Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

DigitalOcean vs Google Compute Engine comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 16, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.1
Users generally found DigitalOcean cost-effective, noticing initial savings, though some lacked details to quantify exact financial impact.
Sentiment score
6.3
Compute Engine offers initial cost savings and performance boosts, but financial benefits and precise savings remain challenging to gauge.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.5
DigitalOcean's customer service is responsive yet inconsistent, needing improved technical support and quicker resolutions compared to AWS.
Sentiment score
6.3
Google Compute Engine support receives mixed reviews; some praise responsiveness while others note inadequate assistance and delayed responses.
DigitalOcean support is rated lower than AWS's because we encounter issues more frequently.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.2
DigitalOcean is highly rated for scalability, offering tools to manage increased loads and easily add resources like RAM or CPUs.
Sentiment score
8.0
Google Compute Engine is scalable and versatile, suitable for varying workloads, with strong network and security features.
I have not tried vertical scaling yet, but from the documentation, it seems very easy to scale the system.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
DigitalOcean offers reliable stability, though some users note occasional downtimes and performance fluctuations based on extended use.
Sentiment score
8.3
Google Compute Engine is highly reliable with a 99.99% SLA, frequently surpassing performance expectations and stability compared to competitors.
DigitalOcean is quite stable, and I would rate its stability at nine out of ten.
It is approximately 50 to 60% stable, reaching 60 to 70% depending on usage levels.
 

Room For Improvement

DigitalOcean struggles with performance, customer dissatisfaction, and service issues, prompting calls for improved features and better support.
Google Compute Engine users seek UI enhancements, expanded options, improved security, synchronization, and better support and marketing focus.
The lack of a proper service provider model ultimately led us to cease operations with DigitalOcean.
There are issues where even with 8 GB RAM, the performance doesn't meet expectations.
DigitalOcean could offer a pay-as-you-go model similar to AWS, where I would pay for what I use rather than having fixed payments.
 

Setup Cost

DigitalOcean's pricing ranges from $5 to $50 monthly, with costs depending on configuration and perceived as competitive by some.
Google Compute Engine offers competitive, flexible pricing, often cheaper than Azure and AWS, with savings possible through resource optimization.
DigitalOcean offers affordable pricing, especially for startups.
 

Valuable Features

DigitalOcean provides reliable, cost-effective servers with an intuitive interface, database management, flexible hosting, and easy installation.
Google Compute Engine offers customizable VMs, scalability, cost-effectiveness, security features, and diverse compute and storage options.
The droplet feature is valuable for hosting my applications as it is particularly cost-effective and serves my needs well.
Some customers had compliance issues with Microsoft that did not exist in DigitalOcean, which provided more flexibility to use the solution.
The most significant aspect is that we can connect directly to the system from anywhere.
In GCP, there's a custom configuration feature unlike AWS and Azure.
 

Categories and Ranking

DigitalOcean
Ranking in Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS)
14th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Google Compute Engine
Ranking in Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS)
10th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS) category, the mindshare of DigitalOcean is 2.4%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Compute Engine is 0.8%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS)
 

Featured Reviews

Michael Olayemi - PeerSpot reviewer
Enjoy cost-effective hosting with flexible deployment and room for payment model improvement
I use only one feature, which is the droplet, and it has been satisfactory. The droplet feature is valuable for hosting my applications as it is particularly cost-effective and serves my needs well. I also have total freedom over what I use, and I have a better user interface and documentation compared to Oracle.
WahyuKurniawan - PeerSpot reviewer
Reasonably priced and offers high availability features
The synchronization between two tools, meaning if I have another server outside Google Cloud, as far as I know, I cannot mimic the server in Google Cloud to another server outside Google Cloud. I don't know if Google has the above-mentioned features or not, and if it does have them, then maybe Google can help us set things right and how to make a server mimic either of the servers outside Google. With the hot swap features or if Google Cloud itself is down, we can replace the services with another server. Right now, I have another server outside Google as a backup of a production server. There should be synchronization between servers inside Google and those outside it. The high availability features in Google are only available in Google Compute Engine in different regions. If I have another server outside Google, the high availability features in Google cannot synchronize with such a server.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS) solutions are best for your needs.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
27%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
University
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about DigitalOcean?
It's been a good choice for us for some services. We generally have several deployments. For instance, for some static Angular applications, it was a clear choice to run them on Cloudflare, which p...
What needs improvement with DigitalOcean?
There are disadvantages, such as machines getting stuck or disconnected, requiring restarts. Sometimes we lose connection and need to check with the IT service provider from the DigitalOcean servic...
What is your primary use case for DigitalOcean?
We use DigitalOcean mostly for RDS services and cloud-related systems where we want to deploy codes and run them using nginx or other services where it is cheaper to use, and we use it to extract d...
What do you like most about Google Compute Engine?
Everything is simple and useful. The initial setup is not challenging.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Compute Engine?
Google resources are cheaper compared to AWS and Microsoft Azure. Among the three, Google is the cheapest option.
What needs improvement with Google Compute Engine?
Google has a lack of focus on their products. They have many products in various areas of the market, but they do not productize or appeal to the market effectively. They should concentrate on prod...
 

Also Known As

Digital Ocean
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

jQuery Foundation, Pertino, TaskRabbit, Compose, InfluxDB, The Able Few
Allthecooks, BetterCloud, Bluecore, Cosentry, Evite, Ezakus, HTC, Infectious Media, iStreamPlanet, Mendelics, SageMathCloud, Sedex, Treeptik, Wibigoo, Wix, zulily, Zync
Find out what your peers are saying about DigitalOcean vs. Google Compute Engine and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.