The best VPS under $5 a month is InterServer's Linux VPS 1 Slice: 1 vCPU, 2 GB of RAM and 40 GB of SSD for $3.00, paid monthly, with no price increase at renewal. If a six-month contract is fine, netcup's VPS nano gives you 2 vCPUs, 2 GB and 60 GB for $3.47 (€3.10). And if you can stretch three cents past the budget, OVHcloud's VPS-1 has 4 GB of RAM for $5.03.
We checked these prices on 11 October 2026. Fifteen unmanaged Linux plans in our data cost $5.00 a month or less at their shortest billing term. Here is every one of them.
Every VPS at $5 a month or less
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | Price per month | Billing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scaleway STARDUST1-S | 1 | 1 GB | 10 GB SSD | $0.48 (€0.43) | Hourly |
| netcup VPS pico G11.5s | 1 | 1 GB | 30 GB SSD | $2.07 (€1.85) | 12-month contract |
| Vultr Regular 512 MB (IPv6 only) | 1 | 512 MB | 10 GB SSD | $2.50 | Hourly |
| InterServer Linux VPS 1 Slice | 1 | 2 GB | 40 GB SSD | $3.00 | Monthly |
| InterServer Storage VPS 1 TB | 1 | 2 GB | 1 TB HDD | $3.00 | Monthly |
| UpCloud Starter 1 GB | 1 | 1 GB | 10 GB SSD | $3.36 (€3.00) | Hourly |
| netcup VPS nano G11.5s | 2 | 2 GB | 60 GB SSD | $3.47 (€3.10) | 6-month contract |
| Vultr Regular 512 MB | 1 | 512 MB | 10 GB SSD | $3.50 | Hourly |
| DigitalOcean Basic 512 MB | 1 | 512 MB | 10 GB SSD | $4.00 | Hourly |
| Namecheap Spark VPS | 1 | 1 GB | 20 GB SSD | $4.88 | Monthly, renews at $5.88 |
| Bluehost VPS NVMe 2 | 1 | 2 GB | 50 GB NVMe | $4.99 | Monthly, renews at $5.99 |
| Vultr Regular Performance 1 GB | 1 | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | $5.00 | Hourly |
| Linode Shared CPU Nanode 1 GB | 1 | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | $5.00 | Hourly |
| AWS Lightsail Linux 512 MB | 2 | 512 MB | 20 GB SSD | $5.00 | Hourly |
| IONOS VPS S+ (Linux) | 1 | 2 GB | 60 GB NVMe | $5.00 | 12-month term, renews at $6.00 |
What $5 buys, sorted by RAM
The headline price hides a big spread in what you get. Sorted by memory instead:
- 512 MB (4 plans, $2.50 to $5.00). Enough for a VPN, a proxy, a small bot or a monitoring agent. Too small for WordPress with a database.
- 1 GB (6 plans, $0.48 to $5.00). Runs one small site or app. Add swap space and keep an eye on memory.
- 2 GB (5 plans, $3.00 to $5.00). A real small server: a WordPress site with its database, or an app with a couple of supporting containers.
Nothing at $5.00 or under has 4 GB. The first plan that does is OVHcloud's VPS-1 at $5.03.
Best value: InterServer 1 Slice at $3.00
InterServer's smallest VPS matches or beats the RAM of everything else under $5 except its own storage plan, and it has the simplest terms on the list: pay monthly, cancel when you like, same price next year. One slice is 1 vCPU, 2 GB of RAM, 40 GB of SSD and 2 TB of transfer. The servers are in the United States.
The Storage VPS at the same $3.00 swaps the SSD for a 1 TB hard disk. It is built for backups and file storage, not for a database or a busy site, because hard disks are much slower at the small random reads those need.
Best in Europe: netcup VPS nano at $3.47
netcup's nano is the only plan on the list with two vCPUs and 2 GB together, plus the largest SSD (60 GB) and unmetered traffic. It is hosted in Germany and costs €3.10 a month on a six-month contract, renewing at the same price. The even smaller pico (1 GB, 30 GB) is €1.85 a month on a 12-month contract.
Cheapest with hourly billing
If you want to create and destroy servers freely, look at the hourly plans. Scaleway's STARDUST1-S is the lowest price we track for any server, €0.43 a month for 1 GB of RAM and a 10 GB disk, available in France, the Netherlands and Poland. Scaleway bills a public IPv4 address separately, so the real monthly cost is higher if you need one.
After that, UpCloud's Starter 1 GB is $3.36 with locations in Europe, the United States, Singapore and Australia, and Vultr's and Linode's 1 GB plans are $5.00 in a long list of countries.
The catches at this price
- IPv6-only. Vultr's $2.50 plan has no IPv4 address. Visitors and services on IPv4-only networks can't reach it directly. Its $3.50 plan is the same server with IPv4.
- Contracts. netcup's pico and nano and IONOS's VPS S+ need 6 to 12 months. Everything else is monthly or hourly.
- Renewal bumps. Namecheap Spark goes from $4.88 to $5.88, Bluehost VPS NVMe 2 from $4.99 to $5.99 and IONOS VPS S+ from $5.00 to $6.00. All three end up over $5 after the first term.
- Tiny disks. Four plans have 10 GB. The operating system takes a few gigabytes of that before you install anything.
- Unmanaged. Every plan here gives you root access and nothing else. Updates, firewall, backups and fixes are yours.
Three cents over: OVHcloud VPS-1
OVHcloud's VPS-1 costs $5.03 a month (€4.49), which keeps it off this list on a technicality. It has 2 vCPUs, 4 GB of RAM and 40 GB of NVMe, twice the memory of anything above, with no contract and no renewal increase. On a 12-month term it is €3.81 a month, about $4.27, which puts it under $5 after all.
If your budget has any give at all, this is the plan to compare everything else against. Our 4 GB VPS guide covers the alternatives at that size.
FAQ
What is the cheapest VPS you can buy?
In our data, Scaleway's STARDUST1-S at $0.48 a month (€0.43), billed hourly, before the cost of an IPv4 address. The cheapest with a normal contract and IPv4 is netcup's VPS pico at $2.07 a month on a 12-month term.
Is a $5 VPS enough for WordPress?
A 2 GB plan is: InterServer's 1 Slice ($3.00), netcup's nano ($3.47), Bluehost's VPS NVMe 2 ($4.99) or IONOS's VPS S+ ($5.00). The 512 MB and 1 GB plans will struggle once the database and PHP are both running.
Are sub-$5 VPS plans reliable?
The providers on this list are established companies, and most publish a 99.9% uptime figure. What you give up at this price is resources and support, not the provider: you get a small unmanaged server and you run it yourself.
The bottom line
Under $5, buy RAM, not a brand name. InterServer's 1 Slice ($3.00, no contract) and netcup's VPS nano ($3.47, six months) both give you 2 GB, while the big clouds give you 512 MB to 1 GB for more money. If you can go three cents higher, OVHcloud's VPS-1 doubles the memory again.
See every VPS under $5 as it stands today on the VPS hosting page, or the complete cheapest VPS ranking. For the next step up, see the cheapest 2 GB VPS plans.
