosystem — or where you need a broader global region footprint. For European workloads where data sovereignty matters and where you’re comfortable managing your own Kubernetes/databases, Hetzner is the better choice: 3-10x cheaper at equivalent specs, German jurisdiction, own EU data centres (Germany, Finland), 27 years of operational track record, and renewable-energy infrastructure.

For European startups and SMBs, the cost difference alone often pays for the additional operational complexity many times over.

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Looking for more European cloud hosting alternatives? See also: Scalingo vs Heroku, Clever Cloud vs Heroku, and Infomaniak Web Hosting.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does Hetzner pricing compare to DigitalOcean?

Hetzner is dramatically cheaper at equivalent specs. A Hetzner CX23 (2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM) is €5.99/month excl. VAT in Germany/Finland (list price on hetzner.com in October 2026, including a primary IPv4 address — €5.49 without it — after the June 2026 price increase; hetzner.com currently marks the cost-optimised CX line as unavailable for new orders). The DigitalOcean equivalent (s-2vcpu-4gb) is $24/month. For dedicated servers the price gap is typically even more pronounced. For European workloads where US-region latency doesn't matter, Hetzner economics are hard to argue with.

Is Hetzner suitable for production workloads?

Yes — extensively. Hetzner operates dedicated infrastructure for thousands of production workloads across European startups, mid-market businesses, and enterprises. The platform is mature (27+ years), ISO 27001 certified, and supports the standard DevOps tooling (Terraform, Ansible, Kubernetes via your own deployment). For mission-critical workloads requiring managed Kubernetes or specialised managed databases, DigitalOcean or hyperscalers may still be preferred for the management layer.

Where are data centres located?

Hetzner owns and operates data centres in Nuremberg and Falkenstein (Germany) and Helsinki (Finland). Hetzner Cloud also offers locations in Ashburn and Hillsboro (USA) and Singapore, run in third-party colocation facilities — so pick a German or Finnish location if you want your data to stay in the EU. Hetzner Online GmbH is a German company with no US parent, subject to German and EU law, so there is no CLOUD Act exposure via ownership.

How does Hetzner compare to OVHcloud and Scaleway?

All three are major European cloud/dedicated providers. Hetzner is German with strongest reputation for price/performance and dedicated infrastructure. OVHcloud is French, larger overall, with broader managed-services portfolio and SecNumCloud-qualified offerings. Scaleway is French (Iliad Group), more developer-experience focused with cleaner cloud-native services. Choice depends on workload profile — Hetzner for raw cloud/dedicated, OVH for managed/sovereign, Scaleway for developer-experience.

Can I migrate from DigitalOcean?

Yes. Standard process: 1) Provision equivalent Hetzner cloud servers or dedicated, 2) Configure networking, security groups, SSH keys, 3) Migrate data (database dumps, file storage), 4) Update DNS to Hetzner endpoints, 5) Decommission DigitalOcean droplets. For a moderate-complexity application, plan for a weekend; for substantial multi-droplet deployments, 1-2 weeks.