HostingSimple vs Cloudways.
A managed layer on someone else's cloud (DO, Linode, Vultr, AWS, GCP). Decent stack — but you're paying two markups and they own the relationship.
When Cloudways is genuinely
the right pick.
We want you on the right host — even if that's not us. This is when we'd tell you to stay.
favour
Cloudways works if you specifically want to pick your underlying cloud provider and you're comfortable managing the cloud-layer billing separately. The team is technically credible and the stack is well-tuned. For most teams, the dual-billing and indirection isn't worth it — but for some workloads (specifically, you-NEED-AWS-for-compliance), it's the right call.
What you'd actually pay,
for your workload.
Drag the sliders to your real numbers. We compute the cheapest plan that fits, including Cloudways's renewal hikes and any overage billing. Honest math — show your accountant.
Your workload
Or pick a scenario below. All math is 36 months total cost of ownership in USD.
Same workload, both hosts.
What it costs, what runs.
Three common workloads, run through the same calculator. Numbers are 3-year sticker cost — no estimates, no hand-waving.
Don't switch from Cloudways
if any of these are true.
We'd rather lose a sale than recommend a bad move. If one of these describes you, save your migration energy for a better moment.
You picked Cloudways specifically for AWS under the hood.
If you have a regulatory or commercial reason to need AWS infrastructure, we're not on AWS. Stay where the requirement is met.
You're DevOps-comfortable and the per-server pricing genuinely fits your usage.
Cloudways is genuinely good if you treat it like 'managed DigitalOcean'. If that's working: keep it.
You have 3-4 servers across regions that you've tuned manually.
Re-tuning takes time. Factor it. We'll happily help, but the migration window is real.
The specific differences,
not the marketing.
Six rows. Concrete values. If something looks stale, tell us — we update within 24h.
Pre-migration questions,
answered by an engineer.
Real questions we get during pre-sales calls — answered the way we'd answer them on chat.
Will I lose my DigitalOcean droplet IPs?
Yes — they belong to DigitalOcean. We provision a fresh IP on our network, you point DNS, traffic moves over. We coordinate the cutover.
How does the migration handle Breeze caching?
We replace Breeze with our object + page cache layer (Redis + edge). Config migrated; cache rules ported.
What if I'm using AWS as my underlying cloud on Cloudways?
Same migration flow. We don't move you onto AWS — we move you onto our owned infrastructure. If you genuinely need AWS for compliance, we'll be honest and say so.
Can I still pick a region like Cloudways lets me?
Three regions today: Sydney AU, Ashburn US, London EU. Multi-region routing on Agency Pro+. More regions based on demand.
Move off Cloudways. We do the heavy lifting.
Send us your Cloudways credentials. A human engineer migrates your site within 24 hours, with zero downtime. Free, every time.