DigitalOcean Hosting: Dev-Friendly But Do They Get The Basics Right?

Looking for a simple, cheap and robust cloud computing platform that can host your site or app? Our DigitalOcean review (2021 update) will help you make an informed decision whether or not you should buy cloud hosting from DigitalOcean.

DigitalOcean has quickly become one of the most popular cloud hosting providers, thanks to their cloud servers simplicity, robust and reliable infrastructure, and cheap prices.

DigitalOcean lets you create, automate, and manage a robust cloud server infrastructure with out of the box features like floating IP addresses, shared private networking, Tier-1 bandwidth, team accounts and SSD (solid-state drive) hard drives come as standard.

All of their cloud servers are provisioned in as little as 55 seconds and DigitalOcean’s cheapest cloud hosting plan is  5.00 per month.

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DigitalOcean: Simplicity and Advanced Technology

The mission statement of DigitalOcean revolves around simplicity. This is evident throughout their platform but is particularly noticeable in their main features.

Try DigitalOcean. Pricing starts at only $5 per month

Video above: This DigitalOcean video provides an overview of their developer-friendly IaaS platform.

Overview of DigitalOcean Features

Digital Ocean’s 99.99% uptime makes it one of the most reliable resources available.

When added to high levels of security and data protection, it’s no wonder that so many clients use this platform.

The easily navigated control panel is a breath of fresh air for developers. The API facilities offer users the ultimate level of control. This offers a personal experience that ensures great results.

Pay Only for What You Use

Even the pricing strategy is simple. Clients are only billed for their actual usage. This means no excess spending on unused hours.

The monthly caps ensure that you’ll never exceed the maximum spending, regardless of how many droplets are produced.

Snapshot: What this Host Offers

Digital Ocean provides a fair amount of information to help you decide which plan you need:

• The host offers two types of Droplets (cloud servers): Standard and CPU Optimized. The kind of Droplet you need depends on factors including your traffic. For a growing blog, you could select a Standard Droplet
• Standard Droplets are the most flexible, in terms of pricing and use (you can use Standard Droplets for small testing to large production deployments)
• CPU Optimized Droplets are best for CPU intensive tasks such as processing large data sets
• Standard Droplets function as part of a shared CPU, meaning there will be a slight difference in the amount of computing power you can access from time to time
• CPU Optimized Droplets have dedicated vCPU threads, and provide up to a 21% increase in speed compared to the Standard Droplets.
• Plans come with different bandwidth allocations so check the data transfer allocations to find the package that best suits your needs
• Droplets come with an allocation of free outbound data transfer, and inbound bandwidth is free
• You can’t roll transfers over from month to the next
• All Droplet plans are available in all regions

Hosting Plans for Individuals, Small Businesses, Developers

DigitalOcean’s greatest selling point is the wide spectrum of available plans. This flexibility makes it the perfect option for individuals and companies. No developer will struggle to find a solution tailored to their specific needs.

Standard plans range from one server to four while memory can vary from 512 MB to 8 GB.

The TB transfer rate can be anywhere from 1 to 5 depending on the plan while the SSD Disk space starts at 20 GB and stretches to 80GB.

The most popular plan offers:

• 1 GB memory
• 1 core processor
• 30 GB SSD disk
• 2 TB transfer

Alternatively, DigitalOcean also offers high volume plans for those developers that will need it.

What Types of Hosting Does DigitalOcean Provide?

There are a number of different types of hosting available for your business and each comes with a number of distinct advantages and disadvantages. Below we will take a look at two of the most popular hosting options available to you.

Shared Hosting

Shared hosting is one of the most popular hosting options available on the market. It is often the cheapest option available, however, it usually ranks lowest in terms of available resources and server performance. Shared hosting is when a single server is shared among a number of different websites, all competing with each other for space and resources.

Virtual Private Server (VPS)

VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting is usually seen as a step up from shared hosting. It may be the best choice for you if your business requires higher performance and resources than your shared hosting plan can offer.

It usually takes the form of a single server which has been split into a number of smaller virtual servers with each virtual server allocated exclusively to a website. As such, that website is not competing with others on the server for space and resources.

WordPress Hosting

WordPress is an ultra-popular content management system (CMS) used by over 60 million people across the globe.

DigitalOcean provides a one-click installation of WordPress hosting solutions.

The company claims that you can have WordPress up and running in just 55 seconds. The hosting company also offers a series of storage capacities and memory capacities depending on your company’s individual needs.

SSD (Solid-State Drive) Storage

One of the leading benefits of using DigitalOcean hosting is the fact that the company uses SSD storage on all of their servers.

SSD servers have no moving parts, unlike their HDD counterparts. Therefore, they work more quickly and perform exponentially faster than others. This is important for your business as it will allow customers to access your site quicker than rivals

Setting up Your Cloud Server

DigitalOcean is committed to simplicity, and this is clear in their set up processes too.

How to Create a Droplet

Follow these instructions to create a Droplet (cloud instance) using your DigitalOcean control panel:

1. Log into the DigitalOcean control panel, and you can select to create a Droplet from your dashboard
2. The next screen will be the Create Droplet page where you can specify your Droplet configuration
3. The most popular defaults have already been selected so you can scroll to the end and Create Droplet
4. If you want to customize your Droplet, the first step is to choose an image, which includes your operating system and any pre-installed apps.
5. Choose the size of your droplet – the amount of RAM and storage
6. Add block storage to create additional storage volumes you can attach to your Droplets
7. Choose a datacenter region nearest to you and your customers
8. Add SSH keys to provide additional security
9. Finalize and create your Droplet

DigitalOcean Datacenters

Digital Ocean hosting has a wide range of data centers dotted around the globe.

There are currently 8 centers across the world located in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Germany, The Netherlands, Singapore, and India.

This is useful for your business if many of your customers are based on a specific part of the globe and require high-speed servers close to their location. If a customer is geographically closer to a server then, in theory, the page loading speeds should be fast, allowing them to access your site quickly.

Excellent Customer Support and Help

As one of the market leaders, DigitalOcean boasts excellent support facilities.

Most notably, their website has an incredibly useful community area.

This is packed with tutorials, FAQs and other items that can be used to improve the client’s experience.

Meanwhile, an extensive help section provides the answers to almost any query imaginable. If those questions remain unanswered, a ticketing system allows customers to speak to technical experts.

DigitalOcean Web Hosting Pros and Cons

There are a number of other items worth noting about DigitalOcean. They offer six popular Linux distributions. This gives them a large market.

The only potential downside for some developers will be the fact that payment is made via a credit card system. However, the use of hours and monthly spending caps compensates. Moreover, the fact you can pay by various methods, including PayPal, is a bonus.

DigitalOcean makes migrating to a cloud server quicker and easier than ever. With such a high degree of flexibility available too, they are easily amongst the best companies in the field.

Try DigitalOcean. Pricing starts at only $5 per month

DigitalOcean Web Hosting Frequently Asked Questions

Where are DigitalOcean’s datacenters located?

Digital Ocean hosting has eight centers across the world located in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Germany, The Netherlands, Singapore, and India. DigitalOcean recommends choosing the data center nearest to your users.

This is because if a customer is geographically closer to a server then, in theory, the page loading speeds should be fast, allowing them to access your site quickly.

What kind of plans are available?

DigitalOcean has flexible plans. You can select from two types of cloud servers (DigitalOcean refers to servers as Droplets). The Standard Droplet is sufficient for a blog, and any small testing tasks. There are several more options to choose from within the Standard Droplet category.

The CPU Optimized Droplet is geared towards users who need to perform CPU intense tasks such as batch processing.

What is DigitalOcean’s web hosting price structure?

Clients are only billed for their actual usage. This ensures no excess spending on unused hours. The monthly caps mean you’ll never exceed the maximum spending. DigitalOcean accepts credit cards as a payment method. Your credit card will be charged on the first day of each month.

DigitalOcean Hosting Plans & Prices

DigitalOcean has a range of cloud servers on offer and all plans come with solid-state drives (SSD) as standard. For latest and most up to date prices visit DigitalOcean’s website.

Try DigitalOcean. Pricing starts at just 5$ per month

Best DigitalOcean alternatives

• Linode Review
• Vultr Review
• Rackspace Review
• Cloudways Review

People share their opinions about companies on Twitter each and every day. We monitor tweets about DigitalOcean and apply a sentiment analysis algorithm that classifies these tweets as positive or negative. Every review is from a real person opinion. We use this information and output an approval rating score, which is based on real people, positive and negative, opinions about DigitalOcean on Twitter.

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