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I've been using Hetzner servers for ~15 years with multiple clients and employers, and always been disappointed with other providers compared to what Hetzner de

I've been using Hetzner servers for ~15 years with multiple clients and employers, and always been disappointed with other providers compared to what Hetzner delivers. OVH with their frequent network level outages, the 2021 fire and so on. DigitalOcean with their way too frequent and long lasting maintenance windows. And AWS/GCP/Azure with their obscene pricing, ridiculous SLA and occasional hour-lasting outages. One application platform I managed was migrated from DO to Hetzner with huge cost savings, much better uptime and insanely much higher performance running on bare metal servers rather than cheapo VMs. If you need more than two vCPUs and a few gigs of RAM, I see absolutely no reason to use overpriced AWS/GCP/Azure VMs.

numlock86 4y ago
Have you tried Contabo? That has been my go-to hoster for the past decade.
- abujazar 4y ago
  Not familiar with them, but their pricing seems significantly higher than Hetzner.
  - numlock86 4y ago
    Interesting. I initially went with Contabo because they were (are?) much cheaper than their competitors. At last when it comes to VPS.
GOATS- 4y ago
It's like people forget that Leaseweb and Worldstream exist.
outime 4y ago
While I like Hetzner a lot and can share your recommendations, I just don't see how it compares to full-blown cloud providers like AWS, GCP or Azure. It's a common misconception to put them at the same level when the offering is completely different. Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. If someone can run their full workload in e.g. Hetzner without much hassle then they shouldn't be using any of the other cloud platforms in the first place as they'd be definitely overpaying. EDIT: I want to clarify that I unfortunately do know some companies use the big 3 as simple VPS providers but it seems that everybody agree here that it's a waste of money and that's one of my main points, which is also why the comparison of the big ones vs Hetzner or any other standalone VPS/dedicated server provider is pointless as they serve different use cases.
- epolanski 4y ago
  > Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. Hmm, anything that doesn't have insanely huge traffic and requirements does, and in those cases the major cloud vendors are still cheap and easy enough for those use cases. Hetzner seems to fit the "not big enough to get major discounts and support but large enough to have considerable cloud bills" customer and that is fine.
  - outime 4y ago
    Amazon for example tries to capture these with the Lightsail offering [1] which is a separate product from the typical AWS offering (even though of course it runs on AWS but that doesn't matter in this context). No need to go with "raw" EC2 which would make things more complicated and more expensive if all you want to have is a couple VPS. [1] https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/ https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/
- bombcar 4y ago
  I wonder what percentage of AWS are just EC2 instances that run as a simple VM. I know I’ve never used more than that.
  - wkat4242 4y ago
    This is how my employer, a large enterprise, uses 'cloud'. They just picked up all the server boxes and virtualized them in AWS. Obviously it costs a lot more now and there's no benefits like flexibility because the configuration is all static. I know cloud can make sense but not like this.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- bluedino 4y ago
  > Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. I think you're seriously underestimating the amount of cloud customers that do a simple lift and shift.
pelagicAustral 4y ago
I agree with your judgement on OVH and the top tier cloud providers. I've never used Hetzner but I've had good experieces with UpCloud, Vultr and Linode/Akamai. These three providers are my defacto goto everytime I need to deploy stuff...
- Jnr 4y ago
  I have been using Kimsufi servers (OVH cheap end) for more than 10 years and have not experienced any major outages (and can't remember even small ones). I still have one dedicated server there. 14eur/mo for i5 750, 16gb ram and 2tb hdd seems quite good to me.
xslvrxslwt 4y ago
Hetzner is not on the level of the any you mentioned. It's dirt cheap because latencies and protections against exploits are non-existent, sure it serves good when you don't have such needs but the moment you need any (i.e. DDoS protection and low/stable ms for game servers) - hetzner is out of the window. - Someone that used to fry lil hetzner servers for fun
- bflesch 4y ago
  Interesting. can you maybe tell us some anecdotes?
  - xslvrxslwt 4y ago
    If you mean the anecdotes related to >used to fry lil hetzner servers for fun< https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/04/ddos-for-hire-service-webstresser-dismantled/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/04/ddos-for-hire-service-we... should be enough
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  Presumably you can front it with CloudFlare if you need DDoS protection?
  - notamy 4y ago
    Not if you're running game servers; those require plain UDP (sometimes TCP) proxying and CF only offers that on the enterprise plan afaik.
    - cma 4y ago
      I'm not sure if this is the enterprise plan, but it is designed for proxying game servers and preventing ddos like steam's newer networking: https://www.cloudflare.com/products/cloudflare-spectrum/ https://www.cloudflare.com/products/cloudflare-spectrum/
      - 4y ago
ofrzeta 4y ago
We use Hetzner but I also had good experience with Scaleway (another French cloud provider).
- Bellamy 4y ago
  Hetzner is German.
  - ofrzeta 4y ago
    Yeah, with "another" I was referring to OVH the parent mentioned.
onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
The first time I saw Hetzner's pricing - I assumed it must've been a scam - since it seemed like such an incredible deal, and yet I hadn't heard of a single person that ever used it. Glad that I'm regularly seeing how awesome this company is lately.
- senorsmile 4y ago
  I've been using Hetzner for many years. I've had a couple maintenances on baremetal servers over the last several years. Otherwise, the only down time has been self inflicted.
whalesalad 4y ago
Just wish they had more of a US presence. Latency is a killer for me.
- abujazar 4y ago
  They do have two US locations, but only for «cloud» products, no bare metal servers.
postdb 4y ago
Not to mention their default DDoS protection by default. AWS DDoS team costs about $6000 last I checked here in hnews. Of course most corporation chose AWS because of permission management console.
Meekro 4y ago
I run a hosting company that has around 100 large dedicated servers at OVH. OVH's website sucks, but everything else is great-- outages are extremely rare in my experience, and their built-in DDoS protection is excellent. Also, OVH's Canada data center has great ping times from the US, whereas Hetzner's locations are in Europe.
alphabettsy 4y ago
The biggest issue I’ve had with providers like Digital Ocean is the networking speeds. 1 Gbps is just not enough especially when you need to restore a backup or similar.

numlock86 4y ago

Have you tried Contabo? That has been my go-to hoster for the past decade.

abujazar 4y ago
Not familiar with them, but their pricing seems significantly higher than Hetzner.
- numlock86 4y ago
  Interesting. I initially went with Contabo because they were (are?) much cheaper than their competitors. At last when it comes to VPS.

GOATS- 4y ago

It's like people forget that Leaseweb and Worldstream exist.

outime 4y ago

While I like Hetzner a lot and can share your recommendations, I just don't see how it compares to full-blown cloud providers like AWS, GCP or Azure. It's a common misconception to put them at the same level when the offering is completely different. Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. If someone can run their full workload in e.g. Hetzner without much hassle then they shouldn't be using any of the other cloud platforms in the first place as they'd be definitely overpaying. EDIT: I want to clarify that I unfortunately do know some companies use the big 3 as simple VPS providers but it seems that everybody agree here that it's a waste of money and that's one of my main points, which is also why the comparison of the big ones vs Hetzner or any other standalone VPS/dedicated server provider is pointless as they serve different use cases.

epolanski 4y ago
> Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. Hmm, anything that doesn't have insanely huge traffic and requirements does, and in those cases the major cloud vendors are still cheap and easy enough for those use cases. Hetzner seems to fit the "not big enough to get major discounts and support but large enough to have considerable cloud bills" customer and that is fine.
- outime 4y ago
  Amazon for example tries to capture these with the Lightsail offering [1] which is a separate product from the typical AWS offering (even though of course it runs on AWS but that doesn't matter in this context). No need to go with "raw" EC2 which would make things more complicated and more expensive if all you want to have is a couple VPS. [1] https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/ https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/
bombcar 4y ago
I wonder what percentage of AWS are just EC2 instances that run as a simple VM. I know I’ve never used more than that.
- wkat4242 4y ago
  This is how my employer, a large enterprise, uses 'cloud'. They just picked up all the server boxes and virtualized them in AWS. Obviously it costs a lot more now and there's no benefits like flexibility because the configuration is all static. I know cloud can make sense but not like this.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
bluedino 4y ago
> Nobody seriously uses AWS/GCP/Azure to have a couple VMs or dedicated servers alone. I think you're seriously underestimating the amount of cloud customers that do a simple lift and shift.

pelagicAustral 4y ago

I agree with your judgement on OVH and the top tier cloud providers. I've never used Hetzner but I've had good experieces with UpCloud, Vultr and Linode/Akamai. These three providers are my defacto goto everytime I need to deploy stuff...

Jnr 4y ago
I have been using Kimsufi servers (OVH cheap end) for more than 10 years and have not experienced any major outages (and can't remember even small ones). I still have one dedicated server there. 14eur/mo for i5 750, 16gb ram and 2tb hdd seems quite good to me.

xslvrxslwt 4y ago

Hetzner is not on the level of the any you mentioned. It's dirt cheap because latencies and protections against exploits are non-existent, sure it serves good when you don't have such needs but the moment you need any (i.e. DDoS protection and low/stable ms for game servers) - hetzner is out of the window. - Someone that used to fry lil hetzner servers for fun

bflesch 4y ago
Interesting. can you maybe tell us some anecdotes?
- xslvrxslwt 4y ago
  If you mean the anecdotes related to >used to fry lil hetzner servers for fun< https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/04/ddos-for-hire-service-webstresser-dismantled/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/04/ddos-for-hire-service-we... should be enough
Nextgrid 4y ago
Presumably you can front it with CloudFlare if you need DDoS protection?
- notamy 4y ago
  Not if you're running game servers; those require plain UDP (sometimes TCP) proxying and CF only offers that on the enterprise plan afaik.
  - cma 4y ago
    I'm not sure if this is the enterprise plan, but it is designed for proxying game servers and preventing ddos like steam's newer networking: https://www.cloudflare.com/products/cloudflare-spectrum/ https://www.cloudflare.com/products/cloudflare-spectrum/
    - 4y ago

ofrzeta 4y ago

We use Hetzner but I also had good experience with Scaleway (another French cloud provider).

Bellamy 4y ago
Hetzner is German.
- ofrzeta 4y ago
  Yeah, with "another" I was referring to OVH the parent mentioned.

onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago

The first time I saw Hetzner's pricing - I assumed it must've been a scam - since it seemed like such an incredible deal, and yet I hadn't heard of a single person that ever used it. Glad that I'm regularly seeing how awesome this company is lately.

senorsmile 4y ago
I've been using Hetzner for many years. I've had a couple maintenances on baremetal servers over the last several years. Otherwise, the only down time has been self inflicted.

whalesalad 4y ago

Just wish they had more of a US presence. Latency is a killer for me.

abujazar 4y ago
They do have two US locations, but only for «cloud» products, no bare metal servers.

postdb 4y ago

Not to mention their default DDoS protection by default. AWS DDoS team costs about $6000 last I checked here in hnews. Of course most corporation chose AWS because of permission management console.

Meekro 4y ago

I run a hosting company that has around 100 large dedicated servers at OVH. OVH's website sucks, but everything else is great-- outages are extremely rare in my experience, and their built-in DDoS protection is excellent. Also, OVH's Canada data center has great ping times from the US, whereas Hetzner's locations are in Europe.

alphabettsy 4y ago

The biggest issue I’ve had with providers like Digital Ocean is the networking speeds. 1 Gbps is just not enough especially when you need to restore a backup or similar.