DigitalOcean droplet pricing explained: per-second billing, the 672-hour cap and the extras

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The price on the DigitalOcean plan picker is the largest line on the invoice, but not the only one. We run our test server on the $6 droplet, so we read the pricing page and the billing docs line by line to know what the invoice can and cannot contain.

The plan prices

These are the Basic droplets with a regular CPU, the ones most small teams start on. Prices from the DigitalOcean pricing page:

The Premium Intel and Premium AMD versions of the 1 GB droplet cost $7.00 a month ($0.01042 an hour), and $14.00 for 2 GB.

How the billing actually works

Per second, with a floor. Since 1 January 2026 droplets are billed per second, with a minimum charge of 60 seconds or $0.01, whichever is higher. A one-hour test of the $6 droplet costs about one cent. A full day costs 21 cents.

Capped at 672 hours. The docs state that usage "is capped at 672 hours (28 days) per month". The hourly rate is simply the monthly price divided by 672: $0.00893 × 672 = $6.00. After 28 days the rest of the month is free, which is why the invoice never exceeds the plan price.

Powered off is not free. Quoting the docs: "You are still billed for bundled-plan CPU Droplets that are powered off because the compute resources stay reserved on the hypervisor. To end billing, destroy the Droplet." If you want to pause a server cheaply, take a snapshot and destroy the droplet.

Bandwidth: pooled, and cheap when you go over

Each plan includes outbound transfer: 1,000 GiB on the $6 droplet. Three details from the bandwidth docs:

• The allowance is pooled across all droplets in the team. Two $6 droplets share 2,000 GiB, however the traffic is split between them.
• It accrues per second, like the bill. A droplet that lives for one day has earned about 36 GiB of allowance, not 1,000.
• Beyond the pool, outbound transfer costs $0.01 per GiB. Inbound transfer is free, and so is traffic between droplets over the private VPC network.

For a small team's apps, 1,000 GiB a month is rarely the limit. If you do go 100 GiB over, that is one extra dollar.

The optional extras

Backups also come in a usage-based version, priced per GiB with frequencies up to every 4 hours; for one small droplet the percentage plans are simpler.

The reserved IP is the classic surprise. It costs nothing while it points at a droplet. Destroy the droplet and forget the IP, and it becomes a $5 monthly line by itself.

The newer "v5" droplets

In some datacenters the control panel now offers v5 configurations, where vCPU, memory and boot disk each have their own hourly price. Two differences matter for the invoice. The docs say v5 droplets "do not have a monthly usage cap", so a 31-day month costs more than a 28-day one. And their public IPv4 address is a separate line item, currently at an introductory $0.00 that the docs describe as subject to change. If you want a bill that is the same every month, pick a classic plan from the table above.

What our own droplet costs

Our test server is the 1 GiB plan in Frankfurt, created on 1 Oct 2026. The droplet line for October should be $6.00: it will pass the 672-hour cap before the month ends. We set a $10 billing alert on the first day, which takes a minute and is the cheapest insurance against a forgotten resource. The first invoice closes at the end of October; we will add it to this article when it does, so you can compare the theory above with the real bill.

What that $6 can run is covered in Can Coolify run on 1 GB of RAM? and the full timed install. If you want to try it yourself, the plans are on DigitalOcean's site.

FAQ

Is a DigitalOcean droplet billed hourly or monthly?

Per second, with a minimum of 60 seconds or $0.01, and capped at 672 hours a month. In practice you pay for exactly the time the droplet exists, and never more than the monthly price shown on the plan.

Do I pay for a droplet that is powered off?

Yes. A powered-off droplet keeps its resources reserved and is billed at the full rate. To stop the charge, destroy the droplet. Take a snapshot first if you want the data back later.

How much do DigitalOcean backups cost?

Weekly backups add 20% of the droplet's price and daily backups add 30%. On the $6 droplet that is $1.20 or $1.80 a month.

What happens if I use more bandwidth than my plan includes?

Extra outbound transfer costs $0.01 per GiB. The allowance is pooled across all droplets in your team, and inbound traffic is free.

Is a reserved IP free?

Only while it is assigned to a droplet. A reserved IPv4 address that is not attached to anything costs $5.00 a month.