Amazon Web Services (AWS) vs Hetzner
- ✦ EC2 Compute
- ✦ S3 Storage
- ✦ Lambda Serverless
- ✦ Cloud Servers
- ✦ Dedicated Servers
- ✦ Block Storage
Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Hetzner are both Cloud Hosting tools. Compare features, pricing, and ratings below to find the best fit for your team.
When to Choose Amazon Web Services (AWS) vs Hetzner
The question that matters: “In what situation will I regret choosing A over B after 3 months?”
AWS ECS/EKS deploys new container revisions while health checks verify readiness and API Gateway shifts traffic - all without dropping a single request.
Product photos on Hetzner Object Storage, proxied through Floating IPs, hit 85% cache rates across EU traffic at a fraction of typical CDN costs.
S3 stores assets and CloudFront caches them at 600+ edge locations globally, serving a 50MB file to Tokyo in 50ms instead of 2 seconds.
Hetzner's Cloud Servers in Frankfurt keep customer data within EU borders, satisfying GDPR and MiFID II on Private Networks without cross-border audit overhead.
Assign a Floating IP to an upgraded database, flip traffic in seconds, and keep apps running with zero rewrites. The old instance stays live for rollback.
Pricing Comparison & PlansHigh· Verified May 30, 2026
Amazon Web Services (AWS) Plans
Free tier available
AWS Free Tier
FreeBest for: Ideal for new users to explore AWS services without upfront costs
- ✓Access to over 30 always-free services up to specified limits
- ✓$100 USD credits upon sign-up for new customers
- ✓Earn up to an additional $100 USD credits by exploring foundational services
- ✓Free account plan for up to 6 months, no charges until upgrade to paid plan
- ✓Ideal for experimenting and building proof of concepts
Pay-as-you-go (On-Demand)
Contact SalesBest for: Offers maximum flexibility with no long-term commitments
- ✓Pay only for the individual services you need
- ✓No upfront costs or long-term contracts
- ✓Pay for services only for as long as you use them
- ✓Easily adapt to changing business needs without overcommitting budgets
- ✓Billed per hour, per second, per GB, or per request depending on the service
Savings Plans
Contact SalesBest for: Provides significant discounts over On-Demand pricing in exchange for a 1-year or 3-year commitment to a consistent amount of compute usage.
- ✓Save over On-Demand pricing with a commitment to a specific amount ($/hour) of usage
- ✓Discounts up to 72% compared to On-Demand rates
- ✓Includes Compute Savings Plans (up to 66% off, flexible across EC2, Fargate, Lambda)
- ✓Includes EC2 Instance Savings Plans (up to 72% off, specific instance family in a region)
- ✓Includes Database Savings Plans (up to 35% off, covers various database services)
Reserved Instances
Contact SalesBest for: Offers a discount compared to On-Demand pricing by committing to a specific instance configuration for a 1-year or 3-year term.
- ✓Significant discount (up to 75%) compared to On-Demand Instance pricing
- ✓Capacity reservation when used in a specific Availability Zone
- ✓Available for Amazon EC2 and Amazon RDS
- ✓Standard RIs offer flexibility to change AZ, instance size, networking type
- ✓Convertible RIs offer flexibility to change instance families, OS, tenancies (up to 66% discount)
Spot Instances
Contact SalesBest for: Leverages unused EC2 capacity for up to 90% savings compared to On-Demand prices
- ✓Access to unused AWS capacity
- ✓Up to 90% discount off On-Demand prices
- ✓Pay-as-you-go model for interruptible workloads
- ✓Ideal for fault-tolerant and interruption-tolerant workloads
- ✓Instances can be reclaimed by AWS with a two-minute warning
Enterprise Discount Program (EDP)
Contact SalesBest for: Designed for large enterprises with substantial AWS spend, offering custom discounts and terms based on negotiated agreements.
- ✓Tailored discount program for enterprise cloud users
- ✓Requires demonstrated history of significant AWS cloud usage (typically $1M+ annually)
- ✓Negotiated discounts on total AWS billing
- ✓Commitment period typically 1-5 years
- ✓Access to benefits like Enterprise Support, dedicated teams, prototyping support, and training credits
Hetzner Plans
Paid plans only
Snapshots
$0.01/GB/moBest for: Snapshots offer point-in-time backups for cloud servers, crucial for data recovery and testing
- ✓On-demand full disk images
- ✓Backups
Block Storage
$0.06/GB/moBest for: This service provides scalable, persistent storage that can be attached to cloud servers, ideal for databases or applications needing flexible storage
- ✓Additional storage
Traffic Overage
$1/TBBest for: This charge applies if your server exceeds its included traffic quota, providing flexibility for unexpected spikes in usage
- ✓Additional data transfer
CX23
$4.49/moBest for: This entry-level cloud server is ideal for small projects, testing environments, or low-traffic websites
- ✓4 GB RAM
- ✓40 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Intel®/AMD CPU
CAX11
$4.99/moBest for: This ARM-based cloud server is a cost-effective option for specific workloads optimized for ARM architecture
- ✓4 GB RAM
- ✓40 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Ampere® Altra® ARM64 CPU
CX33
$6.99/moBest for: A step up from CX23, this plan provides more resources suitable for growing applications or medium-sized websites
- ✓8 GB RAM
- ✓80 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Intel®/AMD CPU
CPX22
$7.99/moBest for: Part of the premium CPU line, CPX22 offers better single-core performance for applications that benefit from faster processing
- ✓2 vCPU
- ✓4 GB RAM
- ✓80 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓AMD EPYC CPU
CAX21
$8.49/moBest for: A mid-tier ARM server, CAX21 provides more resources for ARM-native applications or services
- ✓8 GB RAM
- ✓80 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Ampere® Altra® ARM64 CPU
CX43
$12/moBest for: Offering enhanced CPU and RAM, the CX43 is good for more demanding web applications, databases, or development servers
- ✓16 GB RAM
- ✓160 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Intel®/AMD CPU
CAX31
$16/moBest for: The CAX31 offers significant ARM processing power, suitable for larger ARM-optimized applications or microservices
- ✓16 GB RAM
- ✓160 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Ampere® Altra® ARM64 CPU
CCX13
$16/moBest for: A high-performance cloud server, CCX13 is suitable for applications requiring strong CPU and memory
- ✓Dedicated vCPUs
- ✓8 GB RAM
- ✓80 GB Storage
- ✓20 TB Traffic
CX53
$23/moBest for: This plan is designed for resource-intensive applications, larger databases, or high-traffic websites
- ✓32 GB RAM
- ✓320 GB SSD
- ✓20 TB Traffic
- ✓Intel®/AMD CPU
Capability Breakdown
8 differences found across 18 standardized features
- •EC2 Compute
- •S3 Storage
- •Lambda Serverless
- •RDS Databases
- •CloudFront CDN
- •ECS/EKS Containers
- •API Gateway
- •IAM Security
- •CloudWatch Monitoring
- •Route 53 DNS
- •SageMaker AI/ML
- •VPC Networking
- •Elastic Beanstalk
- •Lightsail
- •200+ Services
- •CloudFormation Templates
- •CodePipeline CI
- •CodeBuild Automation
- •CodeCommit Version
- •CodeArtifact Repos
- •XRay Tracing
- •CloudTrail Logging
- •Config Compliance
- •OpsWorks Management
- •Workspaces Desktop
- •Workdocs Storage
- •Directory Service
- •Cognito Identity
- •Pinpoint Marketing
- •SES Email
- •SQS Messaging
- •SNS Notifications
- •MQ Messaging
- •MSK Streaming
- •Kinesis Analytics
- •Glue ETL
- •Lake Formation
- •OpenSearch Service
- •QuickSight Analytics
- •Rekognition Vision
- •Transcribe Audio
- •Comprehend Text
- •Lex Chatbots
- •Connect Contact
- •Step Functions
- •AppFlow Integration
- •AppSync GraphQL
- •CloudHSM Security
- •Key Management
- •Certificate Manager
- •Shield Protection
- •WAF Firewall
- •Firewall Manager
- •Resource Groups
- •Tag Editor
- •Cost Explorer
- •Budgeting Alerts
- •Trusted Advisor
- •Support Hub
- •Well Architected
- •Control Tower
- •CloudDevelopment Kit
- •AWS Cloud9
- •CodeGuru Review
- •DevOps Guru
- •XRay Insights
- •Performance Hub
- •Cloud Servers
- •Dedicated Servers
- •Block Storage
- •Object Storage
- •Load Balancers
- •Firewalls
- •Floating IPs
- •Private Networks
- •Snapshots
- •Backups
- •API
- •CLI
- •Terraform Provider
- •DNS Management
- •Data Centers in EU/US
Strengths & Limitations
Evaluative strengths and weaknesses: not feature lists
- +Unmatched breadth of 200+ fully-featured services
- +Most extensive global cloud infrastructure and availability zones
- +Deepest enterprise adoption and third-party ecosystem support
- +Mature, robust services for compute, storage, and databases
- +Pioneering serverless (Lambda) and managed container services
- −Complex pricing models can lead to unexpected, high costs
- −Steep learning curve due to the sheer number of services
- −Data egress fees are significantly higher than competitors'
- −Inconsistent UI/UX across different service consoles
- −Premium support plans are expensive for smaller teams
- +Industry-leading price-to-performance ratio for compute
- +Generous free egress traffic (20TB/month included)
- +Affordable dedicated root servers with high-end CPUs
- +No-frills, developer-focused interface without vendor lock-in
- +Strong European data sovereignty with German/Finnish locations
- −Limited managed services (e.g., no managed databases or Kubernetes)
- −Support is ticket-based and can be slower than premium providers
- −Fewer global data center locations outside of Europe and the US
- −Strict account verification process can be slow for new users
- −Network performance can be less consistent than AWS/GCP
At a Glance
Recent Price History
Amazon Web Services (AWS) removed the "Savings Plans & Reserved Instances" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Amazon Web Services (AWS) added a new "Savings Plans" plan (Custom pricing)
Plan added · May 30, 2026
Amazon Web Services (AWS) removed the "Pay-as-you-go" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Amazon Web Services (AWS) added a new "Pay-as-you-go (On-Demand)" plan (Custom pricing)
Plan added · May 30, 2026
Amazon Web Services (AWS) added a new "Spot Instances" plan (Custom pricing)
Plan added · May 30, 2026
Hetzner removed the "Dedicated Server (AX42)" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Hetzner removed the "CX42" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Hetzner removed the "CX32" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Hetzner removed the "CX22" plan
Plan removed · May 30, 2026
Hetzner added a new "Load Balancer" plan at $39/mo
Plan added · May 30, 2026
Frequently Asked Questions
Related Comparisons
Sources & Data Trail · Amazon Web Services (AWS)
- 1.Official Pricing Page·Source of verified tiers(Checked: 2026-05-30)
- 2.Official Website·Official vendor website
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Sources & Data Trail · Hetzner
- 1.Official Pricing Page·Source of verified tiers(Checked: 2026-05-30)
- 2.Official Website·Official vendor website
- 3.G2·G2 verified reviews · 4.6/5 · 13 reviews
- 4.TrustRadius·TrustRadius verified reviews