For years the answer was simple: Hetzner for price-to-performance, Contabo for raw specs per dollar. Then Hetzner pushed through two price increases in 2026, and the gap narrowed or flipped on several popular plans. If you are choosing between them today, the old advice no longer applies. This comparison uses publicly listed plans as of October 2026 — but both providers change prices without much warning, so check the official pricing pages before you pay.
The short verdict
Hetzner wins on network quality, hardware generation, and billing flexibility (hourly billing, easy spin-up and destroy) — the safer pick for production services where consistent CPU performance matters. Contabo wins on sheer resources per dollar: more vCPUs, RAM, and NVMe storage per tier, plus 32 TB of traffic — the better pick for RAM-hungry or storage-heavy workloads where slower support and some performance variance are acceptable.
Pricing in 2026: what actually changed
Hetzner’s 2026 adjustments hit the AMD shared-CPU line hardest. Third-party price tracking found the CPX22 (2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM) jumping from about €7.99 to roughly €19.49 per month after the June 2026 change. The Intel-based CX22 (2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM, 40 GB NVMe) still sits near €3.79 per month, which keeps Hetzner competitive at the very bottom of the range.
Contabo raised some prices too, but its entry tiers moved far less. The Cloud VPS S plan (4 vCPU, 8 GB RAM, 200 GB NVMe) lists around $6.99 per month plus a one-time setup fee of about $5.95. The next steps up, VPS M and VPS L, list around $12.99 and $20.99 per month with the same one-time setup fee.
Three billing differences matter more than the list prices:
- Hourly billing: Hetzner bills by the hour (capped at the monthly price), so a few hours of testing costs cents. Contabo bills monthly only.
- Setup fees: Contabo charges a one-time setup fee (about $5.95) on monthly plans. Hetzner charges none.
- Extras: Hetzner charges extra for snapshots (per GB per month) and floating IPs. Contabo includes manual snapshots and gives you an IPv4 plus IPv6, with automated backups as a paid add-on.
Every number above is approximate and will drift. Confirm current figures on both official pricing pages before you decide.
Plan specs side by side
How roughly comparable tiers line up as of October 2026. Prices are approximate and may exclude VAT.
| Factor | Hetzner Cloud | Contabo Cloud VPS |
|---|---|---|
| Entry price | ~€3.79/mo (CX22) | ~$6.99/mo + ~$5.95 setup (VPS S) |
| Entry specs | 2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM, 40 GB NVMe | 4 vCPU, 8 GB RAM, 200 GB NVMe |
| Mid-tier price | ~€19.99/mo (CPX22, AMD) | ~$12.99/mo + setup (VPS M) |
| Mid-tier specs | 2 AMD vCPU, 4 GB RAM | 6 vCPU, 16 GB RAM, 400 GB NVMe |
| Included traffic | 20 TB outbound, inbound free | 32 TB, inbound free |
| Billing | Hourly or monthly | Monthly only |
| Regions | Germany, Finland, US (2), Singapore | Germany, US, Singapore, and others |
| Snapshots | Paid per GB/month | Manual snapshots included |
| Support | Ticket-based, generally solid | Ticket-based, often 24-48h |
The pattern is clear: Contabo gives roughly double the cores, RAM, and disk at a lower monthly price, while Hetzner gives finer-grained billing and a cleaner extras menu.
Performance: what to realistically expect
No benchmark table here: numbers from one rented VM say almost nothing about the VM you will get. Both providers sell shared virtual CPUs, so your performance partly depends on your neighbors on the physical host.
What is publicly known about the hardware:
- Hetzner runs current-generation AMD EPYC processors on local NVMe storage, with strong and stable single-core performance — what matters most for web servers, databases, and PHP or Node.js apps.
- Contabo also ships NVMe on its Cloud VPS line, but with more performance variance between hosts and more slowdown during peak European hours. The extra cores help parallel workloads, but individual cores are generally slower.
For a typical self-hosting stack (Nginx, WordPress, a few Docker containers, Postgres), both handle the job. Under sustained load, Hetzner stays more predictable while Contabo can wobble when the host is busy. Bursty workloads benefit more from Contabo’s extra RAM; latency-sensitive or always-on production benefits more from Hetzner’s consistency.
Practical tip: whatever you choose, run a quick curl -sL yabs.sh | bash on the new server before you migrate anything. Five minutes of testing beats any review, including this one.
Network, bandwidth, and regions
Both embarrass the big clouds on bandwidth: 20 TB outbound on every Hetzner plan, 32 TB on Contabo. For a blog, a side project, or a handful of client sites, you will never touch either limit. Both include a free IPv4 and IPv6.
Region choice matters more than the terabyte counts. Hetzner runs in Germany, Finland, the US (Ashburn, Hillsboro), and Singapore; Contabo covers Germany, the US, Singapore, and several other locations. Test Singapore latency on both if your users are in Asia. Neither is ideal for South America or Africa — put a CDN in front or pick a provider with local regions.
Signup, support, and the fine print
- Hetzner screens new accounts aggressively: some legitimate signups get flagged and asked for ID verification. Annoying, but it keeps their network clean. Once you are in, the console, API, private networking, and firewall tools are polished and well documented.
- Contabo has a smoother signup, but support is the weak point: ticket responses of 24 to 48 hours are common, and there is no live chat. If you can fix your own server at 2 a.m., this never matters. If not, factor it into the price.
Hetzner enforces its terms strictly: crypto mining and other high-abuse workloads get shut down fast. Read both terms of service before you buy if your workload is unusual.
Which one should you pick?
Pick Hetzner if: you run production services where stable CPU performance matters, you want hourly billing for experiments and staging, you value a clean API and console, or your users are in Europe and you want the best network quality per euro.
Pick Contabo if: you need lots of RAM or disk on a tight budget (media servers, backup storage, game servers, dev boxes), you are fine managing the server yourself, and you can live with monthly billing and slower support.
Consider neither if: you need regions outside Europe, the US, and Singapore, or you need a managed service with someone else on call. Both are unmanaged, self-service VPS providers. The low price assumes you are the sysadmin.
FAQ
Is Hetzner still cheaper than Contabo in 2026?
Not across the board. After the April and June 2026 increases, Contabo’s mid-tier plans list lower prices with more RAM and storage. Hetzner still has the cheaper entry point (about €3.79/mo for the CX22), but the old “always cheaper” rule no longer holds. Compare the tiers you need and verify current prices on both official sites.
Does Contabo have a catch?
The main trade-offs are slower support (often 24-48 hours by ticket), no hourly billing, a one-time setup fee on monthly plans, and more performance variance on shared CPU hosts. The hardware specs on the tin are real: NVMe storage and generous RAM allocations are standard.
Can I run Docker and WordPress on either provider?
Yes. Both sell standard KVM virtual machines with full root access and a choice of Linux distributions, so any normal self-hosting stack works. A 4 GB RAM plan handles WordPress plus a few containers comfortably; go to 8 GB if you run heavier apps or multiple sites.
Final take
My opinion: the 2026 price changes turned this from a default answer into a real contest. For a production API I would still pick Hetzner for steadier performance and better tooling. For a big cheap box for storage, backups, or a personal media server, I would pick Contabo and pocket the difference. Either way, start with the smallest plan, run your own quick benchmark, and scale up only when your monitoring says so. The cheapest server is the one you do not outgrow in three months.