Cost teardown · July 2026
What a production cluster actually costs.
The same Kubernetes cluster, priced on EKS, GKE, DOKS and Hetzner at four sizes. Matched vCPU and RAM per node, list price, on-demand, ex-VAT, 730 hrs/mo, EU regions. Every row names the exact instance, so you can check it against your own bill.
01
The floor
3 nodes, each running control plane and workloads · 1 LB · genuinely HA
| Build | Region | 3× node | + LB | Total / mo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3× CX232/4 shared · Intel | EU | €16.47 | €7.49 | ≈ $26 |
| 3× CAX112/4 shared · Arm | EU | €17.97 | €7.49 | ≈ $27 |
| 3× CX334/8 shared · Intel | EU | €25.47 | €7.49 | ≈ $36 |
| 3× CPX112/4 shared · AMD | US-West (hil) | $61.47 | $8.59 | ≈ $70 |
| 3× CPX214/8 shared · AMD | US-East (ash) | $112.47 | $8.59 | ≈ $121 |
Etcd quorum across three nodes survives any one of them. Postgres runs in-cluster and storage is single-attach; add the Patroni and DRBD tiers as you grow. Sub-$40 HA is EU-only: the Intel and Arm lines don't exist in the US.
02
Small · non‑HA
3 nodes @ 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 1 LB · 100 GB. Dev and staging.
| Provider · node × 3 | Control plane | LB | Storage | Total / mo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| HetznerCPX32 · 4/8 shared | in node ($0) | $8 | $5 | ≈ $129 |
| DOKSBasic · 4/8 shared | free ($0) | $12 | $10 | ≈ $166 |
| GKEe2-custom-4-8192 · shared | free zonal ($0) | $18 | $10 | ≈ $292 |
| EKSc6i.xlarge · 4/8 dedicated | $73 (mandatory) | $16 | $10 | ≈ $524 |
EKS charges its $73 control-plane fee even on a non-HA dev cluster. On Hetzner's cheaper Intel line the same config is ≈ $41.
03 · The production baseline
Medium · HA
4 workers @ 4 vCPU / 16 GB + HA control plane · 2 LB · 500 GB. The shape our managed tier runs.
| Provider | HA control plane | LB | Storage | Total / mo | vs Hetzner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HetznerCCX23 · 4/16 dedicated | 3× CPX22 (~$63) | $16 | $27 | $478 | Baseline |
| GKEe2-standard-4 · 4/16 shared | regional $73 | $37 | $50 | $590 | +23% |
| DOKSGP · 4/16 dedicated | +$40 | $24 | $50 | $618 | +29% |
| EKSm5.xlarge · 4/16 dedicated | $73 | $33 | $48 | $825 | +73% |
Hetzner's CCX row is dedicated vCPU while GKE's e2 is shared, so the cheapest row is also the stronger class.
04
Large · HA
8 workers @ 8 vCPU / 32 GB + HA control plane · 3 LB · 2 TB
| Provider | HA control plane | LB | Storage | Total / mo | vs Hetzner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HetznerCCX33 · 8/32 dedicated | 3× CPX32 (~$115) | $24 | $108 | ≈ $1,444 | Baseline |
| GKEe2-standard-8 · 8/32 shared | regional $73 | $55 | $200 | ≈ $2,050 | +42% |
| DOKSGP · 8/32 dedicated | +$40 | $36 | $200 | ≈ $2,292 | +59% |
| EKSm5.2xlarge · 8/32 dedicated | $73 | $49 | $190 | ≈ $2,999 | +108% |
The gap widens with scale: control-plane fees are flat, but per-node and per-GB margins compound.
05 · Every table above is before traffic
Then egress makes it a rout
Push 5 TB a month outbound, a modest API load.
On a busy cluster, egress alone can cost more than the entire Hetzner bill.
06
Hetzner EU vs US
The same cluster in two regions. The gap is structural, not just FX.
| EU (fsn / nbg / hel) | US-West (hil) | US-East (ash) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cheapest shared shape | CX23 €5.49 · CAX11 €5.99 | CPX11 $20.49 | CPX21 $37.49 |
| Dedicated CCX23 (4/16) | €85.99 (~$93) | $102.99 (+11%) | $102.99 (+11%) |
| Cheapest 3-node HA | ~$26 | ~$70 | ~$121 |
| Medium·HA config total | $478 | ~$516 | ~$516 |
| Included traffic / server | 20 TB | 1 TB | 1 TB |
The cheap Intel and Arm lines are EU-exclusive, and US regions include 1 TB of traffic per server against the EU's 20 TB. Stay in the EU unless you need US latency; if you do, the West is the cheaper footprint.
07 · The case against us
Where this comparison is weakest
A managed control plane is vendor-run and SLA-backed. Here you own the three controllers. Terraform, Ansible and ArgoCD stand them up and keep them healed, so the operational delta is small, but it is not zero.
Hyperscalers drop 30–60% under 1–3 year commitments and savings plans. Hetzner doesn't offer those because its list price is already lower, but if you will commit for three years, close the gap yourself before deciding.
Matching Hetzner's dedicated CCX against GKE n2 or c2 widens the gap rather than narrowing it, so we left the cheaper comparison in.
Hetzner has no managed database, no S3-compatible object storage in every region, and fewer services. If you lean on twenty AWS services, this comparison is not really about you.
Sources: provider list prices as of July 2026 (AWS EKS, Google GKE, DigitalOcean DOKS, Hetzner Cloud). On-demand, ex-VAT, 730 hrs/mo, EU regions unless stated, €→$ at ~1.08. Measured in the k0s-hetzner-boilerplate cost analysis.
For $1,500 we read your actual cluster and cloud bill and hand you a short report: what you pay now, what the same workload costs on Hetzner, what moving takes, and what we'd flag before you try. The report is yours whether or not you move.
Or run it yourself: the cluster in these tables is open source. If you'd rather not hold the pager, we operate it from $2,499/mo, about $5,477/mo all-in for production plus a one-time $3,000–$6,000 onboarding, against roughly $9,825/mo if you staff it yourself.