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Web Hosting · head-to-head

Hetzner Cloud vs netcup VPS

As of 2 Nov 2026, the panel rates Hetzner Cloud 2.5/5 and netcup VPS 2/5 in Web Hosting. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 3 of the 6 judges pick Hetzner Cloud and 3 pick netcup VPS. Hetzner Cloud scores higher on 4 of 6 criteria (European sovereignty, Control panel, WordPress & developer tooling, Security, backups & recovery, plus 1 more). netcup VPS scores higher on 2 of 6 criteria (Performance, uptime & infrastructure and Scaling, migration & exit). Provenance — Hetzner Cloud: EU-Made; netcup VPS: EU-Made. Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: how scores are made.

Hetzner Cloud

EU-Made

Panel rating

Sovereignty: not determined

Full evaluation →

netcup VPS

EU-Made

Panel rating

Sovereignty: not determined

Full evaluation →

The short answer

Hetzner Cloud leads on management and developer tools (6.7 vs 4.3, six judges), support and service (4.3 vs 2.7, six judges), security and backups (5.7 vs 3.8, five judges, one tie) and sovereignty (7.2 vs 3.8, six judges). netcup VPS leads on pricing transparency (6.0 vs 2.2, five judges) with published prices from 8,26 € a month on a 12-month term to 289,46 €, both including 19% VAT, plus performance and reliability (5.3 vs 3.7, five judges) and scaling and portability (4.7 vs 4.0, five judges). Weighted totals split: netcup VPS ahead for the agency lead (5.4 vs 5.3), app developer (5.7 vs 5.3) and skeptic (5.6 vs 4.9); Hetzner Cloud ahead for the shop operator (5.3 vs 5) and data protection officer (5.6 vs 4.8). Hetzner Cloud has no verdict summary and its pricing is unweighted (the vendor publishes no prices); listed sovereignty attributes read unknown for both products.

Choose Hetzner Cloud if

  • Your team scripts infrastructure daily through a management console and API — six judges lean Hetzner Cloud on management and developer tools (6.7 vs 4.3).
  • You need support channels with published hours and response times — six judges lean Hetzner Cloud on support and service (4.3 vs 2.7); netcup VPS's verdict records no public information on phone or chat channels, hours or response times.
  • Your backup policy requires stated snapshot retention — five judges lean Hetzner Cloud on security and backups (5.7 vs 3.8); netcup VPS's verdict documents only customer-triggered snapshots without stated retention.
  • Your compliance review scores sovereignty first — six judges lean Hetzner Cloud there (7.2 vs 3.8), a criterion where the netcup VPS bench itself split 3-6.
  • You sit in the data protection officer's chair — that judge's weighted total reads 5.6 for Hetzner Cloud against 4.8 for netcup VPS.

Choose netcup VPS if

  • You need published prices before signing — five judges lean netcup VPS on pricing transparency (6.0 vs 2.2), with prices from 8,26 € a month on a 12-month term to 289,46 €, both including 19% VAT.
  • You buy against named hardware generations — five judges lean netcup VPS on performance and reliability (5.3 vs 3.7), on hardware named to the generation (AMD EPYC 9645, DDR5, NVMe).
  • You plan to step between fixed server sizes on a published ladder — five judges lean netcup VPS on scaling and portability (4.7 vs 4.0).
  • You judge like the app developer or the skeptic — their weighted totals read 5.7 and 5.6 for netcup VPS against 5.3 and 4.9 for Hetzner Cloud.
  • Your priorities match the agency lead's — the weighted total reads 5.4 for netcup VPS against 5.3 for Hetzner Cloud.

Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.

The bench's picks

Same scores, different priorities: each judge's weighting applied to both products. The split is the finding.

Criterion by criterion

Hetzner Cloud netcup VPS Bench average per criterion. Each label leads to its row in the table.
Scores per criterion, in stars out of 5
Criterion Hetzner Cloud netcup VPS
Performance, uptime & infrastructure 2 of 5 2.5 of 5
Control panel, WordPress & developer tooling 3.5 of 5 2 of 5
Security, backups & recovery 3 of 5 2 of 5
Scaling, migration & exit 2 of 5 2.5 of 5
Support, domains & email 2 of 5 1.5 of 5
European sovereignty 3.5 of 5 2 of 5
Criterion Hetzner Cloud netcup VPS The bench leans
Performance, uptime & infrastructure netcup VPS, 5 of 6 judges
Control panel, WordPress & developer tooling Hetzner Cloud, 6 of 6 judges
Security, backups & recovery Hetzner Cloud, 5 of 6 judges
Scaling, migration & exit netcup VPS, 5 of 6 judges
Support, domains & email Hetzner Cloud, 6 of 6 judges
European sovereignty Hetzner Cloud, 6 of 6 judges
Pricing transparency no published price not comparable

Stars show the bench average per criterion; the lean counts which product each judge scored higher. Open a judge's tab for their reasoning on both sides.

Sovereignty, side by side

Dimension Hetzner Cloud netcup VPS
Legal entity Not determined Not determined
Hosting location Not determined Not determined
Hosting options Not determined Not determined
Open source Not determined Not determined
Data processing agreement Not determined Not determined
Transfer impact assessment Not determined Not determined

Questions about Hetzner Cloud and netcup VPS

Which is better, Hetzner Cloud or netcup VPS?

As of 2 Nov 2026, the panel rates Hetzner Cloud higher: 2.5/5 against 2/5. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 3 of the 6 judges pick Hetzner Cloud and 3 pick netcup VPS. Which one fits depends on the criteria that matter to you; the table on this page shows both side by side, and each judge’s reading has its own page. Both were scored by the same AI bench under the same rubric, from public evidence only, as the methodology describes.

Is Hetzner Cloud or netcup VPS European?

Hetzner Cloud is European (EU-Made). netcup VPS is European (EU-Made). Provenance is read from each company’s own legal pages: who builds it and who owns it.