The best dedicated server hosting of 2026
For current hardware at a low price, Hetzner rents a 6-core server with 64 GB of memory and unlimited traffic for $69 a month, but only in Germany and Finland. OVHcloud is the budget pick in North America, with Eco servers from $10 a month and DDoS protection on every server. If you want someone else to run the server, Liquid Web sells fully managed machines with cPanel and backups from $163.25 a month, and Bluehost adds 24/7 phone support and a 30-day refund to cPanel servers from $144.19 a month on a three-year term.
Compared at a glance
| Product | Best for | Free plan | Starts at |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hetzner | Unmanaged servers in Europe with unlimited traffic | No | $69 a month, no setup fee (AX41) |
| Liquid Web | Fully managed servers | No | $163.25 a month |
| OVHcloud | Budget servers in North America with DDoS protection | No | $10 a month (Kimsufi), setup fee equal to one month |
| Vultr Bare Metal | Hourly billing and a wide choice of locations | No | $120 a month or $0.164 an hour |
| Bluehost | cPanel and WHM with phone support | No; 30-day money-back guarantee | $144.19 a month on a 36-month term, renews at $191.79 |
| Cherry Servers | Large traffic allowances with hourly or term billing | No | $57.33 a month or $0.0983 an hour |
Hetzner: best for low-cost current hardware in Europe
Hetzner pairs recent AMD hardware with unlimited traffic at prices well below US hosts. The entry AX41 has a 6-core AMD Ryzen 5 3600, 64 GB of DDR4 memory and two 512 GB NVMe drives on a 1 Gbit/s port, for $69 a month with no setup fee. That price includes the $1.90 monthly charge for the IPv4 address. Traffic is unlimited and free on the standard port, so a busy download or media site does not run up a bandwidth bill. For comparison, Vultr's cheapest bare metal plan has 4 cores and 32 GB of memory for $120 a month.
The newer AX42 moves to an 8-core Ryzen 7 PRO with 64 GB of DDR5 ECC memory from $89 a month plus a $39 setup fee. The AX102 has a 16-core Ryzen 9 7950X3D and 128 GB of ECC memory from $189, and the AX162 has a 48-core AMD EPYC from $374. Hetzner also sells Intel servers (the EX line), storage servers (SX) and GPU servers, plus a server auction of refurbished machines listed from €75.70 a month.
The catch is location. Hetzner's dedicated servers sit in data centers in Nuremberg and Falkenstein in Germany and Helsinki in Finland, which it says are ISO 27001 certified. Visitors in the US will see more delay than they would from a US host. The servers are also unmanaged: you install the operating system, apply updates and fix problems yourself. Prices exclude VAT.
- AX41 with 64 GB of memory for $69 a month, no setup fee
- Unlimited traffic on the standard 1 Gbit/s port
- Monthly prices with an hourly rate shown, and no long contract
- AMD EPYC servers up to 48 cores
- Dedicated servers only in Germany and Finland
- Unmanaged, so security and updates are your job
- Setup fees of $39 to $59 on most newer models
AX41 $69 a month with no setup fee; AX42 from $89 plus $39 setup; AX102 from $189 plus $39 setup; AX162 from $374 plus $39 setup. Prices include the $1.90 IPv4 charge and exclude VAT. Server auction from €75.70 a month. Prices checked November 4, 2026.
Liquid Web: best for a fully managed dedicated server
Liquid Web suits a business that needs a whole server but has no one to run it. Its featured plans are fully managed and include cPanel, 500 GB of Acronis backups, 10 TB of bandwidth, a dedicated IP address and root access. Liquid Web's team handles monitoring and updates, and support runs 24/7.
The cheapest featured plan has a 4-core Intel Xeon E-2134, 16 GB of memory and a 480 GB SSD for $163.25 a month. A 16-core Xeon 6526Y with 64 GB of memory and a 960 GB NVMe drive costs $577.15. The longer plan list includes 16-core and dual 32-core Xeon machines with mirrored drives and 10 or 15 TB of bandwidth, from $167.50 to $845 a month, some with 50% off the first two months. A two-year term takes 15% off the featured plans.
Liquid Web says every plan includes 99.99% uptime and promises to replace failed hardware within 30 minutes. It runs data centers in the US, Europe and Australia. If you want the hardware without the management, Liquid Web sells self-managed bare metal servers on a separate page.
You pay a lot more than you would at Hetzner or OVHcloud for similar hardware. What you are paying for is the backup space, the cPanel license and a team that patches the server and answers at 3 a.m. For a store or agency without a systems administrator, that trade usually makes sense.
- Fully managed, with cPanel and 500 GB of backups included
- 10 to 15 TB of bandwidth on every plan
- 99.99% uptime and a 30-minute hardware replacement promise
- 15% off on a two-year term
- Costs more than unmanaged hosts for the same hardware
- No money-back guarantee stated on the dedicated page
- The page names no specific data center cities
Featured managed plans $163.25 (4 cores, 16 GB), $312.80 (4 cores, 12 GB, RAID-1) and $577.15 a month (16 cores, 64 GB). Other managed plans from $167.50 to $845 a month. 15% off on two-year terms. Prices checked November 4, 2026.
OVHcloud: best for low-cost servers in North America
OVHcloud has data centers in Hillsboro, Oregon and Vint Hill, Virginia, plus Beauharnois and Toronto in Canada, and sells dedicated servers at three price levels. Every OVHcloud dedicated server includes its anti-DDoS protection, and incoming and outgoing traffic is unlimited outside its Asia-Pacific sites.
The cheapest servers are in the Eco range. Kimsufi machines start at $10 a month for a 4-core Xeon E5-1620v2 with 32 GB of memory and a 120 GB SSD on a 500 Mbps connection. So You Start begins at $30 a month for a 6-core Xeon-E 2136 with NVMe storage. Rise servers start at $70 a month for a 6-core Xeon-E 2386G with 32 to 128 GB of memory. Each Eco server has a one-time setup fee equal to its monthly price, which OVHcloud waives on Rise servers when you commit for 12 months or more. Support for Eco servers is by chat or ticket, 24/7, at no extra cost.
The Advance range is for production work. The 2026 Advance-1 has a 6-core AMD EPYC 4245P, 32 GB of DDR5 ECC memory, two 960 GB NVMe drives and a 25 Gbps private network for $204 a month, with a $204 setup fee.
When we checked, every Eco model card carried a "Coming Soon" label, so the server you want may be out of stock in the region you want. Check availability before you plan a move around a $10 server.
- Eco servers from $10 a month
- Anti-DDoS protection included on every server
- Data centers in Oregon, Virginia, Quebec and Toronto
- Unlimited traffic outside Asia-Pacific
- Setup fees equal to one month on most servers
- Eco models showed "Coming Soon" when we checked
- Eco support is chat and tickets only
Kimsufi from $10, So You Start from $30 and Rise from $70 a month, each with a setup fee equal to one month (waived on Rise for 12-month commitments). Advance from $204 a month plus $204 setup. Prices checked November 4, 2026.
Vultr Bare Metal: best for hourly billing and location choice
Vultr sells bare metal servers alongside its cloud servers, and its public API lists both. Billing is by the hour, which makes it practical to rent a dedicated machine for a load test or a short project and then delete it.
The smallest plan has a 4-core Intel Xeon E3-1270, 32 GB of memory, two 240 GB SSDs and 5 TB of bandwidth for $120 a month or $0.164 an hour, but Vultr lists it in only 7 locations. The 6-core Xeon E-2286G with 32 GB and two 960 GB drives costs $185 a month and is listed in 25 locations. An AMD EPYC 4245P with 32 GB, two 960 GB drives and 10 TB of bandwidth costs $295 a month. Vultr runs 33 regions in all.
Vultr is the right pick when your visitors are spread out, or sit somewhere Hetzner and OVHcloud do not reach. It costs more than both for the same hardware, the cheapest plans include less traffic, and like them the servers are unmanaged.
- Hourly billing on physical servers
- Bare metal plans sit in the same API as Vultr's cloud servers
- 6-core plan listed in 25 locations
- Cheapest plan available in only 7 locations
- 5 TB of bandwidth on the entry plans
- Unmanaged
From $120 a month or $0.164 an hour (4 cores, 32 GB, 5 TB). 6-core Intel from $185 and 6-core AMD EPYC from $295 a month. Prices from Vultr's public plan list, checked November 4, 2026.
Bluehost: best for cPanel servers with phone support
Bluehost fits a site owner who already uses cPanel on shared hosting and wants a bigger server that works the same way. Each dedicated plan runs AlmaLinux 9 with WHM and cPanel ready from the first day, or plain root SSH if you prefer. Support is 24/7 by phone and chat, and Bluehost staff will help with jobs such as firewall setup, backups and upgrades.
The Standard NVMe 32 plan has 8 cores, 32 GB of DDR5 memory, 1 TB of NVMe storage, unmetered bandwidth and three IP addresses for $144.19 a month on a 36-month term. It renews at $191.79. Enhanced NVMe 64 (16 cores, 64 GB, 2 TB) costs $220.19 and renews at $274.19. Premium NVMe 128 (32 cores, 128 GB, 3 TB) costs $315.19 and renews at $394.19.
Read two details before you buy. The low price needs three years paid up front. And the number of cPanel accounts you can host depends on the cPanel license tier you buy, so a reseller or agency should price that in. Unmetered bandwidth comes with a rule: an account that uses 25% or more of the system's resources for more than 90 seconds may be asked to cut back.
Bluehost refunds hosting fees within 30 days, which none of the other providers here offered on their dedicated pages. It has five data center locations and a 99.99% uptime SLA.
- WHM and cPanel ready from day one
- 24/7 phone and chat support
- 30-day money-back guarantee
- Unmetered bandwidth and three IPs on every plan
- Lowest price needs a 36-month prepaid term
- Renewals run 25% to 33% higher
- cPanel account capacity depends on the license tier you buy
Standard $144.19, Enhanced $220.19 and Premium $315.19 a month on 36-month terms, renewing at $191.79, $274.19 and $394.19. Prices checked November 4, 2026. Bluehost listingVisit Bluehost Affiliate link
Cherry Servers: best for large traffic allowances with flexible billing
Cherry Servers rents bare metal servers in Lithuania, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Chicago and Singapore. Its plans include generous traffic: 30 TB a month on the smaller servers and 100 TB on many of the AMD machines.
Cherry's public plan list shows its cheapest server, a 4-core Xeon E3-1240v3 with 16 GB of memory and a 250 GB SSD, at $57.33 a month or $0.0983 an hour in Lithuania. For a US location, servers in Chicago start at $186.03 a month for an AMD Ryzen 7700X or EPYC 7313P with 64 GB of memory and 100 TB of traffic. You can pay by the hour, or choose a monthly, quarterly, semi-annual or annual term, which Cherry says saves up to 50%.
Pre-built servers deploy in about 12 minutes on average, and custom builds take about 24 hours. Every plan includes 24/7 live chat, tickets and a personal account manager. The servers are unmanaged, though Cherry offers a DirectAdmin control panel as an add-on.
Cherry suits a developer or a small company that moves a lot of data and is happy with mostly European locations and one US site. If most of your visitors are in North America, OVHcloud or Vultr offers more US choice.
- 30 TB to 100 TB of monthly traffic included
- Hourly billing, or term billing for up to 50% off
- Personal account manager on every plan
- Chicago is the only US location
- Unmanaged servers
- Cheapest plans are in Lithuania only
From $57.33 a month or $0.0983 an hour (4 cores, 16 GB, Lithuania). Chicago from $186.03 a month (64 GB, 100 TB traffic). Term billing saves up to 50%. Prices from Cherry's public plan list, checked November 4, 2026.
What to look for
A dedicated server is a whole physical machine rented to you alone. You get every core, all the memory and the full disk, and nobody else's traffic slows your site. It costs more than a VPS, so it makes sense when a VPS keeps running out of memory or CPU, when you need specific hardware such as large NVMe drives or many cores, or when a compliance rule says your data cannot share hardware.
Managed or unmanaged
This choice decides most of the price. An unmanaged server from Hetzner, OVHcloud, Vultr or Cherry Servers comes with the operating system and little else: you handle updates, firewalls, backups and recovery. A managed server from Liquid Web includes monitoring, patching, a control panel and backups, and costs more than twice as much for comparable hardware. If nobody on your team is comfortable on a Linux command line at 2 a.m., pay for management.
Read the bandwidth terms
"Unmetered" and "unlimited" have conditions. Hetzner's unlimited traffic covers the standard 1 Gbit/s port, not the 10G upgrade. Bluehost's unmetered plans can be asked to cut back if you use 25% or more of system resources for more than 90 seconds. Vultr's entry bare metal plans include 5 TB. If you serve video or large downloads, compare the included traffic before the monthly price.
Count setup fees and renewals
OVHcloud charges a setup fee equal to one month on most servers. Hetzner charges $39 to $59 on its newer AMD models. Bluehost's lowest price needs three years paid up front and renews 25% to 33% higher. Work out the cost of the first year and the second year before you compare.
Put the server near your visitors
Distance adds delay to every request your visitors make. Hetzner's dedicated servers are only in Germany and Finland, which suits a European audience. For US visitors, look at OVHcloud's Oregon and Virginia sites, Cherry's Chicago site, Vultr's US regions or Bluehost's US data centers.
Check stock and delivery time
Budget servers sell out. OVHcloud's Eco models all showed "Coming Soon" when we checked. Cherry Servers says pre-built servers deploy in about 12 minutes and custom builds take about a day. If you need a server this week, confirm the exact model is available before you plan around it.
How we chose
The earlier version of this guide listed ten hosts, several of them UK-only or no longer selling dedicated servers under the same name. We kept Bluehost and Liquid Web, which still sell dedicated servers with current US prices, and added Hetzner, OVHcloud, Vultr and Cherry Servers. On November 4, 2026 we checked each provider's own dedicated server pages and, where they publish one, their public price data. We compared the entry server's cores, memory and storage, included traffic, setup fees, renewal prices, how much of the server the host manages, data center locations and refund terms.
Questions people ask
What is the difference between a dedicated server and a VPS?
A VPS is a virtual machine that shares a physical server with other customers, each with a fixed slice of the hardware. A dedicated server gives you the whole machine. You get more consistent performance and full control of the hardware, at a higher price.
How much does a dedicated server cost?
Unmanaged servers start at $10 a month at OVHcloud's Kimsufi range and $69 a month at Hetzner. Fully managed servers start at $163.25 a month at Liquid Web. Hetzner, OVHcloud and Bluehost also charge a setup fee or ask for a long term to reach the lowest price. Prices checked November 4, 2026.
What is the cheapest dedicated server for US visitors?
OVHcloud's Kimsufi servers start at $10 a month plus a $10 setup fee, and OVHcloud has data centers in Oregon and Virginia. Stock varies, and every Eco model showed "Coming Soon" when we checked. Vultr's bare metal plans start at $120 a month with hourly billing.
Do I need a managed dedicated server?
You need one if nobody on your team can install updates, configure a firewall and restore from backup on a Linux server. Managed hosts such as Liquid Web handle those jobs and include cPanel and backup space. If you have that skill in house, an unmanaged server costs far less.
Is bare metal the same as a dedicated server?
Yes, in practice. Vultr, Cherry Servers and OVHcloud use "bare metal" for single-tenant physical servers, often with cloud-style hourly billing and an API. A traditional dedicated server is the same hardware, usually rented by the month.
Which dedicated server hosts offer a refund?
Bluehost refunds hosting fees within 30 days of purchase, minus any domain fees. Liquid Web, Hetzner, OVHcloud, Vultr and Cherry Servers did not state a money-back guarantee on their dedicated server pages when we checked.
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About the editorial team
Sources we checked 12
- hetzner.com/dedicated-rootserver for Hetzner dedicated server lines, server auction starting price, ISO 27001 data centers in Nuremberg, Falkenstein and Helsinki checked November 4, 2026
- hetzner.com/dedicated-rootserver/matrix-ax for AX41, AX42, AX102 and AX162 specs, unlimited traffic terms, setup fees checked November 4, 2026
- website-price-api.hetzner.com/api/v1/products/ROBOT_1718 for Hetzner's own USD prices for the AX models (also ROBOT_1719, 1720, 1721, 1723, 1724, 1727) and the ROBOT_1266 IPv4 charge checked November 4, 2026
- liquidweb.com/dedicated-server-hosting for Liquid Web managed plans, prices, inclusions, 99.99% uptime, 30-minute hardware replacement, data center regions, two-year discount checked November 4, 2026
- us.ovhcloud.com/bare-metal/prices for OVHcloud Advance prices, specs and setup fees, US data center regions checked November 4, 2026
- eco.us.ovhcloud.com for Kimsufi, So You Start and Rise prices, specs, setup fees and locations checked November 4, 2026
- eco.us.ovhcloud.com/rise for Rise setup fee waiver, unlimited traffic terms, anti-DDoS, Eco support and 99.90% SLA checked November 4, 2026
- api.vultr.com/v2/plans-metal for Vultr bare metal plan prices, hourly rates, specs, bandwidth and location counts checked November 4, 2026
- api.vultr.com/v2/regions for Vultr total region count checked November 4, 2026
- bluehost.com/hosting/dedicated for Bluehost dedicated plans, intro and renewal prices, term, specs, cPanel/WHM, support, refund terms, resource rule, uptime SLA checked November 4, 2026
- cherryservers.com/dedicated-servers for Cherry Servers locations, billing options, support, deployment times checked November 4, 2026
- api.cherryservers.com/v1/plans for Cherry Servers USD plan prices, specs, traffic allowances and regions checked November 4, 2026