Short answer
As of October 23, 2026, UpCloud sells 9 VPS plans from $3.50/month (Starter 1xCPU-1GB: 1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, 10 GB SSD) in 14 locations. It ranks #26 of 160 providers overall and #5 of 157 for VPS for Developers. Trustpilot rates it 3.0 from 168 reviews.
Key takeaways
- Cheapest plan: Starter 1xCPU-1GB at $3.50/month (1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, 10 GB SSD).
- Windows Server from $3.50/month (Starter 1xCPU-1GB, licence fee extra (not published)).
- 14 data-center locations in 12 countries: Amsterdam, Chicago, Copenhagen, Frankfurt, Helsinki, London and 8 more.
- Free trial: Free trial after card verification (EUR/USD 0-1 authorisation, not charged): the docs describe a standard 7-day trial limited to 2 cores/4 GB, 60 GB storage, 2 IPv4 + 2….
- Ranks #26 of 160 overall; best placing #5 of 157 for VPS for Developers.
Key facts
| Website | upcloud.com |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | Helsinki, Finland |
| Founded | 2011 |
| Cheapest plan | Starter 1xCPU-1GB, $3.50/month (€3.00) |
| Price per GB RAM (median) | $4.50 |
| Data centers | 14 locations in 12 countries (Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania) |
| Virtualization | KVM |
| Billing | Hourly, monthly |
| Windows Server | Yes Windows Server is available 'through our provided templates' (upcloud.com/docs/products/cloud-servers/windows-licensing); the licence is charged per CPU core assigned to the server on top of the plan price. The 'Windows licenses' heading on the pricing page rendered without figures and the docs do not name versions or the per-core rate, so the surcharge amount is unverified. Windows is excluded from the free trial. |
| Operating systems | Ubuntu, Debian, AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux, CentOS Stream, Windows Server, Custom image |
| Storage | — NVMe (SSD) |
| DDoS protection | — |
| Backups / snapshots | Paid backups; snapshots: Yes |
| IPv4 / IPv6 | IPv4 included: Yes; IPv6: Yes |
| API | Yes |
| Dedicated CPU plans | No |
| Payment methods | Card, paypal, other |
| Trial or credit | Free trial after card verification (EUR/USD 0-1 authorisation, not charged): the docs describe a standard 7-day trial limited to 2 cores/4 GB, 60 GB storage, 2 IPv4 + 2 IPv6, no Windows/GPU; the product page advertises 'Start your 30-day trial with €500' (promotional variant). FAQ also promises a 30-day money-back guarantee on the first payment. |
| Money-back | 30 days |
| Support | 24/7/365 live chat in the control panel plus email; tiered response targets (Essentials: incident < 2 h / request < 4 h; Advanced: < 30 min / < 1 h; Enterprise: < 5 min / < 10 min); no phone support listed. |
| Email / port 25 | Port 25 blocked by default |
| Uptime SLA | 99.99% (Starter) / 99.999% (Premium, Cloud Native); SLA compensation is 50x the service fee for unscheduled interruptions over 5 minutes, capped at 30 days of fees per incident |
| Trustpilot | 3.0 / 5 from 168 reviews (profile) |
Plans and prices
9 plans recorded across 3 lines. Monthly list prices in US dollars; the highlighted row is the cheapest.
| Plan | Line | CPU | vCPU | RAM | Storage | Traffic | $/month | $/GB RAM | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter 1xCPU-1GB | Starter (previous-gen AMD, standard SSD) | Shared | 1 | 1 GB | 10 GB SSD | — | $3.50 (€3.00) | $3.50 | Official list price EUR 3/mo (EU page) / USD 3.50/mo (global page), billed by the starting hour with a 28-day monthly cap; 250 Mbit/s; IPv4 included; limited to 5 concurrent deployments per customer; zero-cost egress within the Fair Transfer Policy share (figure not rendered), throttled to 100 Mbps beyond it. |
| Starter 1xCPU-2GB | Starter (previous-gen AMD, standard SSD) | Shared | 1 | 2 GB | 20 GB SSD | — | $7.00 (€6.00) | $3.50 | EUR 6/mo (EU) / USD 7/mo (global); 250 Mbit/s. A 2xCPU-2GB/30 GB variant costs EUR 8 / USD 10 and 1xCPU-4GB/30 GB EUR 10 / USD 12. |
| Starter 2xCPU-4GB | Starter (previous-gen AMD, standard SSD) | Shared | 2 | 4 GB | 30 GB SSD | — | $14.00 (€12.00) | $3.50 | EUR 12/mo (EU) / USD 14/mo (global); 500 Mbit/s. 2xCPU-8GB/40 GB is EUR 18 / USD 20. |
| Starter 4xCPU-8GB | Starter (previous-gen AMD, standard SSD) | Shared | 4 | 8 GB | 40 GB SSD | — | $24.00 (€20.00) | $3.00 | EUR 20/mo (EU) / USD 24/mo (global); 500 Mbit/s. Starter tops out at 4xCPU-16GB/50 GB for EUR 28 / USD 32. |
| Cloud Native 2xCPU-4GB | Cloud Native (diskless) | Shared | 2 | 4 GB | — | — | $18.00 (€15.00) | $4.50 | EUR 15/mo (EU) / USD 18/mo (global); no local disk - attach MaxIOPS, Standard or Archive block storage billed separately; 'server stopped, no charges'; 1000 Mbps; 99.999% SLA. Entry Cloud Native is 1xCPU-4GB at EUR 12 / USD 14. |
| Premium 1xCPU-1GB | Premium (AMD EPYC, MaxIOPS storage) | Shared | 1 | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | — | $6.00 (€5.00) | $6.00 | Cheapest Premium plan: EUR 5/mo (EU) / USD 6/mo (global); 25 GB MaxIOPS, 1000 Mbps and IPv4 included, 99.999% SLA, 'Transfer included' under the Fair Transfer Policy. |
| Premium 2xCPU-4GB | Premium (AMD EPYC, MaxIOPS storage) | Shared | 2 | 4 GB | 50 GB SSD | — | $26.00 (€26.00) | $6.50 | EUR 26/mo (EU) and USD 26/mo (global) - the global page lists the same number in USD; 1000 Mbps, 99.999% SLA. UpCloud markets 'Premium AMD CPUs' and consistent performance but does not label vCPUs as dedicated, so cpu_type is recorded as shared. |
| Premium 4xCPU-8GB | Premium (AMD EPYC, MaxIOPS storage) | Shared | 4 | 8 GB | 100 GB SSD | — | $54.00 (€52.00) | $6.75 | EUR 52/mo (EU) / USD 54/mo (global); 100 GB MaxIOPS. |
| Premium 8xCPU-16GB | Premium (AMD EPYC, MaxIOPS storage) | Shared | 8 | 16 GB | 200 GB SSD | — | $164.00 (€148.00) | $10.25 | EUR 148/mo (EU) / USD 164/mo (global); 200 GB MaxIOPS. Premium scales to 80 vCPU / 512 GB / 500 GB at EUR 2,552/mo. |
No conversion applied: USD figures are UpCloud's own list prices from the global pricing page (upcloud.com/global/pricing, USD) and EUR figures from the EU page (upcloud.com/pricing). UpCloud's USD list is not a straight conversion (e.g. Premium 2xCPU-4GB is EUR 26 and USD 26); for reference ECB EUR→USD was 1.1188 on 2026-10-13. Prices exclude taxes.
UpCloud Windows VPS prices
Plans that can run Windows Server, with the monthly licence fee added where UpCloud charges one.
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | $/month | Licence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter 1xCPU-1GB | 1 | 1 GB | 10 GB | $3.50 | licence fee extra (not published) |
| Premium 1xCPU-1GB | 1 | 1 GB | 25 GB | $6.00 | licence fee extra (not published) |
| Starter 1xCPU-2GB | 1 | 2 GB | 20 GB | $7.00 | licence fee extra (not published) |
| Starter 2xCPU-4GB | 2 | 4 GB | 30 GB | $14.00 | licence fee extra (not published) |
| Cloud Native 2xCPU-4GB | 2 | 4 GB | — | $18.00 | licence fee extra (not published) |
| Starter 4xCPU-8GB | 4 | 8 GB | 40 GB | $24.00 | licence fee extra (not published) |
Data-center locations
UpCloud lets you deploy in 14 locations: 9 in Europe, 3 in North America, 1 in Asia and 1 in Oceania. Countries: Australia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and United States.
Map of UpCloud locations
Click a marker to see which providers sell servers there. Marker size reflects the number of providers in that city.
Pros and cons
Strengths
- 15 zones in 12 countries (10 in Europe incl. Helsinki x2, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Stavanger, Madrid, Warsaw) at one global list price in EUR or USD
- Hourly billing capped at 28 days/month, zero-cost egress under the Fair Transfer Policy, 99.999% SLA with 50x fee compensation on Premium and Cloud Native
- Windows Server templates, 30-day money-back on the first payment and a card-verified free trial
Limitations
- Starter plans are limited to 250-500 Mbit/s and previous-gen CPUs, and all plans throttle to 100 Mbps once the undisclosed fair-transfer share is exceeded
- No free backups: Simple Backup adds 10-60% to the server price; Windows licence surcharge is not published on the pricing page
- Card/PayPal/Apple-Google Pay only (no SEPA, wire or crypto), and Trustpilot score is 3.0/5 from 168 reviews
Acceptable use
Terms of Service / AUP prohibit cryptocurrency mining without prior written approval, unsolicited mass email, data mining/robots/scraping, unauthorised network monitoring, copyright infringement and child sexual abuse material; VPNs, proxies, Tor, torrents and IPTV are not mentioned (UpCloud sells its own VPN Gateway product). Port 25 is blocked on trial accounts.
Where UpCloud ranks
Positions in the rankings on this site, based on the data above.
- Best VPS for Developers #5 of 157
- VPS for PBN Hosting #13 of 157
- Best Node.js VPS #13 of 157
- Best Docker VPS #12 of 118
- Best VPS for Laravel #16 of 157
- Best VPS in San Jose #2 of 19
- Best VPS in Europe #14 of 129
- Hourly Billed VPS #5 of 44
- Best VPS in North America #13 of 113
- Windows VPS Hosting #9 of 77
- Best VPS in Amsterdam #9 of 76
- Best Forex VPS #9 of 76
- Cheap Singapore VPS #5 of 42
- Best VPS in United States #13 of 109
- Best VPS in Netherlands #10 of 83
- Best VPS for Django #19 of 157
- Cheap Windows VPS #8 of 65
- Cloud VPS Hosting #4 of 32
- Best VPS for a VPN Server (WireGuard, OpenVPN) #22 of 157
- Best VPS for Proxies #22 of 157
- Best VPS in California #9 of 60
- Best Trading VPS #11 of 73
- Best VPS in Asia #13 of 84
- Best VPS in Singapore #10 of 64
Alternatives to UpCloud
Providers closest to UpCloud by region, price and features. LikeVPS, OVHcloud VPS and VPSServer.com are the nearest matches.
| # | Provider | Plan | $/month | RAM | $/GB RAM | Locations | Windows | Trustpilot |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lite 2.0 | $10.00 | 2 GB | $5.00 | 26 | Yes | — | |
| 2 | VPS-1 | $4.54 | 4 GB | $1.14 | 11 | Yes | 3.8 (8,843) | |
| 3 | Entry (1 GB) | $4.00 | 1 GB | $4.00 | 21 | Yes | 1.4 (118) | |
| 4 | Regular Performance 1 vCPU / 0.5 GB (vc2-1c-0.5gb) | $2.50 | 512 MB | $5.00 | 32 | Yes | 1.6 (585) | |
| 5 | Basic 512 MB (s-1vcpu-512mb-10gb) | $4.00 | 512 MB | $8.00 | 13 | No | 4.5 (2,581) | |
| 6 | Cloud VPS 4 | $6.16 | 8 GB | $0.77 | 10 | Yes | 4.6 (11,470) |
Frequently asked questions
How much does UpCloud VPS cost?
Plans start at $3.50 per month for Starter 1xCPU-1GB (1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, 10 GB SSD); Official list price EUR 3/mo (EU page) / USD 3.50/mo (global page), billed by the starting hour with a 28-day monthly cap; 250 Mbit/s; IPv4 included; limited to 5 concurrent deployments per customer; zero-cost egress within the Fair Transfer Policy share (figure not rendered), throttled to 100 Mbps beyond it. Across its published plans the median price is $4.50 per GB of RAM.
Where are UpCloud's data centers?
UpCloud lets you deploy in 14 locations: 9 in Europe, 3 in North America, 1 in Asia and 1 in Oceania. Countries: Australia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and United States.
Does UpCloud offer Windows VPS?
Windows Server is available 'through our provided templates' (upcloud.com/docs/products/cloud-servers/windows-licensing); the licence is charged per CPU core assigned to the server on top of the plan price. The 'Windows licenses' heading on the pricing page rendered without figures and the docs do not name versions or the per-core rate, so the surcharge amount is unverified. Windows is excluded from the free trial. Cheapest Windows-capable plan: Starter 1xCPU-1GB at $3.50/month.
Does UpCloud have hourly billing?
Yes, servers are billed by the hour with a monthly cap.
Is UpCloud good?
As of October 23, 2026, UpCloud sells 9 VPS plans from $3.50/month (Starter 1xCPU-1GB: 1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, 10 GB SSD) in 14 locations. It ranks #26 of 160 providers overall and #5 of 157 for VPS for Developers. Trustpilot rates it 3.0 from 168 reviews. Strengths: 15 zones in 12 countries (10 in europe incl. helsinki x2, stockholm, copenhagen, stavanger, madrid, warsaw) at one global list price in eur or usd and hourly billing capped at 28 days/month, zero-cost egress under the fair transfer policy, 99.999% sla with 50x fee compensation on premium and cloud native. Limitations: starter plans are limited to 250-500 mbit/s and previous-gen cpus, and all plans throttle to 100 mbps once the undisclosed fair-transfer share is exceeded and no free backups: simple backup adds 10-60% to the server price; windows licence surcharge is not published on the pricing page.
Sources
Data was read from these pages (provider data checked October 14, 2026; rankings updated October 23, 2026). Prices change; check the provider's site before buying.
- https://upcloud.com/pricing/
- https://upcloud.com/global/pricing/
- https://upcloud.com/products/cloud-servers/
- https://upcloud.com/data-centres/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/getting-started/locations/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/products/cloud-servers/windows-licensing/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/getting-started/billing/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/getting-started/billing/payment-methods/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/getting-started/free-trial/
- https://upcloud.com/docs/getting-started/faq/
- https://upcloud.com/about/
- https://upcloud.com/support/
- https://upcloud.com/terms-of-service/
- https://upcloud.com/fair-transfer-policy/
- https://upcloud.com/products/simple-backup/
- https://www.trustpilot.com/review/upcloud.com
- https://api.frankfurter.dev/v1/latest?base=EUR&symbols=USD
- https://www.vpsbenchmarks.com/hosters/upcloud
- https://sparecores.com/servers?vendor=upcloud