Head-to-head, indicative as of Oct 2026. Prices change — always confirm on the vendor page.
Quick read: pick Hetzner Cloud if your workload is maximum hardware per dollar, self-managed and its included egress fits your traffic shape; pick AWS Lightsail if you need simple sites that still want the aws backbone. For anything latency-sensitive at the edge, cold start row is the tiebreaker.
| Hetzner Cloud | AWS Lightsail | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | VPS / cloud | Simplified VPS |
| Free tier | None | 3 months free on first instances |
| Paid pricing (indicative) | From ~€4/mo (best price-perf in EU/US) | Flat from ~$5/mo (1GB) |
| Egress | 20TB included on most plans | 1-5TB included by plan |
| Cold start | N/A (always-on) | N/A (always-on) |
| Regions | EU + US + Singapore | Major AWS regions |
| Best for | Maximum hardware per dollar, self-managed | Simple sites that still want the AWS backbone |
Try Hetzner Cloud Try AWS Lightsail
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Last reviewed 2026-10-02 · NinjaOps SEO grid · DevOps blog