# Hetzner Cloud

> German VPS provider: fixed-size virtual machines from €6.49, billed hourly but capped at the monthly price, with a powered-off server still billed in full.

Website: https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/  
Guide page: https://botperch.com/providers/hetzner/  
Checked: 2026-10-29

**Short answer:** One always-on personal agent (2 vCPU / 4 GiB / 20 GiB) costs about $23.59 a month here, the 7th cheapest of the 16 providers that run it as described. The AI model adds about $1.88 a month on top (DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (1017), 30 requests a day at 40k tokens each, median zero-retention price; from $0.46 at the cheapest host). Fits well: An always-on agent on a small machine: CPX22 at $22.99 + $0.60 IPv4 covers Hermes, OpenClaw, a chat bot, n8n or an MCP server, with 20 TB of EU traffic included.

Hetzner Cloud sells fixed-size virtual machines (vCPUs, RAM and NVMe disk in one bundle) in six data centres across Germany, Finland, the US and Singapore. It is an ordinary Linux server product: root, SSH, any kernel module you can load, Docker if you install it, and a monthly price cap with an hourly rate underneath.
It is the reference plain VPS rather than a sandbox service. There is no prompt endpoint, no memory snapshot, no idle sleep, no per-second meter and no session limit. You create a server from the console, the API or the hcloud CLI, and it exists until you delete it.
Three plan families: Cost-Optimized (CX on Intel/AMD and CAX on Ampere, shared, older hardware), Regular Performance (CPX, shared, current AMD) and General Purpose (CCX, dedicated vCPUs). At this check the whole Cost-Optimized family was marked not available for ordering, leaving Regular Performance as the cheapest buyable option.

**Who it is for:** People who want a cheap, ordinary, always-on Linux server in the EU (or the US or Singapore) and are happy to run the operating system, the agent and the backups themselves. It is the natural first choice for a personal agent, a chat bot, n8n or a small MCP server that must never sleep.

**Isolation:** A VPS (virtual private server), not a sandbox built for agents. A full virtual machine per server with its own kernel, disk and IP: root, Docker inside, real SSH and live migration of a failing host with under a second of disruption. Nested virtualisation is explicitly not available, there is no GPU, and the hypervisor is never named in the docs.

**Sizes and regions:** Fixed plans only, no custom CPU/RAM split. Regular Performance (AMD, shared): 1–16 vCPU, 1–32 GB RAM, 20–640 GB NVMe. General Purpose (dedicated vCPU): 2–48 vCPU, 8–192 GB, 80–960 GB. Cost-Optimized: 2–16 vCPU, 4–32 GB, 40–320 GB, currently not orderable. Extra disk comes from Volumes (10 GB–10 TB, up to 16 per server), not from the plan.

## How it charges

- model: Per-server hourly rate with a monthly price cap, plus separately billed Primary IPs, Volumes, Snapshots, Backups, Load Balancers and Object Storage. The account currency (EUR or USD) is fixed at signup.
- meter: Hourly, rounded up to a whole hour per server, and capped at that server's monthly price. CPX22 is $0.0368/h and $22.99/mo; the cap therefore binds at about 624 hours.
- stopped: Nothing changes. A powered-off server keeps its disk, its IP and its full bill until it is deleted: "you pay for a server that has completed the creation process for as long as it exists, regardless of whether it is turned on or not".
- planFee: No plan and no fee. The monthly figure is a cap on usage, not a subscription: a server deleted after 90 hours bills 90 hours at the hourly rate.
- minimum: No free tier and no signup credit. A payment method is required at signup, and the first limit increase is only available after a month and a paid invoice.

A fixed-size server billed by the hour but never more than its monthly price, from creation until deletion; a powered-off server costs the same as a running one.
- These are Hetzner's own USD prices for the EU network zone (Falkenstein, Nuremberg, Helsinki), read from the price API the plan pages use. US and Singapore plans are priced separately and higher.
- A public IPv4 is billed separately at $0.60 a month or $0.001 an hour per server, and the calculator includes it. A server with only an IPv6 address (free) costs $0.60 a month less.
- Each server's usage is rounded up to a whole hour, so a ten-minute task on its own server bills a full hour. The calculator rounds each task up the same way.
- A powered-off server is billed in full until it is deleted: there is no pause, sleep or cheaper stopped-storage rate. billedWhileStopped applies the running hourly rate to stopped hours.
- The bill is capped at each server's monthly price, which binds at about 624 hours at these rates. shape.monthly applies that cap to machines mode.
- Snapshots, backups, volumes, Floating IPs and load balancers are separate products and are not priced by this card. Hetzner no longer publishes a snapshot rate on its live pricing pages: the API exposes an image price per GB-month (and a 20% backup surcharge) but needs a token to read, and the last figure visible on a legacy page variant was €0.011/$0.0130 per GB-month, unverified today.
- Out of stock: the cheaper Cost-Optimized plans are listed at CX23 2 vCPU / 4 GB / 40 GB €5.99; CAX11 (Arm) 2 / 4 / 40 €6.49; CX33 4 / 8 / 80 €8.99; CAX21 (Arm) 4 / 8 / 80 €10.99; CX43 8 / 16 / 160 €16.49; CAX31 (Arm) 8 / 16 / 160 €21.49; CX53 16 / 32 / 320 €29.99; CAX41 (Arm) 16 / 32 / 320 €41.49 a month (EU prices before VAT and the separate IPv4 charge), but every one is marked 'not available' with 'This product is currently unavailable. Please check back later.' (checked 30 October 2026). They are not priced by the calculator until Hetzner sells them again; when it does, a 2 vCPU / 4 GB server costs about a third of the CPX22 used here.

## Monthly cost for each preset workload

- A personal agent that stays on (Hermes, OpenClaw): $23.59
- A coding agent for one developer: $42.59
- A code interpreter inside your product: $756.00
- A browser agent for a small team: $1,134.00
- Self-hosted n8n for a small team: $23.59
- A Discord or Slack bot for one server: $14.09
- Claude Code for a team of five: $212.95
- A scraper that runs four times a day: $2.71
- Your own remote MCP server: $8.09
- A: 1,000 short tasks: $37.80
- B: one always-on box: $42.59
- C: three hours a day: $23.59

## Fits well

- An always-on agent on a small machine: CPX22 at $22.99 + $0.60 IPv4 covers Hermes, OpenClaw, a chat bot, n8n or an MCP server, with 20 TB of EU traffic included.
- A coding box for one developer: CPX32 gives 4 vCPU / 8 GB / 160 GB for $41.99 a month, with the repository safe on the disk between sessions.
- EU data residency: Nuremberg, Falkenstein and Helsinki, German law, ISO 27001 and BSI C5, and a DPA you can sign online.
- Anything that needs a real kernel, root, Docker, arbitrary ports or a stable public IP.

## Fits badly

- Bursty work: a powered-off server bills exactly like a running one, so a three-hours-a-day agent costs the same as a 24-hour one.
- Many short runs: each server is rounded up to a whole hour, so 1,000 ten-minute tasks cost 1,000 hours.
- Live resizing: a plan change needs the server powered off and cannot shrink the disk.
- Anything that needs a GPU, nested virtualisation, a memory snapshot, an idle sleep, a hard spend cap or SSO.

## Features

- **Isolation** (yes): Full VM; root, Docker, SSH. A full virtual machine per server with its own kernel, disk and IP, plus live migration of a failing host with under a second of disruption. Nested virtualisation is explicitly refused, there is no GPU, and the hypervisor is never named. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/overview) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/overview)
- **Sizes and regions** (yes): 48 vCPU / 192 GB; 6 locations. Shared plans run 1–16 vCPU and 1–32 GB with 20–640 GB NVMe; dedicated plans reach 48 vCPU / 192 GB / 960 GB. No custom CPU/RAM split, no live resize, no GPU, and extra disk comes from volumes. Six locations in four network zones, with EU, US and Singapore prices differing. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/locations) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/locations)
- **Lifecycle** (no): No pause; off still billed. There is no pause, sleep or hibernate. Powering off keeps the disk but loses RAM, running processes and open sockets, and the server keeps billing until it is deleted; the documented alternative is snapshot-and-delete, which also loses the IP. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- **Snapshots and forks** (partly): Disk-only; 30 per account. Snapshots are manual disk copies, kept until deleted and capped at 30 per account, and they double as the template mechanism. They never include RAM or attached volumes, are crash-consistent at best from a running server, and cannot change architecture. Daily backups exist separately with seven rotating slots at 20% of the server price. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview)
- **Storage** (yes): Disk kept; volumes to 10 TB. The whole disk persists and is billed whether or not the server runs. Extra storage is a volume at €0.044 per GB a month, up to 10 TB and 16 volumes per server, but a volume attaches to only one server at a time. Object Storage is S3-compatible with no native mount. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/volumes/overview)
- **Idle and waking** (yes): No timer; no session limit. There is no idle timeout, no auto-stop and no maximum session length, so an always-on agent is safe from the provider. The same absence means there is no wake path: a server that is powered off stays off until something calls the API, and a stopped server cannot be woken by a request. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- **Reaching it** (yes): Public IP, any port, real SSH. A Primary IP gives the server a static public IPv4 and/or IPv6, any port can be opened, and SSH is a normal daemon. There is no provider-issued private or token-gated link, and the browser console is an emergency VNC console rather than a shell. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/primary-ips/overview) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/primary-ips/overview)
- **Custom domains** (partly): Your DNS, your own proxy. Hetzner runs a free DNS service and the server has a fixed public IP, so a custom domain is a DNS record plus a reverse proxy you run. There is no managed certificate for a server: Hetzner Cloud's managed Let's Encrypt certificates belong to the paid Load Balancer, from €7.49 a month. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/load-balancer/) [docs](https://www.hetzner.com/dns/)
- **Outbound network** (yes): 20 TB EU; firewall allowlist. Each server includes 20 TB of outbound traffic in the EU (1 TB in the US, 0.5 TB in Singapore) with overage at €1.00/$1.20 per TB, incoming and internal traffic free. Cloud Firewalls filter outgoing traffic as well as incoming and are free, and a server can be created with no public IP at all. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview)
- **Keys and secrets** (no): No secrets store. There is no vault, no write-only environment store and no request-signing proxy. Cloud-init user data (up to 32 KiB) is the only documented first-run injection and it lives on the disk. API tokens, by contrast, are properly scoped: one project each, read-only or read-write. [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/getting-started/generating-api-token)
- **Ways to drive it** (yes): Console, CLI, API, SSH. The console creates every resource by clicking, with one-click apps preselected, and the REST API, hcloud CLI and official Go and Python libraries cover automation. There is no official TypeScript library, no MCP server and no PTY or file API, so an agent driving the platform needs Go, Python or raw HTTP. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/reference/cloud)
- **Built-in agents** (no): None; you install the agent. The one-click apps are infrastructure (Docker CE, Coolify, Nextcloud, WordPress, GitLab, Grafana, WireGuard and similar). No coding agent, no Hermes, no OpenClaw and no prompt API. OpenClaw and n8n publish their own Hetzner guides, and a community Ansible playbook exists for Hermes, so the routes are documented but terminal-based. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- **Teams and accounts** (partly): Roles; alerts, not caps. Projects with Owner, Admin, Member and Restricted roles, per-project API tokens and cost alerts. No SSO is documented, there is no account audit log with user attribution, and there is no hard spending cap: alerts only send email and never stop a machine. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/faq)
- **Billing models** (partly): Hourly, rounded up; monthly cap. The meter is hourly, rounded up to a whole hour per server, with the bill capped at the monthly price — so always-on is cheap and predictable (about 624 hours to reach the cap) while bursty use is expensive. A powered-off server is billed in full, and there is no pause or cheaper stopped-storage rate. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- **Trials and free tiers** (no): No free tier or credit. No free tier, no automatic signup credit and no card-free trial: an account needs a card, SEPA direct debit, bank transfer or PayPal, invoices are due immediately, and new projects start with a small limit that is only raised after a month and a paid invoice. Promo codes exist but are handed out case by case. The advertised €5.99 Cost-Optimized plans are marked not available for ordering. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/billing-and-account-management/billing-at-hetzner/payment-overview/) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/billing-and-account-management/billing-at-hetzner/payment-overview/)
- **The company** (yes): ISO 27001, C5, 99.9% SLA. Hetzner Online GmbH of Gunzenhausen, founded 1997 and independent, with its own data-centre parks, ISO/IEC 27001:2022, BSI C5 Type 2, KRITIS classification and PCI DSS. A 99.9% monthly availability SLA per server pays refunds as Cloud Credit, and a DPA with technical and organisational measures is created online. No SOC 2, by explicit choice, and no published venture funding. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/) [docs](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)

## Capabilities

- Its own virtual machine: yes (Full VM, own kernel) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/overview)
- Root access: yes (Root by SSH key or password) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/connecting-to-the-server)
- Docker inside: yes (Docker CE one-click app) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- Nested virtualisation: no (Not available) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/faq)
- Your own image: partly (Snapshot or custom ISO). There is no Dockerfile or OCI-image import: a custom image is a snapshot of a Hetzner server or a mounted ISO, and a snapshot can only boot the architecture it was taken on. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/creating-a-server)
- Any size you like: no (Fixed plans only) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/technical-details/faq)
- Large machines: yes (48 vCPU / 192 GB / 960 GB) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/general-purpose/)
- Resize while running: no (Power off, then rescale) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- GPUs: no (None on Cloud) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- Choose the region: yes (6 locations, 4 zones) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/locations)
- Runs in the EU: yes (Falkenstein, Nuremberg, Helsinki) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/locations)
- Pause keeps memory: no (No pause state) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Pre-started pools: no (None) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/creating-a-server)
- Starts in under a second: no (Seconds, not under one) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- Snapshots of files: yes (Manual, kept until deleted) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview)
- Snapshots with memory: no (Disk only) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/faq)
- Copy a running machine: no (Snapshot, then new server) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/faq)
- Pick an older snapshot: yes (Up to 30, any age) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/faq)
- Reusable templates: yes (Snapshot → many servers) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview)
- Automatic backups: yes (Daily, 7 slots, +20%) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview)
- Files survive a stop: yes (Disk and IP persist) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Separate volumes: yes (€0.044/GB/mo, to 10 TB) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/block-storage)
- One volume, several machines: no (One server at a time) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/volumes/faq)
- Mount outside storage: partly (S3 buckets, no native mount). Object Storage is S3-compatible but Hetzner offers no native mount: you add s3fs or rclone yourself, and buckets exist only in Nuremberg, Falkenstein and Helsinki. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/storage/object-storage/)
- Large disk: yes (10 TB volume; 960 GB plan) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/block-storage)
- Can stay on indefinitely: yes (No session limit) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Choose the idle timeout: no (No idle timer exists) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/creating-a-server)
- Wakes on a request: no (No sleep to wake) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/creating-a-server)
- Scheduled runs: no (No provider scheduler) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Public link to a port: yes (Public IPv4/IPv6, any port) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/primary-ips/overview)
- Private link: no (No token links) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview)
- Real SSH: yes (ssh root@IP, IPv4 or IPv6) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/connecting-to-the-server)
- Terminal in the browser: partly (VNC console, emergency use). The browser console is a VNC console for emergencies, not a shell: Hetzner recommends SSH for day-to-day work and the console needs the root password. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/faq)
- Tunnel to your computer: yes (ssh -L over real SSH) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/connecting-to-the-server)
- Non-web ports: yes (Any TCP or UDP port) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview)
- Your own domain: yes (Point DNS at the server IP) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/dns/)
- Automatic HTTPS: partly (Certificates only on a Load Balancer). Managed Let's Encrypt certificates belong to the paid Load Balancer (from €7.49 a month); a plain server needs Caddy, certbot or an app's own script. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/load-balancer/)
- Outbound data included: yes (20 TB EU / 1 TB US / 0.5 TB SG) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/regular-performance/)
- Allow only some sites: yes (Outbound firewall rules) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview)
- Turn the internet off: yes (Private-only server) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/getting-started/creating-a-server)
- Fixed outgoing IP: yes (Primary IP + Floating IP) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/floating-ips/overview)
- Stored secrets: no (No secrets manager) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Secrets the agent cannot read: no (None) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Limited API keys: yes (Read or Read & Write, per project) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/getting-started/generating-api-token)
- Create from the website: yes (Console wizard) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- Command-line tool: yes (hcloud (official, open source)) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/faq)
- Python SDK: yes (hcloud-python (official)) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/faq)
- TypeScript SDK: no (Go and Python only) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/faq)
- Documented HTTP API: yes (Full REST API, OpenAPI spec) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- MCP server: no (None official) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Interactive terminal over the API: no (No PTY endpoint) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Files over the API: no (No file endpoint) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- Coding agents preinstalled: no (None) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- Send it a prompt: no (None) [source](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- One-click Hermes: no (Not an app) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- One-click OpenClaw: no (Not an app, but a guide) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- Browser built in: no (Install it yourself) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/apps/overview)
- Desktop for computer use: no (Install it; view via VNC) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/faq)
- Runs other platforms' agents: yes (OpenClaw documents Hetzner) [source](https://docs.openclaw.ai/install/hetzner)
- Team workspace: yes (Projects with invited members) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/faq)
- Roles and permissions: yes (Owner, Admin, Member, Restricted) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/faq)
- Single sign-on: not-published (Email + optional 2FA) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/faq)
- Hard spending cap: no (Alerts only, no cap) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Usage alerts: yes (Email cost and traffic alerts) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Audit log: partly (Activity feed, no attribution). The Console shows an Activity feed of what happened to resources; no account audit log with who-did-it attribution, export or retention period is published. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/faq)
- Billed per second: no (Hourly, rounded up) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- CPU billed only while working: no (Resources reserved while it exists) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Paused costs only storage: no (Off is billed in full) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- No monthly fee: yes (No plan or fee) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Flat monthly price: yes (Monthly cap per server) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- Ongoing free tier: no (None) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- Free starting credit: no (No signup credit) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/billing-and-account-management/billing-at-hetzner/promo-code/)
- Try without a card: no (Payment method required) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/billing-and-account-management/billing-at-hetzner/payment-overview/)
- Public status page: yes (status.hetzner.com) [source](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- Uptime promise (SLA): yes (99.9% monthly, Cloud Credit) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/slas-cloud/)
- SOC 2 report: no (ISO 27001 and C5 instead) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)
- Data processing agreement: yes (Online DPA, TOMs in Appendix 2) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)
- Open source or self-hostable: no (Platform not self-hostable) [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/faq)

## Usability

- Dashboard: Yes: the Hetzner Console creates servers, IPs, volumes, firewalls, networks, load balancers, snapshots and backups, with graphs, an Activity feed, per-project members and cost alerts.
- Without code: Yes for the machine itself. Choosing a plan, a location, an image, an SSH key and a firewall is all clicking, and one-click apps (Docker CE, Coolify, Nextcloud, WordPress, GitLab and others) are preselected from the console. Everything after that — the agent, the database, the certificate — is a terminal.
- Signup: A payment method (card, SEPA direct debit for EUR accounts, bank transfer or PayPal) and an email address. No free tier, no automatic credit, and new accounts start with a small project limit that is only raised after a month and a paid invoice.
- Docs: Dozens of focused pages under docs.hetzner.com/cloud plus a complete OpenAPI reference at docs.hetzner.cloud, an open-source CLI, Go and Python libraries, community tutorials and a 24/7 support desk.
- Trips people up: Powering a server off does not stop the bill; only deleting it does.
- Trips people up: Each server's usage is rounded up to a whole hour, which is brutal for short tasks.
- Trips people up: The advertised price includes one Primary IPv4; the server alone is €0.50/$0.60 cheaper a month, and IPv6-only is free.
- Trips people up: Resizing needs a reboot and cannot shrink the disk; the partition may need fixing in the rescue system afterwards.
- Trips people up: Snapshots are disk-only, capped at 30 per account, and never contain attached volumes.
- Trips people up: Ports 25 and 465 are blocked on new accounts until a support request is approved.
- Trips people up: The cheap Cost-Optimized plans are listed but marked not available for ordering.

## Company

- Legal entity: Hetzner Online GmbH, Industriestr. 25, 91710 Gunzenhausen, Germany; Ansbach HRB 6089; VAT DE 812871812. Management: Martin Hetzner, Stephan Konvickova, Günther Müller. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/legal/legal-notice/)
- Age and scale: A German IT company founded in 1997, one of Europe's largest hosting providers, with its own data-centre parks in Nuremberg, Falkenstein and Helsinki plus Singapore and the USA. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/unternehmen/ueber-uns/)
- Ownership and funding: No parent company, stock listing or venture round is published; Martin Hetzner is CEO and the company is headquartered in Gunzenhausen. [source](https://www.hetzner.com/legal/legal-notice/)
- Certification: ISO/IEC 27001:2022, BSI C5 Type 2, classified as a KRITIS operator under §8a BSIG, and PCI DSS for card handling. No SOC 2, by choice. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)
- Status and SLA: A public status page and a 99.9% monthly availability SLA per Cloud server, refunded as Cloud Credit. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/slas-cloud/)
- Data protection: A Data Processing Agreement can be created online, with technical and organisational measures in Appendix 2; the audit protocol is available in the customer account. [source](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)

## Caveats

- **A stopped server is not a paused server** (open): There is no pause, sleep or hibernate. A powered-off server keeps its disk and its IP but also its full monthly charge; the documented way to stop paying is to snapshot and delete, which loses memory, processes and the IP.
- **Hourly rounding punishes short runs** (open): Usage is rounded up to a whole hour per server, so any task under an hour costs a full hour: 1,000 ten-minute tasks bill 1,000 server-hours, not 167.
- **The public IPv4 is billed separately** (open): Hetzner bills the server and its public IPv4 separately: $0.60 a month or $0.001 an hour per IPv4, and IPv6 is free. The plan pages' monthly price includes one IPv4; the costs on this site include it too, so an IPv6-only server is $0.60 a month cheaper.
- **The cheapest family is out of stock** (open): Every Cost-Optimized plan carries a 'not available' badge, and each order button says 'This product is currently unavailable. Please check back later.' (rechecked 30 October 2026), while the price API still reports active: true. The listed monthly prices are CX23 2 vCPU / 4 GB / 40 GB €5.99; CAX11 (Arm) 2 / 4 / 40 €6.49; CX33 4 / 8 / 80 €8.99; CAX21 (Arm) 4 / 8 / 80 €10.99; CX43 8 / 16 / 160 €16.49; CAX31 (Arm) 8 / 16 / 160 €21.49; CX53 16 / 32 / 320 €29.99; CAX41 (Arm) 16 / 32 / 320 €41.49, before VAT. Until they can be ordered, this guide prices the Regular Performance plans, which cost about three to four times as much for the same size.
- **Two first-party price lists, and marketing includes the IPv4** (contradiction): Hetzner publishes separate EUR and USD lists (the USD one is about 1.18× the EUR one) and the account currency is fixed at signup. Plan cards add one Primary IPv4 to the server price; the API does not.

## Sources

- [Cloud overview and plans](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/)
- [Regular Performance plans](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/regular-performance/)
- [General Purpose plans](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/general-purpose/)
- [Cost-Optimized plans](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/cost-optimized/)
- [Block storage (volumes)](https://www.hetzner.com/cloud/block-storage)
- [Price API: traffic overage (CLOUD_66)](https://website-price-api.hetzner.com/api/v1/products/CLOUD_66)
- [Website price API used by the plan pages](https://website-price-api.hetzner.com/api/v1/products/CLOUD_124)
- [Docs: servers overview](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/overview)
- [Docs: billing FAQ](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/billing/faq)
- [Docs: servers FAQ](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/faq)
- [Docs: locations](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/general/locations)
- [Docs: backups and snapshots](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/backups-snapshots/overview)
- [Docs: primary IPs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/servers/primary-ips/overview)
- [Docs: floating IPs](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/floating-ips/overview)
- [Docs: firewalls](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/firewalls/overview)
- [Docs: networks](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/networks/overview)
- [Docs: API tokens](https://docs.hetzner.com/cloud/api/getting-started/generating-api-token)
- [Cloud API reference (OpenAPI)](https://docs.hetzner.cloud/cloud.spec.json)
- [Docs: information security and certifications](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/information-security-at-hetzner/)
- [Docs: cloud SLA](https://docs.hetzner.com/general/company-and-policy/slas-cloud/)
- [Legal: terms and conditions](https://www.hetzner.com/legal/terms-and-conditions/)
- [OpenClaw: Hetzner install guide](https://docs.openclaw.ai/install/hetzner)
- [n8n: deploy to Hetzner](https://docs.n8n.io/deploy/host-n8n/install-options/use-a-cloud-provider/deploy-to-hetzner)