Overview
What is DigitalOcean?
DigitalOcean is an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platform from the company of the same name headquartered in New York. It is known for its support of managed Kubernetes clusters and “droplets” feature.
Best Affordable and Inexpensive Virtual Servers
One of the best dedicated server platforms!
DigitalOcean for the win
Why DigitalOcean Dominates the VPS Market
Developer-friendly cloud provider
If DigitalOcean is good enough for Beyonce it's good enough for you.
DigitalOcean, great community, great features and startup friendly
DigitalOcean - Great pricing with enterprise grade solutions and value
Super easy to use and incredibly affordable. Sail away with DigitalOcean and be the captain of your voyage!
DigitalOcean and the evolution of hosting
A great basic virtualization provider
Super-intuitive, scalable, and affordable!
DigitalOcean is the answer to the reliable and low-cost Cloud Providers.
Flexible hosting with great customer service and documentation
Dive in! As long as you've got the training and/or team
Popular Features
- Pre-defined machine images (29)8.787%
- Dynamic scaling (28)8.282%
- Monitoring tools (30)7.777%
- Operating system support (29)7.777%
Pricing
1GB-16GB
$5.00
8GB-160GB
$60.00
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Product Demos
Demo: Deploying Librarian to DigitalOcean's App Platform in 3 minutes
Hands on with Redis Labs and DigitalOcean
MICROWEBER TUTORIAL + DEMO + INSTALL + REVIEW
DigitalOcean Swimmer Demo
Features
Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)
IaaS provides the basic building blocks for an IT infrastructure like servers, storage, and networking, in an on-demand model over the Internet
- 9Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime(26) Ratings
The service uptime as a percentage defined in the SLA
- 8.2Dynamic scaling(28) Ratings
Ease of scaling up or down in response to customer needs
- 7.2Elastic load balancing(20) Ratings
Automatic balancing and distribution of resources across multiple virtual computers
- 9.3Pre-configured templates(25) Ratings
Pre-defined templates for virtual machines
- 7.7Monitoring tools(30) Ratings
Monitoring tools provide alerts when problems are detected
- 8.7Pre-defined machine images(29) Ratings
Range of different server configurations available
- 7.7Operating system support(29) Ratings
Range of operating systems available as pre-configured images
- 7.7Security controls(28) Ratings
Compliance with security protocols like SSL and AES
- 8Automation(2) Ratings
Automation of administrative tasks
Product Details
- About
- Tech Details
- FAQs
What is DigitalOcean?
DigitalOcean is an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platform from the company of the same name headquartered in New York. It is known for its support of managed Kubernetes clusters and “Droplets” feature.
Deployment
Create managed Kubernetes clusters just by specifying the size and location of worker nodes
Standard, general purpose, or CPU-optimized compute types
App marketplace
Global availability
Scalability
Scale up, scale down, or migrate between Droplets (virtual machines)
Distribute traffic across droplets
Redirect network traffic
Hourly billing
Storage
Managed MySQL, Redis, or PostgreSQL databases
Store and retrieve any amount of data (audio, video, etc.)
SSD-based storage support
Backups and snapshots
Security
Cloud firewalls
Private networking
Two-factor authorization and centralized billing
Monitoring
Native integration
Resource usage reports and graphs
Real-term alerts and notifications
DigitalOcean Video
DigitalOcean Technical Details
Deployment Types | Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based |
---|---|
Operating Systems | Unspecified |
Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Comparisons
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Reviews and Ratings
(132)Community Insights
- Business Problems Solved
- Pros
- Cons
- Recommendations
DigitalOcean is a versatile platform that has been widely adopted for various use cases by different types of users. For web developers and engineers, DigitalOcean offers a seamless hosting solution for websites and web applications, allowing them to easily set up and manage their own servers. This includes hosting personal and professional websites, managing documentation for migration and setup, as well as providing support throughout the process. Customers have praised DigitalOcean for its user-friendly interface and the ability to quickly spin up servers for testing new WordPress 'stacks' within minutes.
In addition to web hosting, DigitalOcean is also utilized by organizations for cloud computing needs. This includes hosting cloud instances, managing DNS records, utilizing floating IP addresses, deploying Kubernetes instances, and setting up load balancers. The flexibility and scalability of DigitalOcean's services allow organizations to easily adapt their infrastructure based on their specific requirements. Moreover, development teams appreciate the low-cost reliable servers and support provided by DigitalOcean when it comes to developing, testing, and deploying production infrastructure.
One notable use case is DustMoon, a media company that switched to DigitalOcean for hosting their website. They reported improved performance after moving to an entry-level VPS plan. Another use case involves customers using DigitalOcean to host custom scheduling software publicly, eliminating the need for VPN accounts or exposing servers to public access, thus enhancing security in the process.
DigitalOcean's simplicity, flexibility, and affordability make it an attractive option for both small client projects and larger organizations. Customers highly recommend DigitalOcean as a web hosting service due to its fantastic performance at a great price point. However, while users appreciate the features provided by DigitalOcean, some have suggested that the support could be more effective. Overall, DigitalOcean has proven to be a reliable solution for various cloud computing needs such as hosting websites and web apps, running microservices, and launching prototypes quickly and cost-effectively.
Developer-friendly tools and APIs: Users have expressed their appreciation for the developer-friendly tools and APIs provided by DigitalOcean, finding them useful and conducive to efficient development processes. Several reviewers have stated that these tools have made it easier for them to develop and manage their cloud resources effectively.
Great documentation: The comprehensive and well-structured documentation offered by DigitalOcean has been highly praised by users. Many reviewers have found the documentation to be helpful, particularly when setting up various configurations and services. They have highlighted its wide coverage of topics as a valuable resource for guidance.
Active and helpful community: The active and supportive community of DigitalOcean has garnered positive feedback from users. They have commended the community's responsiveness in providing assistance whenever needed. Reviewers also appreciate the availability of official help articles and public forums, which contribute to their positive experience with the platform.
Limited product offerings: Some users have mentioned that DigitalOcean offers a limited range of products compared to other cloud providers, specifically noting the absence of enterprise-level options such as Windows Server, MS SQL Server, and Oracle products. This may be a drawback for users who require a wider variety of services.
Limited number of regions: Users have expressed concern about the limited availability of data center regions in DigitalOcean. While the platform is expanding rapidly and introducing new data centers, some reviewers feel that having fewer options could be disadvantageous for those who require specific geographical locations.
Complex email server setup: Setting up email servers on DigitalOcean can be complex according to some users, leading them to recommend external services like Zoho instead. The intricate process may pose challenges for users who prefer a simpler email setup within the DigitalOcean platform.
Users have made several recommendations based on their experiences with DigitalOcean. The three most common recommendations are:
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Users suggest DigitalOcean as a good choice for enterprise or small-medium businesses, but not for beginner individual developers. They appreciate the ease of setup compared to other cloud providers.
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Use DigitalOcean for hosting projects with great support and functionalities. Users find DigitalOcean to be an excellent platform for hosting web applications, virtual machines, and VPS servers. They recommend using DigitalOcean for quick and affordable hosting needs, especially for small projects or users with limited server management experience.
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Consider DigitalOcean as a reliable cloud provider for startups or new companies looking to quickly create a backend infrastructure or cloud-based computing. Users mention that DigitalOcean is easy to use, provides transparent monthly billing, and offers straightforward pricing. They also appreciate helpful documentation, interesting promotions, inbuilt monitoring, and consistent service without surprises at the end of the month.
Overall, users find DigitalOcean to be a competitive option in the market with flexible tariffs, easy setup, strong functionality, and affordability.
Attribute Ratings
Reviews
(1-3 of 3)Developer-friendly cloud provider
We use several Virtual Machines to host our different services from our SOA architecture (Nginx load balancer/API proxy, PostgreSQL DB instance, APIs servers, and Nginx Web Servers) together with some networking services like Private Network and Public Floating IPs.
- Developer-friendly tools and APIs.
- Great documentation.
- Awesome community and support.
- Good and clean UI for cloud resources management.
- Nice collection of products which is growing all the time adding new products every year.
- Some products/services available on other Cloud providers aren't available, but they seem to be catching up as they add new products like Managed SQL DBs.
- While they have FreeBSD droplets (VMs), support for *BSD OSs is limited. I.e. the new monitoring agent only works on Linux.
- There are no regions available on South America.
- They don't seem to offer enterprise-level products, even basic ones as Windows Server, MS SQL Server, Oracle products, etc.
I wouldn't recommend it to anybody looking for enterprise-level solutions or trying to host proprietary software on the platform.
Big projects that require Global availability and replication may fall short in available regions as well.
Also, projects looking to use modern/advanced technologies, like AI, ML, Big Data, will not find packaged solutions like other cloud providers offer.
- Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime
- 90%9.0
- Dynamic scaling
- 70%7.0
- Elastic load balancing
- 90%9.0
- Pre-configured templates
- 80%8.0
- Monitoring tools
- 70%7.0
- Pre-defined machine images
- 100%10.0
- Operating system support
- 70%7.0
- Security controls
- 80%8.0
- Costs are easily predicted, so budget estimation is more accurate.
- The architecture was defined around available products at the time. With new product offerings, we feel forced to migrate to more robust solutions which adds some cost, but also adds reliability to our infrastructure.
- Documentation and community docs were a great resource to help us build our architecture.
Products like Storage or Pub/Sub isn't available on Digital Ocean and the alternative to Cloud SQL wasn't available at the time we created the project, so product availability may be a deciding factor.
They help a lot, but mostly through information, it's hard to get support taking actions on your architecture. While this isn't something I look for in a provider, it may be a blocker for some users that may need extra help setting up environments.
Answer times aren't the best either, but not sure how that compares to other providers anyway.
Their dashboard is clean and easy to use, not overloaded with action buttons or other unnecessary elements.
The Marketplace is a great way to easily deploy a lot of products.
The community docs provide easy to follow step-by-step instructions for deploying almost anything without being an expert.
DigitalOcean vs. Others: Flexibility
The various regions available to DigitalOcean customers is very nice for targeting specific geographical areas. Launching a service for the Asian market? Spin up a server in Indonesia, instead of New York like you'd do for US users.
- Various geographical regions to run a VPS in.
- Many pre-built images like WordPress, GitLab, and Ghost.
- Local networking making it easy to communicate between your VPSs.
- Backups that are always on and free would be sweet.
- Better integration with Docker Cloud.
- Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime
- 100%10.0
- Dynamic scaling
- 100%10.0
- Elastic load balancing
- 100%10.0
- Pre-configured templates
- 100%10.0
- Monitoring tools
- 100%10.0
- Pre-defined machine images
- 100%10.0
- Operating system support
- 100%10.0
- Security controls
- 100%10.0
- Reduced costs for servers
- Google Cloud and ChunkHost
ChunkHost is very similar to DigitalOcean, but doesn't have the infrastructure that DigitalOcean has. Geographical regions aren't available with ChunkHost and they don't provide as many monitoring tools. Comparable service, just not as flexible.
Great for the little guy (like me!)
- Uptime. Since I joined a couple of years ago I don't think I've had a single outage.
- Native IPv6. IPv6 is the way of the future and DigitalOcean allows me to participate without jumping through hoops (e.g. negotiating through a tunnel broker).
- Simplicity. I can spin up a droplet and have it up and running quickly, and I don't have to go through a lengthy process to do so.
- Platform. I love Ubuntu and it's standard with DigitalOcean.
- External storage. This is the big one. When you spin up a droplet you have a fixed virtual disk size. It would be really nice to be able to temporarily or permanently add storage without resorting to hacks involving solutions like S3 or Dropbox.
- DNS management. There are numerous DNS solutions available on the net but it would be nice to have one native to DigitalOcean.
- Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime
- 100%10.0
- Dynamic scaling
- N/AN/A
- Elastic load balancing
- N/AN/A
- Pre-configured templates
- N/AN/A
- Monitoring tools
- N/AN/A
- Pre-defined machine images
- 100%10.0
- Operating system support
- 100%10.0
- Security controls
- 100%10.0
- Since I don't use DigitalOcean for business purposes at the moment, this doesn't apply. But as an IT professional using it for personal projects and as a testbed for learning, it works great.
- AWS
- Database, both SQL (MySQL) and NoSQL (Redis)
- Email (Postfix)
- Website (primarily Rails and Nginx)
- I run a politically themed URL shortener. DigitalOcean allows me to do this fairly easily with Rails, Redis and MySQL.
- When Docker burst upon the scene I used my DigitalOcean droplet to learn how it works. Now all of my services run in Docker containers and it makes updating and maintenance easier.
- Spinning up a machine
- Updating via apt
- Support through tutorials and how-tos
- Can't think of any!