Hetzner vs IONOS: Which German Host Should You Choose?
Hetzner and IONOS are both German, both run their own data centers and both sell everything from web hosting to bare metal, but they take opposite approaches to pricing and service. Hetzner, founded in 1997, keeps prices flat, bills its cloud by the hour and leaves the administration to you. IONOS, with roots going back to 1988 and part of the United Internet group, leads with very low introductory prices, bundles phone support with a personal consultant, and sells to everyone from first-time site owners to large server fleets. Prices below are live from our tracker.
At a glance
| Hetzner | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Founded | 1997, Gunzenhausen | 1988, Montabaur (United Internet group) |
| Cheapest virtual server | CX23: $6.23/mo (2 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 40 GB NVME · 20 TB traffic · 10 Gbps) | VPS M+: $5.00/mo (4 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 120 GB NVME · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps), then $11.00 |
| Web hosting | Webhosting S: $1.81/mo | Plus: $1.00/mo, renews at $14.00 |
| Pricing model | Flat; cloud billed hourly | Low introductory price, then a higher regular rate |
| Dedicated plans we track | 18 | 51 |
| Support | Tickets; phone on weekdays, 8am–6pm CET | 24/7 phone, chat and email with a personal consultant |
| Guarantee | 14-day right of withdrawal | 30-day money-back |
| Locations | Germany, Finland, the US and Singapore | Germany, the UK, France, Spain and the US |
Virtual servers
IONOS's VPS M+ gives you 4 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 120 GB NVME · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps for $5.00 a month, which is generous, but the introductory price lasts three months before it moves to $11.00, and IONOS VPS are billed monthly rather than hourly. Hetzner's CX23 gives you 2 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 40 GB NVME · 20 TB traffic · 10 Gbps for $6.23, billed by the hour up to that cap, and the price never changes. Over a year, compare Hetzner's flat rate with IONOS's regular rate rather than its first three months.
Dedicated servers
Both are major European dedicated-server suppliers. IONOS lists AMD, Intel and storage lines, 51 plans in our tracker starting at $47.00 for 4 Cores · 16 GB RAM · 1000 GB HDD · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps, with no setup fee, ECC memory and unlimited traffic on a 1 Gbit/s port. Hetzner's dedicated line includes models such as the AX41 at $64.98 for 6 Cores · 64 GB RAM · 1024 GB NVME · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps, a server auction with older hardware and unlimited traffic, with a one-time setup fee on some larger models.
Web hosting and extras
IONOS's web plans start at $1.00 a month for the first year and renew at $14.00, with a free domain, a wildcard SSL certificate, daily backups and unlimited websites. Hetzner's Webhosting S costs $1.81 at a flat rate with unlimited mailboxes but no free domain. IONOS also sells Windows VPS with the licence included, GPU servers billed by the minute and a public cloud; Hetzner has no Windows images on its cloud, but offers ARM servers and storage boxes.
Support
IONOS supports customers around the clock by phone, chat and email and assigns a named personal consultant. Hetzner works through support tickets and a phone line open on weekdays from 8am to 6pm CET, and expects customers to administer their own servers. Our monitor checks each company's own website every few minutes; over the last 30 days it measured 99.78% for Hetzner and 99.83% for IONOS.
Locations
IONOS lists ten data centers: Frankfurt (two) and Berlin, London and Worcester, Paris, Logroño in Spain, and Las Vegas, Newark and Lenexa in the US. Hetzner runs Falkenstein and Nuremberg in Germany, Helsinki, Ashburn, Hillsboro and Singapore.
Which one should you pick?
- Choose Hetzner if you manage your own servers and want flat, hourly-billed cloud pricing, generous included traffic and a popular dedicated line.
- Choose IONOS if you want 24/7 phone support with a personal consultant, a cheap first year of hosting, Windows servers, or a wide dedicated catalog with no setup fees.
About HetznerHetzner is a German cloud and dedicated-server provider famous for the best price-to-performance in Europe. Where Contabo competes on raw resources, Hetzner competes on network quality, low latency and a polished API — ideal for developers running latency-sensitive workloads.
About IONOSIONOS is one of Europe's largest digital infrastructure and web hosting providers, offering domains, web hosting, VPS, dedicated servers, cloud infrastructure, email, website solutions, cybersecurity services, and business applications.
The company has more than 30 years of experience in the hosting and cloud infrastructure industry and serves millions of customers across multiple countries. IONOS combines traditional web hosting services with enterprise-grade cloud infrastructure through its IONOS Cloud platform, making it suitable for individuals, developers, startups, small businesses, and large enterprises.
Company Overview
IONOS has its roots in Germany and is part of United Internet AG, one of Europe's major internet services groups. The company traces its history back more than 30 years and has developed from a traditional web hosting provider into a broad digital infrastructure company.
Today, IONOS offers services ranging from domain registration and shared hosting to virtual private servers, dedicated servers, public cloud infrastructure, Kubernetes, object storage, GPU computing, and AI-related services.
The company's infrastructure is designed to support customers from the initial creation of a website or domain through to sophisticated cloud and enterprise deployments.
IONOS emphasizes three major principles across its infrastructure business: reliability, security, and scalable technology. Its data centers include ISO 27001-certified facilities, while its support organization provides 24/7/365 assistance.
IONOS Product Portfolio
IONOS operates across several major areas of the digital infrastructure market.
Its portfolio includes:
Domain registration
Web hosting
WordPress hosting
WooCommerce hosting
Website builders
Email and business communication
VPS hosting
Cloud VPS
Dedicated servers
Bare metal servers
GPU servers
Public cloud
Compute Engine
Object Storage
Block Storage
Network File Storage
Managed Kubernetes
Backup and disaster recovery
Load balancing
Cloud Firewall
DDoS protection
AI services
AI Model Hub
Cloud desktops
Managed infrastructure
This broad portfolio allows customers to start with a simple website and gradually move toward dedicated or cloud infrastructure as their requirements increase.
VPS Hosting
VPS hosting is one of IONOS's most popular infrastructure products.
IONOS provides fully virtualized private servers running on Linux or Windows, with full root access, SSD/NVMe storage, configurable resources, and unlimited traffic on its current VPS offerings.
Customers can choose from different CPU, RAM, and storage configurations and deploy servers in supported data center locations.
Current VPS infrastructure supports:
Linux
Windows Server
Full root access
KVM console
SSD/NVMe storage
Unlimited traffic
Up to 1 Gbps external connectivity
Cloud Panel
Firewall management
DDoS protection
IPS/IDS
Optional backups
Private networking
Load balancing
VM cloning
IONOS currently advertises 99.99% availability for its VPS+ platform.
Linux and Windows VPS
IONOS supports both major server operating-system environments.
Linux customers can deploy distributions including:
AlmaLinux
Debian
Rocky Linux
Ubuntu
Windows customers can deploy supported versions of Windows Server, including Windows Server 2022 and Windows Server 2025 on current VPS offerings.
This makes IONOS suitable for both open-source applications and Microsoft-based business environments.
Dedicated Servers
IONOS provides dedicated servers for customers who require physical hardware rather than virtualized infrastructure.
Dedicated servers provide customers with 100% of the physical server's resources, including CPU, RAM, storage, and network capacity.
IONOS offers both Intel- and AMD-based dedicated servers as well as storage-oriented configurations and specialized GPU servers.
The company currently reports more than 38,000 dedicated and bare-metal servers, with server availability above 99.995% on its dedicated infrastructure platform.
Dedicated servers are particularly suitable for:
High-traffic websites
Databases
E-commerce
SaaS platforms
Game servers
Virtualization
AI workloads
High-performance applications
Enterprise applications
Infrastructure requiring physical resource isolation
IONOS Cloud
IONOS Cloud is the company's enterprise-oriented cloud infrastructure platform.
It provides Infrastructure-as-a-Service and cloud-native services for businesses that require scalable computing, storage, networking, security, and orchestration.
The IONOS Cloud portfolio includes:
Compute Engine
Public Cloud
Bare Metal Cloud
Object Storage
Block Storage
Network File Storage
Managed Kubernetes
Load Balancing
Cloud Firewalls
IAM
Backup and Recovery
GPU infrastructure
IONOS Cloud currently reports more than 250,000 customers and positions its infrastructure as an alternative to large U.S. hyperscalers.
Cloud Compute
IONOS Cloud Compute Engine provides virtual machines that can be deployed and scaled according to application requirements.
The platform supports full root access and scalable compute resources, allowing organizations to build applications without purchasing physical hardware.
IONOS uses Intel Xeon processors and SSD SAN storage for its cloud server infrastructure, with virtualized instances designed for reliability and scalability.
Cloud computing customers can combine compute resources with storage, private networking, firewalls, load balancing, and other infrastructure services.
Bare Metal Cloud
For customers requiring physical infrastructure combined with cloud-style flexibility, IONOS offers Bare Metal Cloud.
The service provides 100% dedicated hardware while retaining the ability to manage and configure infrastructure through cloud interfaces and APIs.
Customers can obtain dedicated CPU, RAM, and storage resources without sharing the physical hardware with other users.
Bare Metal Cloud is designed for:
High-performance computing
Large databases
Enterprise applications
High-traffic websites
Security-sensitive workloads
Private cloud environments
AI and machine learning
Hybrid cloud architectures
GPU and AI Infrastructure
IONOS has significantly expanded its GPU and AI infrastructure.
The company provides dedicated GPU servers designed for artificial intelligence, deep learning, machine learning, high-performance computing, and other GPU-intensive workloads.
IONOS also offers AI-related services such as an AI Model Hub, allowing customers to work with selected large language models and image-generation models.
Its current infrastructure portfolio includes GPU servers designed for AI training, inference, and other high-performance workloads.
IONOS has also introduced specialized hosting solutions for modern AI and automation tools, including n8n, OpenClaw, and AI-agent workloads.
Data Center Network
IONOS operates a large network of data centers across Europe and North America.
Its infrastructure includes locations in Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, and the United States. IONOS Cloud currently lists data centers including:
Frankfurt
Berlin
London
Paris
Logroño
Worcester
Las Vegas
Newark
Lenexa
The company also provides additional server infrastructure across multiple European and U.S. locations.
This geographic distribution allows customers to deploy applications closer to their users and build geographically redundant infrastructure.
European Infrastructure and Data Sovereignty
One of IONOS's major competitive advantages is its European infrastructure and strong focus on data sovereignty.
The company operates significant infrastructure in Germany and other European countries and positions IONOS Cloud as a provider for organizations that require greater control over where their data is stored and processed.
This can be particularly important for:
European businesses
Government organizations
Financial services
Healthcare
Enterprise applications
Organizations with strict data residency requirements
IONOS's European infrastructure is also attractive to companies looking for alternatives to U.S.-based hyperscale cloud providers.
Data Center Security
Security is a major component of IONOS infrastructure.
The company states that its data centers are ISO 27001 certified, providing a recognized information-security management framework.
Depending on the facility and service, IONOS data centers also use:
Physical access controls
24/7 security monitoring
Video surveillance
Biometric authentication
Redundant power
UPS systems
Emergency generators
Redundant network connectivity
Fire protection systems
IONOS's Frankfurt data center infrastructure, for example, includes ISO 9001, ISO 27001, PCI-DSS, and other relevant certifications through its data center environment.
Network Infrastructure
IONOS operates a large network infrastructure designed around redundant connectivity and high availability.
Its cloud infrastructure uses multiple network providers and redundant networking components to reduce the impact of individual network failures.
IONOS also provides private networking, load balancing, firewall policies, DDoS protection, and other network services that allow customers to create more complex application architectures.
Security and DDoS Protection
IONOS provides multiple security layers across its server and cloud products.
Current VPS offerings include:
DDoS protection
Firewall management
IPS/IDS
SSL certificates
Encrypted remote access
KVM console
Optional cloud backups
The company's cloud infrastructure also includes IAM, access policies, firewalls, and other security controls for enterprise deployments.
Customers can therefore combine IONOS's infrastructure security with their own operating-system and application-level security controls.
Backup and Storage
IONOS provides several storage and backup options.
These include:
Cloud Backup
Block Storage
Object Storage
Network File Storage
SSD/NVMe storage
Dedicated storage servers
IONOS Cloud Object Storage provides scalable S3-compatible object storage for large volumes of business data, while Block Storage and NFS can be used for applications requiring persistent storage.
Managed Kubernetes
IONOS Cloud provides managed Kubernetes for organizations running containerized applications.
Managed Kubernetes allows customers to deploy and scale container workloads without managing all of the underlying Kubernetes control-plane infrastructure themselves.
It can be used for:
Microservices
SaaS applications
DevOps
CI/CD
Containerized applications
Cloud-native platforms
Scalable web applications
Managed Kubernetes is part of the broader IONOS Cloud ecosystem and can be combined with compute, networking, storage, and security services.
Domains and Web Hosting
In addition to infrastructure hosting, IONOS is a major domain registrar and traditional web hosting provider.
Its domain portfolio includes:
.com
.org
.net
Country-code TLDs
New generic TLDs
Industry-specific domains
IONOS also offers:
Shared hosting
WordPress hosting
WooCommerce hosting
Website builder
Email hosting
SSL certificates
Domain transfers
Domain security
This makes IONOS different from infrastructure-focused providers such as Contabo or Database Mart: customers can manage their domain, website, email, VPS, dedicated server, and cloud infrastructure through one provider.
Support
IONOS provides 24/7/365 support through phone, email, and chat.
The company also provides customers with access to knowledge databases, tutorials, documentation, and technical guides.
A notable feature of IONOS's business-oriented service model is its personal consultant program, where eligible customers can receive a dedicated personal contact for assistance.
This combination of automated resources and human support is intended to make the platform accessible to both technical and less-technical customers.
Scalability
IONOS is designed to support customers as their infrastructure requirements grow.
A small business can begin with:
Domain registration
Email
Shared hosting
WordPress
and later move to:
VPS
Dedicated servers
Cloud infrastructure
Managed Kubernetes
Bare Metal
GPU infrastructure
This creates a relatively complete infrastructure ecosystem under a single provider.
Who Is IONOS Best For?
IONOS is suitable for a broad range of customers, including:
Individuals
Freelancers
Developers
Startups
SMBs
Agencies
SaaS companies
E-commerce businesses
Enterprises
IT departments
Developers and DevOps teams
AI companies
Organizations requiring European infrastructure
Typical workloads include:
Websites
WordPress
WooCommerce
SaaS applications
APIs
Databases
E-commerce
Business applications
Virtualization
Kubernetes
AI and machine learning
GPU computing
Backup infrastructure
Enterprise cloud applications
IONOS's Main Competitive Advantages
IONOS's main competitive advantage is the breadth of its infrastructure ecosystem.
Unlike providers focused almost exclusively on VPS or dedicated servers, IONOS combines domain registration, web hosting, business email, VPS, dedicated servers, cloud infrastructure, bare metal, Kubernetes, storage, security, and AI services.
Key advantages include:
More than 30 years of industry experience
Large European infrastructure footprint
U.S. data center presence
ISO 27001-certified data centers
VPS and dedicated servers
IONOS Cloud
Bare Metal Cloud
GPU servers
Managed Kubernetes
Object Storage
Block Storage
DDoS protection
Firewall and IPS/IDS
Full root access
Linux and Windows support
24/7/365 support
Personal consultant option
Domain registration
Web hosting
Business email
AI and cloud services
Overall
IONOS has evolved from a German web hosting company into a large-scale digital infrastructure provider offering services across the entire hosting and cloud spectrum.
Its portfolio ranges from inexpensive domains and shared hosting to VPS, dedicated servers, bare metal infrastructure, public cloud, managed Kubernetes, object storage, GPU servers, and AI infrastructure.
One of IONOS's strongest differentiators is its combination of European infrastructure, enterprise security, broad product coverage, and competitive pricing. The company is particularly attractive to organizations that want to consolidate domains, hosting, servers, cloud infrastructure, and business services under one provider.
For developers and businesses, IONOS provides a path from a simple website to sophisticated cloud infrastructure without requiring a complete migration to another provider as the business grows.
Overall, IONOS is best positioned as a full-service digital infrastructure and cloud provider, rather than simply a traditional hosting company. Its combination of web hosting, domains, VPS, dedicated servers, IONOS Cloud, bare metal, GPU infrastructure, and enterprise cloud services makes it one of the more comprehensive hosting ecosystems available in the European and international markets.
Comparison Table
| Feature | Hetzner | IONOS |
|---|---|---|
| Price / mo | $1.81 | $1.00 win |
| Renewal price | Same as initial | Much higher after the first term |
| Datacenters | 6 | 10 win |
| NVMe storage | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Free domain | ✗ No | ✓ Yes win |
| Backups | Paid | — |
| CDN | ✗ No | ✓ Yes win |
| Support | Tickets, weekday phone | 24/7 phone, chat, email |
| Uptime · 30d | 99.78% | 99.83% win |
Price History
Hetzner · Webhosting SCollecting price history — the trend fills in as we track this plan.
IONOS · GrowCollecting price history — the trend fills in as we track this plan.
Uptime & Performance
Hetzner 99.78% IONOS 99.83%Pros & Cons
Hetzner- Flat pricing with hourly cloud billing and no renewal step
- 20 TB of monthly traffic on EU cloud plans
- ARM and x86 cloud servers, load balancers and Terraform
- Dedicated line with a server auction; the AX41 costs $64.98/mo
- No live chat, and the general phone line is open on weekdays only
- No Windows images on the cloud
- Setup fees on some larger dedicated models
- No free domain with web hosting
IONOS- 24/7 phone, chat and email support with a personal consultant
- Strong introductory VPS specs: 4 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 120 GB NVME · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps for $5.00/mo
- Wide dedicated catalog with no setup fees
- Windows VPS and GPU servers billed by the minute
- The VPS intro price lasts three months, then $11.00/mo
- Web hosting renews at several times the first-year price
- No hourly billing on VPS
- No cPanel; Plesk is a paid add-on
The Verdict
Hetzner is the better long-term price for self-managed servers: its cloud bills by the hour, its prices never step up, and its EU plans include 20 TB of traffic. IONOS is the better service package: 24/7 phone support with a personal consultant, a cheap first year, Windows VPS and a very wide dedicated catalog without setup fees. If you will run servers yourself for years, Hetzner's flat pricing usually wins; if you want someone to call and a complete package, IONOS is the more comfortable choice. Read IONOS's regular rate, not the introductory one.
Hetzner & IONOS alternatives
FAQ
It depends on how long you keep the server. IONOS's VPS M+ costs $5.00 a month for three months and then $11.00; Hetzner's CX23 costs $6.23 every month, billed hourly. Compare the specs too: 4 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 120 GB NVME · Unlimited traffic · 1 Gbps against 2 vCPU · 4 GB RAM · 40 GB NVME · 20 TB traffic · 10 Gbps.
Both do. IONOS answers by phone 24/7, together with chat, email and a personal consultant. Hetzner's phone line is open on weekdays from 8am to 6pm CET, with 24/7 data-center lines for dedicated servers.
IONOS sells a Windows VPS line with the licence included and can supply dedicated servers with Windows. Hetzner does not offer Windows images on its cloud.
IONOS lists 51 dedicated plans in our tracker, with no setup fees. Hetzner lists 18 in its dedicated category, plus an auction of older servers.
IONOS offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. Hetzner offers a 14-day right of withdrawal under German law, and its cloud servers cost nothing once deleted.