DigitalOcean Droplet Pricing 2027: Full Tables, v5 Droplets and the Billing Change Nobody Got Right

A surprising amount of content published in 2026 claims DigitalOcean cut its Basic Droplet price by 20 percent in January, from $5 down to $4. That is not true: the $4 Droplet has existed since 2022. What actually changed on January 1, 2026 was how Droplets are billed, and in August DigitalOcean added a new kind of Droplet, v5, that is billed differently again. This page is the reference version going into 2027: every Basic Droplet price, what the billing changes mean for your bill, and what to watch next year.

Every figure below was checked against DigitalOcean's Droplet pricing page and its pricing documentation on 30 October 2026. Prices are in US dollars.

The short answer for 2027

• Basic Droplets start at $4/month (512 MiB). The sizes most projects use are $6 for 1 GiB, $12 for 2 GiB and $24 for 4 GiB.
• No price change announced for 2027. As of 30 October 2026, DigitalOcean has not published new Basic Droplet prices for next year.
• Billing is per second since January 2026, with a 60-second minimum, and a regular Droplet never costs more than its monthly price.
• New v5 Droplets (from August 2026) let you choose CPU, RAM and disk separately, but have no monthly cap and bill the public IPv4 address as its own line item, currently at $0.00 but "subject to change".

Basic Droplet prices

A public IPv4 address is included in these prices. DigitalOcean also sells Premium Basic Droplets with newer Intel or AMD CPUs and NVMe storage for a few dollars more per size; if your workload is CPU-sensitive, compare them before defaulting to the cheapest row. For a typical WordPress or Laravel site, 512 MiB is too tight: budget for at least the $12 tier.

What changed on January 1, 2026: per-second billing

DigitalOcean moved every Droplet from hourly to per-second billing, with a minimum charge of 60 seconds or $0.01, whichever is higher. The monthly prices did not drop. What changed is the cost of short-lived Droplets: spin one up for a ten-minute CI job twenty times a day and you now pay for roughly the minutes used instead of twenty full hours. DigitalOcean's own example puts that at about $0.02 a day instead of about $2.50.

For a Droplet you run all month, nothing changes. Regular ("bundled") Droplets are capped at 672 hours (28 days) a month, so you never pay more than the listed monthly price. Note that a powered-off Droplet is still billed until you destroy it.

New in 2026: v5 Droplets, and why they are not the cheap option

In August 2026 DigitalOcean introduced v5 Droplets, running on 5th-generation AMD EPYC processors. Instead of fixed plans, you choose vCPUs, memory and disk separately, as either Shared (shared vCPUs, for bursty work) or General Purpose (dedicated vCPUs). At launch they were available in the atl1, ric1, mkc1 and mem1 data centres.

Three differences matter for your bill:

• No monthly cap. v5 Droplets are billed for every hour in the month, so a 31-day month costs more than a 28-day one.
• Higher starting prices. DigitalOcean lists Shared v5 from $0.024/hour for 1 vCPU and 1 GB, and $0.052/hour for 2 vCPU and 4 GB. Over an average month (about 730 hours) that is roughly $17.50 and $38, against $6 and $24 for the Basic Droplets of the same size.
• IPv4 is a separate line item. It is billed at an "introductory" $0.00/hour that DigitalOcean says is "subject to change". If that price rises in 2027, every public v5 Droplet gets more expensive.

v5 makes sense when you need a shape the fixed plans don't offer, or newer CPUs for heavy work such as transcoding. For a small web app, Basic Droplets remain the better value.

The real cost: backups and bandwidth are extra

Turn on daily backups for a $12 Droplet and you pay $15.60 a month, not $12. Transfer allowances are pooled across all Droplets in your team and don't roll over between months, so a busy Droplet can borrow from a quiet one. Our free Bandwidth Calculator converts an allowance like 2,000 GiB a month into the average speed it covers.

How this compares to Hetzner going into 2027

On price alone, Hetzner still wins at 4 GB: its CX23 costs €5.99 a month against $24 for the 4 GiB Basic Droplet. At 1 GB the two are close: Hetzner's new CPX02 is €6.49 and the 1 GiB Droplet is $6, although Hetzner includes 20 TB of traffic in the EU against DigitalOcean's 1 TB. Full numbers are in our Hetzner CX23 pricing guide and our 2027 VPS price comparison.

DigitalOcean's real advantage is that you can actually order one. Since June 2026 Hetzner has restricted new cloud servers for new customers and some existing ones, and its cheapest plans are often sold out. DigitalOcean's Basic Droplets have had no comparable shortage. A cheaper server you cannot buy is no use if you need one this week.

What to expect in 2027

Nothing official has been announced. Two things are worth watching: the "introductory" IPv4 price on v5 Droplets, which DigitalOcean has said may change, and the memory and storage costs that pushed Hetzner, OVHcloud and others to raise prices in 2026. Re-check the live pricing page before you budget for next year; we will update this page if DigitalOcean announces changes.

FAQ

Did DigitalOcean lower its prices in 2026?
No. The January 2026 change was the move to per-second billing. The $4 entry price has existed since 2022.

Can per-second billing make my Droplet cost more than the monthly price?
Not for regular Basic Droplets: they are capped at 672 hours a month. v5 Droplets have no cap and are billed for every hour.

Are backups included?
No. Weekly backups cost 20% of the Droplet price, daily backups 30%. Keep a copy somewhere other than DigitalOcean as well; our backup strategy guide shows how.

Is the $4 Droplet usable for a real project?
Only for a very small static site, a reverse proxy or a test box. With 512 MiB of RAM, a PHP app with MySQL will struggle. Start at $12 for WordPress or Laravel.

Should I choose a v5 Droplet for a new project?
Only if you need a size the Basic plans don't offer or dedicated vCPUs. For most small sites, a Basic Droplet costs a third as much.

Bottom line

DigitalOcean's Basic Droplet prices go into 2027 unchanged: $6 for 1 GiB, $12 for 2 GiB, $24 for 4 GiB, with per-second billing that only helps. It is not the cheapest provider at any size, but it is one you can order from today. The thing to watch next year is how DigitalOcean prices IPv4 on its new v5 Droplets.

Sources: DigitalOcean Droplet pricing, Droplet pricing documentation and v5 Droplet release note, checked on 30 October 2026.

Update, 30 October 2026: updated for 2027. Added v5 Droplets and their uncapped billing and IPv4 line item, the 672-hour cap for regular Droplets, pooled transfer, and a new comparison with Hetzner's current prices and ordering restrictions.