Cloudways vs Netlify
We give Cloudways a 2.2 GPA and Netlify a 2.8, out of 4.0. Netlify grades higher on the free plan and features. They get the same grade on value for money, ease of use and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Cloudways
Managed cloud hosting on DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS or Google
Netlify
Git-based hosting for sites and web apps, priced by monthly credits
How we grade them
| 2.2GPACloudwaysFair | 2.8GPANetlifyGood | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | BGraded against the managed hosts it's weighed against. A 1 GB DigitalOcean server is $11 a month, billed hourly with no intro price to expire, so two years cost $264. Rocket.net and Kinsta run $25 to $29 a month, though here you size the server yourself. | BGraded against its own alternatives, since it hosts sites built elsewhere: Personal is $9 a month with no intro price to expire, so the second year costs what the first did. That's under Cloudways' $11 and far under Kinsta's $30. Extra credits are $5 for 500, and a team needs Pro at $20. |
| Free plan and trial | DA 3-day free trial with no credit card, which is nice. But three days is less than a week, too short to judge a host properly, so it lands at D. | BA real free plan: custom domains with SSL, functions, a database and unlimited deploy previews, with 300 credits a month. A small personal site fits. A busy one doesn't, and it pauses when the credits run out rather than billing you. |
| Features | CManaged servers on DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS or Google Cloud, with SSL, backups, staging, Object Cache Pro, Copilot and free migration. The gaps the listing names: email, the CDN and the malware protection service are paid add-ons. | BAgainst its own alternatives it covers the whole job: deploys from Git, the command line, a folder or an AI agent, preview links with feedback, rollbacks, functions, Postgres, file storage, forms and user sign-ups. Just know it's for sites built in code. |
| Ease of use | CNo app store rating to go on. You choose and size the server yourself, which is more decisions than a shared hosting plan asks of you. | CNo store rating on record. Dropping a folder in works, but most of it assumes you build sites in code and push them from Git, and credits are one more thing to keep an eye on. |
| Platforms and integrations | BA web console with no app on record, plus a published API and a choice of five cloud providers, with WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento and Laravel apps on top. | BA web dashboard with no app on record, plus a command-line tool. It hooks into GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket and Slack, and AI agents such as Claude, Codex, Gemini and Cursor can ship code through it. |
| Best for | managed cloud servers without running them yourself | hosting sites you build in code and push from Git |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: Cloudways and Netlify. How we grade
Price against what you get
Cloudways starts at $11 a month and scores 2.3 out of 4 on features, ease of use and platforms. Netlify starts at $9 a month and scores 2.7.
Netlify scores higher and starts $2 a month lower. Of the other web hosts on the chart, 1 scores higher than Cloudways for less, and none scores higher than Netlify for less.
Features, ease of use and platforms, averaged
What paid plans start at, a month (each step along is roughly double) →
- The best score at each price
- Has a free plan
- No free plan
Where they differ
- Cloudways starts at $11 per month for a 1 GB DigitalOcean server, billed hourly. Netlify starts at $9 per month for 1 member.
- Netlify has a free plan. Cloudways does not, though it has a free trial.
- Cloudways also covers malware protection.
- Netlify also covers AI agents and forms.
At a glance
| Cloudways | Netlify | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free trial | Free plan |
| Starts at | $11 per month for a 1 GB DigitalOcean server, billed hourly | $9 per month for 1 member |
| Free plan | None | 300 credits a month as a hard limit, one member, custom domains with SSL, functions, database, blob storage and unlimited deploy previews. Sites pause when credits run out. |
| Free trial | 3-day free trial, no credit card required | None listed |
| Web | ||
| Made by | Cloudways, LLC | Netlify |
| Price read from | cloudways.com | netlify.com |
| Checked | Oct 17, 2026 | Oct 18, 2026 |
Who each one suits
Cloudways
- Sites that have outgrown shared hosting but do not want to run a server
- Agencies hosting many client apps on servers they control
- Developers running Laravel or other PHP apps alongside WordPress
Netlify
- Developers deploying front-end frameworks and static sites from Git
- Teams that want a preview link on every pull request
- Side projects small enough to fit in 300 free credits a month
- Non-commercial open source projects, through the free Open Source plan
Worth knowing
Cloudways
- Offsite backup storage is billed at $0.033 per GB per server on top of the server price, and listed prices exclude tax.
- Email hosting, the Cloudflare CDN and the malware protection service are paid add-ons rather than part of the server price.
- You choose and size the server yourself, which takes more decisions than a shared hosting plan.
Netlify
- Deploys, bandwidth, compute and requests all draw on monthly credits: 15 per production deploy and 20 per GB of bandwidth.
- When an account's credits run out its sites pause until the next cycle, unless auto recharge ($5 for 500 on Personal, $10 for 1,500 on Pro) is turned on.
- Free and Personal allow one member; private organization repos and shared env variables start at Pro, and extra concurrent builds are $40 a month.
- SSO, SCIM, a 99.99% uptime SLA, log drains and 24/7 support are on the Enterprise plan only.
Key features
Cloudways
- Choice of cloud provider
- Servers run on DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, Amazon Web Services or Google Cloud, and you pick the provider, size and location, then scale up later.
- Managed server essentials
- Cloudways sets up and maintains the server with free SSL, backups, one-click staging and Object Cache Pro, and moves an existing site over for free.
- Copilot AI monitoring
- Cloudways Copilot watches the server's critical components and uses AI to diagnose issues and suggest fixes.
- Security and malware scanning
- Servers get malware scanning and vulnerability alerts, with a fuller malware protection service and a Cloudflare CDN sold as add-ons.
- Cloudways API
- Cloudways publishes an API, linked from every page, for working with the platform from your own scripts and tools.
Netlify
- Deploy from Git, CLI, AI or a folder
- Projects deploy on every push from GitHub, GitLab or Bitbucket, from the Netlify CLI, by drag and drop, or from an AI agent, with one-click rollbacks.
- Deploy Previews
- Every pull request and branch gets its own preview URL where reviewers can leave visual feedback, and new projects stay private until you publish them.
- Agent Runners
- AI agents such as Claude, Codex and Gemini can be asked to fix, update and ship code from the dashboard, with 1 to 50 concurrent runs by plan.
- Functions, database and storage
- Serverless and edge functions, Netlify Database (a managed Postgres database) and blob storage for files and images run beside the site.
- AI Gateway
- Calls major AI models without managing your own API keys, billed through credits at 180 credits per $1 of model cost.
- Forms, identity and image CDN
- Collects form submissions without a backend, signs up and authenticates site users, and resizes and serves images on demand.
Plans
Cloudways
Flexible, 1 GB server$11
per month, billed hourly
DigitalOcean Standard server with 1 GB RAM, 1 vCPU, 25 GB SSD and 1 TB bandwidth, for unlimited sites. $0.0164 an hour; Premium with NVMe is $14.
Flexible, 2 GB server$24
per month, billed hourly
DigitalOcean Standard server with 2 GB RAM, 50 GB SSD and 2 TB bandwidth. The Premium version with NVMe storage is $28 a month.
Flexible, 4 GB server$46
per month, billed hourly
DigitalOcean Standard server with 4 GB RAM, 2 vCPUs and 80 GB SSD, where Object Cache Pro is included. Premium is $54; an 8 GB server is $88.
Autonomous Growth$99
per month
Autoscaling WordPress for one site, with 150 GB bandwidth and 20 GB disk. Extra disk is $1 a GB, bandwidth $0.04 a GB and extra servers $0.07 an hour.
Autonomous Scale$199
per month
One site on two baseline autoscaling servers, with 250 GB bandwidth and 50 GB disk. Plus, with three servers and 1,000 GB, is $399 a month.
Netlify
Free$0
300 credits a month that cannot be exceeded, one member, one concurrent build, and 1-day observability and analytics.
Personal$9
per month for 1 member
1,000 credits a month, smart secret detection, 7-day analytics and priority email support. Extra credits are $5 for 500.
Pro$20
per month for unlimited members
3,000 credits a month, private org repos, shared env variables, 3 concurrent builds. 10,000 credits is $63 a month, 20,000 is $126.
EnterpriseCustom
Sold through sales: 99.99% SLA, enterprise network tier, faster builds, SSO and SCIM, log drains and 24/7 support.
Ways to pay less
Cloudways
No public discounts listed.
Netlify
- Other savings
Free Open Source plan for non-commercial projects
Projects with an OSI-approved or Creative Commons license and a code of conduct can apply for 10,000 credits a month, unlimited members and free production deploys.
