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DigitalOcean vs Heroku: What are the differences?
Developers describe DigitalOcean as "Deploy an SSD cloud server in less than 55 seconds with a dedicated IP and root access". We take the complexities out of cloud hosting by offering blazing fast, on-demand SSD cloud servers, straightforward pricing, a simple API, and an easy-to-use control panel. On the other hand, Heroku is detailed as "Build, deliver, monitor and scale web apps and APIs with a trail blazing developer experience". Heroku is a cloud application platform – a new way of building and deploying web apps. Heroku lets app developers spend 100% of their time on their application code, not managing servers, deployment, ongoing operations, or scaling.
DigitalOcean and Heroku are primarily classified as "Cloud Hosting" and "Platform as a Service" tools respectively.
Some of the features offered by DigitalOcean are:
- We provide all of our users with high-performance SSD Hard Drives, flexible API, and the ability to select to nearest data center location.
- SSD Cloud Servers in 55 Seconds
- We provide a 99.99% uptime SLA around network, power and virtual server availability. If we fail to deliver, we’ll credit you based on the amount of time that service was unavailable.
On the other hand, Heroku provides the following key features:
- Agile deployment for Ruby, Node.js, Clojure, Java, Python, Go and Scala.
- Run and scale any type of app.
- Total visibility across your entire app.
"Great value for money", "Simple dashboard" and "Good pricing" are the key factors why developers consider DigitalOcean; whereas "Easy deployment", "Free for side projects" and "Huge time-saver" are the primary reasons why Heroku is favored.
According to the StackShare community, Heroku has a broader approval, being mentioned in 1504 company stacks & 961 developers stacks; compared to DigitalOcean, which is listed in 943 company stacks and 687 developer stacks.
While Media Temple is more expensive than DigitalOcean, sometimes it is like comparing apples and oranges. DigitalOcean provides what is called Virtual Private Servers ( VPS ). While you seem to be on your own dedicated server, you are, in fact, sharing the same hardware with others.
If you need to be on your own dedicated server, or have other hardware requirements, you do not really have as many options with DigitalOcean. But with Media Temple, the skies the limit ( but so is potentially the cost ).
DigitalOcean was where I began; its USD5/month is extremely competitive and the overall experience as highly user-friendly.
However, their offerings were lacking and integrating with other resources I had on AWS was getting more costly (due to transfer costs on AWS). Eventually I moved the entire project off DO's Droplets and onto AWS's EC2.
One may initially find the cost (w/o free tier) and interface of AWS daunting however with good planning you can achieve highly cost-efficient systems with savings plans, spot instances, etcetera.
Do not dive into AWS head-first! Seriously, don't. Stand back and read pricing documentation thoroughly. You can, not to the fault of AWS, easily go way overbudget. Your first action upon getting your AWS account should be to set up billing alarms for estimated and current bill totals.
Pros of DigitalOcean
- Great value for money559
- Simple dashboard364
- Good pricing362
- Ssds300
- Nice ui250
- Easy configuration192
- Great documentation155
- Ssh access138
- Great community135
- Ubuntu24
- Docker13
- IPv6 support12
- Private networking10
- 99.99% uptime SLA8
- Simple API7
- Great tutorials7
- 55 Second Provisioning6
- One Click Applications5
- Dokku4
- Node.js4
- Debian4
- CoreOS4
- LAMP4
- LEMP3
- Ghost3
- Simple Control Panel3
- Word Press3
- 1Gb/sec Servers3
- Quick and no nonsense service2
- Speed2
- Mean2
- Hex Core machines with dedicated ECC Ram and RAID SSD s2
- Django2
- Runs CoreOS2
- Good Tutorials2
- GitLab2
- Ruby on Rails2
- CentOS1
- Spaces1
- KVM Virtualization1
- Amazing Hardware1
- Transfer Globally1
- Fedora1
- FreeBSD1
- Drupal1
- FreeBSD Amp1
- Magento1
- ownCloud1
- RedMine1
- My go to server provider1
- Ease and simplicity1
- Nice1
- Find it superfitting with my requirements (SSD, ssh.1
- Easy Setup1
- Cheap1
- Static IP1
- It's the easiest to get started for small projects1
- Automatic Backup1
- Great support1
- Quick and easy to set up1
- Servers on demand - literally1
- Reliability1
- Variety of services0
- Managed Kubernetes0
Pros of Heroku
- Easy deployment704
- Free for side projects459
- Huge time-saver374
- Simple scaling348
- Low devops skills required261
- Easy setup190
- Add-ons for almost everything174
- Beginner friendly153
- Better for startups150
- Low learning curve133
- Postgres hosting48
- Easy to add collaborators41
- Faster development30
- Awesome documentation24
- Simple rollback19
- Focus on product, not deployment19
- Natural companion for rails development15
- Easy integration15
- Great customer support12
- GitHub integration8
- Painless & well documented6
- No-ops6
- I love that they make it free to launch a side project4
- Free4
- Great UI3
- Just works3
- PostgreSQL forking and following2
- MySQL extension2
- Security1
- Able to host stuff good like Discord Bot1
- Sec0
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Cons of DigitalOcean
- Pricing3
- No live support chat3
Cons of Heroku
- Super expensive24
- Not a whole lot of flexibility7
- No usable MySQL option5
- Storage5
- Low performance on free tier4
- 24/7 support is $1,000 per month1
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