Comparison
DigitalOcean vs Oracle Always Free
You are paying monthly for a VM that Oracle gives away with more RAM.
What DigitalOcean gives you today
No permanent free tier — the cheapest Droplet starts around $4-$6/month, App Platform higher.
Typical spend: $6-$24/month per Droplet, plus $15+/month for managed Postgres
Side by side
| Feature | DigitalOcean | Oracle Always Free + Cheaploy |
|---|---|---|
| Compute | 1 shared vCPU / 512 MB-1 GB on the entry Droplet | Up to 4 ARM OCPUs and 24 GB RAM (Oracle Always Free), yours alone |
| Sleeping / cold starts | None (it is a VM) | None — a long-running VM you own |
| Bandwidth | 500 GB-1 TB transfer on entry plans | 10 TB/month outbound included by Oracle |
| Database | Managed Postgres from ~$15/month | Self-hosted Postgres, MySQL or Oracle Autonomous Database at $0 |
| Background jobs & cron | Usually a paid add-on | Just another container on the same VM |
| Who owns the infrastructure | The provider | Your own Oracle Cloud tenancy |
| What you pay | Per plan, per seat, per bandwidth overage | $0 infrastructure + a flat Cheaploy platform fee |
Stay on DigitalOcean if
- You need a datacentre region Oracle does not offer
- You rely on DigitalOcean's managed database, Spaces or load balancer products
Switch if
- You are paying for a small Droplet that Oracle's 4 OCPU / 24 GB ARM allowance would replace for free
- Bandwidth overages matter to you — Oracle includes 10 TB/month
- You want managed deploys without giving up the free hardware
Related
Frequently asked
Is Oracle's ARM as fast as a Droplet?+
An Ampere A1 core is a full physical core, not a shared vCPU slice, so it usually outperforms entry-level shared Droplets.
What about managed backups?+
You schedule your own dumps to Oracle Object Storage; Cheaploy includes backup and restore tooling.
Can I run Docker Compose?+
Yes, exactly as you would on a Droplet.
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