Cloudways
Managed cloud hosting on DigitalOcean and other providers, billed hourly
What it is
Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting platform that runs your sites on servers from providers such as DigitalOcean. You pay hourly for the server you choose, with no long-term contract.
Key features
- Hourly pay-as-you-go billing
- DigitalOcean 2 GB / 1 vCPU / 50 GB / 2 TB transfer
- Change plans with immediate effect
- Offsite backups ($0.033/GB)
- Autonomous managed plans from $99/mo
Pros and cons
Pros
- No multi-year lock-in or renewal jump
- Easy to scale server size
- 3-day trial without a card
Cons
- Higher entry cost than shared hosting
- Bandwidth overage $0.02/GB and backup storage cost extra
- Billed in arrears, so monthly costs can vary
Not a good fit for
- Absolute beginners wanting the cheapest possible start
- Very tiny sites that fit on $3/mo shared hosting
How we researched this
Facts on this page come from Cloudways’s official pages, checked October 2026. We have not tested Cloudways hands-on yet unless a linked article says so.
Ready to try Cloudways? Free trial: 3 days (no credit card) to get started.
Visit Cloudways (affiliate link, opens in a new tab)Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.