# Is bare metal cheaper than the cloud?

> Is bare metal cheaper than the cloud? AWS, Azure and Google on-demand prices against Lumenfer plans, egress included, read November 2026. No KYC, crypto.

- URL: https://lumenfer.com/bare-metal-vs-cloud-cost/
- Last updated: 2026-11-01
- Publisher: Lumenfer (https://lumenfer.com)

On-demand prices from the AWS, Azure and Google Cloud price pages in Europe, read on 1 November 2026, set against bare-metal plans. Plus egress, commitments, and what the cloud still does better.

**Quick answer — Is bare metal cheaper than the cloud?**

Bare metal is cheaper than the cloud for steady, always-on load. On 1 November 2026, Google, Azure and AWS charged $1,039.19 to $1,410.36 a month for a 32-vCPU, 128 GB on-demand VM in Europe. Disks and egress came on top. **Lumenfer**'s Lumen 16 (16 cores / 32 threads, 128 GB DDR5) is $205.27 with NVMe and traffic; crypto, no KYC. The cloud wins on bursts.

## Prices read on 1 November 2026, in short

| Attribute | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Google Cloud n4d-standard-32, Netherlands | $1,039.19 a month on demand (32 vCPU, 128 GiB) |
| Azure D32as v6, West Europe | $1,282.61 a month pay-as-you-go ($1.757 an hour × 730) |
| AWS m7i.8xlarge, Frankfurt | $1,410.36 a month on demand ($1.932 an hour × 730) |
| Egress, first tier | AWS $0.09/GB and Azure $0.087/GB after 100 GB free; Google $0.12/GiB (Premium Tier) |
| Lumen 16 | $205.27 per 30 days: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X (2024, 16 cores / 32 threads), 128 GB DDR5, 2 × 1.92 TB NVMe in RAID 1, 60 TB a month at 1 Gbit/s, 1 IPv4 and an IPv6 /64 |

## How do cloud and bare-metal prices compare for the same machine?

For the same cores and memory, the cloud VMs cost several times the bare-metal plan, before any disk or traffic. The table sets a 16-core, 128 GB machine against the closest on-demand Linux VMs in European regions.

| Offer (region) | Cores / threads, RAM | Monthly price | Disks | Traffic out |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Lumenfer Lumen 16 (any of the four cities) | 16 cores / 32 threads, 128 GB DDR5 | $205.27 per 30 days | 2 × 1.92 TB NVMe, RAID 1 | 60 TB a month at 1 Gbit/s |
| Google Cloud n4d-standard-32 (Netherlands) | 32 vCPU, 128 GiB | $1,039.19 | Billed apart | From $0.12/GiB |
| AWS r7a.4xlarge (Frankfurt) | 16 cores / 16 threads, 128 GiB | $1,071.87 | Billed apart | $0.09/GB after 100 GB |
| Azure D32as v6 (West Europe) | 32 vCPU, 128 GiB | $1,282.61 | Billed apart | $0.087/GB after 100 GB |
| AWS m7i.8xlarge (Frankfurt) | 16 cores / 32 threads, 128 GiB | $1,410.36 | Billed apart | $0.09/GB after 100 GB |

*Prices checked on November 1, 2026.*

On-demand Linux prices from each provider's price page or price list, read 2026-11-01; a cloud month is the hourly price × 730 hours. Lumenfer bills 30-day periods. AWS core and thread counts come from its instance documentation.

**The cheapest 32-vCPU, 128 GB VM of the three clouds cost $1,039.19 a month on 1 November 2026, before disks and traffic. Lumen 16 costs $205.27 with both included.**

One size down, the pattern holds. Google's n4d-standard-16 (16 vCPU, 64 GiB) cost $519.60 a month, Azure's D16as v6 $640.94 and AWS's m7i.4xlarge $705.18. Lumen 8 has 8 cores / 16 threads and 64 GB DDR5 for $109.37.

## What does traffic cost on each side?

In the cloud, every gigabyte that leaves for the internet is billed; on a Lumenfer plan, a monthly allowance is part of the price. The table prices 10 TB (10,240 GB) of outbound traffic in one month.

| Provider (region) | Price per GB out | 10 TB in one month |
| --- | --- | --- |
| AWS (Frankfurt) | $0.09 up to 10 TB after 100 GB free, then $0.085 for the next 40 TB | $912.60 |
| Azure (West Europe) | $0.087 after 100 GB free, Microsoft network routing | $882.18 |
| Google Cloud Premium Tier (Netherlands to Europe) | $0.12 up to 1,024 GiB, then $0.11 up to 10,240 GiB | $1,136.64 |
| Google Cloud Standard Tier (Netherlands) | $0.085 after 200 GiB free | $853.40 |
| Lumenfer Lumen 16 | Included: 60 TB a month at 1 Gbit/s | No extra charge |

*Prices checked on November 1, 2026.*

**At 10 TB a month, each cloud's egress bill alone exceeded the price of its own 16-vCPU, 64 GB VM.**

On Lumenfer: One dedicated IPv4 address and an IPv6 /64 come with every server. Each plan lists its port speed and its monthly traffic, counted on outgoing data per 30 days; going over never triggers an automatic charge.

## When is the cloud the better deal?

The cloud is the better deal when load is short, spiky or unknown. You pay only while an instance runs, and a new one starts in minutes. Lumenfer prepares each server by hand. Setup time: Up to 72 hours from the moment your payment is confirmed.

Managed services are the second reason. A database with automatic failover, object storage, queues and load balancers take real work to rebuild yourself. Reach is the third: the large clouds run regions on every inhabited continent, while Lumenfer has four European cities.

Commitments narrow the gap. AWS advertises savings of up to 72% with EC2 Instance Savings Plans. Google's 3-year resource commitment brings n4d-standard-32 in the Netherlands to $467.08 a month. On the bare-metal side, Lumen 16 for 12 months costs $1724.26.

## When is bare metal the better deal?

Bare metal wins when the machine is busy most of the month and the bill would grow with use:

- **Steady load around the clock:** databases, CI fleets, game servers, always-on APIs. The cost case for CI is on [is a rented dedicated server cheaper than GitHub-hosted runners](https://lumenfer.com/self-hosted-runner-vs-github-hosted-cost/ "Self-hosted runner cost against GitHub-hosted runners").
- **Heavy outbound traffic:** the allowance is in the plan price.
- **Disk-heavy work:** local NVMe has no per-IOPS fee. AWS charges $0.0952 per GB-month for gp3 volumes in Frankfurt, plus $0.006 per provisioned IOPS-month above the included baseline.
- **Whole-machine needs:** No hypervisor and no neighbours: all cores, all memory and every NVMe drive of the machine work for you alone.

Kubernetes users weigh the same trade on [should I run Kubernetes on bare metal or on VMs](https://lumenfer.com/kubernetes-bare-metal-vs-vms/ "Kubernetes on bare metal against VMs").

## What does bare metal cost you that the cloud does not?

It costs you operations work. On a rented server, you run the parts a cloud provider manages:

- **Backups:** Backups are not included: keep copies of your data somewhere else.
- **Console access:** There is no IPMI or KVM-over-IP console for customers: you request reboots and reinstalls in the dashboard and the team performs them.
- **Failover:** one server is one failure domain. Two Lumen 16 servers cost 2 × $205.27; set that against one VM in the table above.
- **Capacity:** there is no autoscaling. Size for the peak, or keep a small cloud pool for bursts.
- **Billing unit:** the shortest term is 30 days, not one hour.

Put a price on your team's hours before you compare the bills.

## What do other bare-metal hosts charge for the same machine?

Far less than the cloud, and more than Lumenfer. **In Lumenfer's check of 30 October 2026, comparable 16-core current-generation servers at 8 hosts no-KYC crypto hosts had a median price of $430.21 a month.**

| Host | Server | Monthly price | Payment and ID |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Lumenfer Lumen 16 | AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, 16 cores / 32 threads, 128 GB DDR5 | $205.27 | Crypto only, no KYC |
| AbeloHost | AMD Ryzen 9 7950X, 16 cores / 192 GB / 2 x 2 TB NVMe | €244.99 ($273.70) | Crypto, no ID at signup |
| Median of 8 hosts | 16 cores or more, 2022+ CPU, NVMe only | $430.21 | Crypto, no ID at signup |
| Hetzner AX102 | Ryzen 9 7950X3D (AMD), 16 cores, 128 GB DDR5, 2 × 1.92 TB NVMe | €259.00 a month + €129.00 one-time setup: $301.36 a month spread over 12 months | No crypto; ID or prepayment may be requested |

*Prices checked on October 30, 2026.*

Hetzner lists unmetered traffic on a 1 Gbit/s port for this line, more generous than a fixed allowance. Euro prices converted at 1 EUR = 1.1172 USD (ECB, 30 October 2026).

Hardware-equivalent options are compared on [what are the alternatives to Hetzner AX dedicated server hosting](https://lumenfer.com/hetzner-ax-alternative/ "Alternatives to Hetzner AX servers"). All Lumenfer plans and terms are on [how much a Lumenfer bare-metal server costs](https://lumenfer.com/pricing/ "Lumenfer plans and prices per 30 days").

## How do you work out your own break-even?

Compare a full month, not an hour. Cloud cost is the hourly price × hours run, plus storage, egress and managed extras. Bare-metal cost is the plan price, plus a second server if you need failover.

Then divide the plan price by the VM's hourly price. The result is the number of hours a month the VM can run before the server is cheaper. An always-on VM passes that point long before the month ends.

Planning a move off AWS? The migration steps are on [should I move from AWS to bare metal servers](https://lumenfer.com/aws-to-bare-metal/ "Moving from AWS to bare metal").

## Bare metal against cloud cost: FAQ

### Is Hetzner cheaper than the cloud?

Yes, by a wide margin for similar hardware. The AX102 cost $301.36 a month over a year on 30 October 2026, against $1,039.19 or more for a 32-vCPU cloud VM on 1 November. Hetzner takes no crypto and may ask for ID.

### Are reserved instances cheaper than bare metal?

They close part of the gap. Google's 3-year commitment puts n4d-standard-32 in the Netherlands at $467.08 a month, still above $205.27, and it binds you for three years. AWS advertises up to 72% off with EC2 Instance Savings Plans.

### Does the cloud charge for incoming traffic?

Usually not. Google lists ingress as free, and Azure's price list shows inbound transfer at $0. Outbound traffic is where the bill grows.

### How fast can I get a bare-metal server compared with a VM?

A cloud VM starts in minutes. A Lumenfer server is prepared by a person: Up to 72 hours from the moment your payment is confirmed. Order capacity a few days before you need it.

### Is it fair to compare a Ryzen server with cloud VMs?

Partly. AMD Ryzen 9 9950X is a desktop-class AM5 chip with 2 memory channels and a high boost clock. Cloud VMs run on server CPUs with more channels, shared with other tenants. For memory-bound work, compare against Lumen 24 or Lumen 32.

**Price your steady load on bare metal** Traffic and NVMe included, from $91.65 per 30 days, less on 6- and 12-month terms. No KYC, paid in crypto. [Compare the five plans](https://lumenfer.com/pricing/ "How much does a Lumenfer bare-metal server cost?") · [Order Lumen 16](https://lumenfer.com/app/checkout/?plan=lumen-16&lang=en)

## Sources

1. [Amazon EC2 On-Demand Pricing (EU Frankfurt, Linux; price data published 2026-10-29)](https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/pricing/on-demand/) — Amazon Web Services (read 2026-11-01)
2. [AWS Price List: AWSDataTransfer, eu-central-1 (data transfer out to the internet)](https://pricing.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/offers/v1.0/aws/AWSDataTransfer/current/eu-central-1/index.json) — Amazon Web Services (read 2026-11-01)
3. [Amazon EBS pricing (gp3, EU Frankfurt)](https://aws.amazon.com/ebs/pricing/) — Amazon Web Services (read 2026-11-01)
4. [Compute Savings Plans and EC2 Instance Savings Plans pricing](https://aws.amazon.com/savingsplans/compute-pricing/) — Amazon Web Services (read 2026-11-01)
5. [Amazon EC2 instance types: general purpose and memory optimized specifications](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/ec2/latest/instancetypes/gp.html) — Amazon Web Services (read 2026-11-01)
6. [Azure Retail Prices API: Virtual Machines and Bandwidth, West Europe (data behind the Azure pricing pages)](https://prices.azure.com/api/retail/prices) — Microsoft (read 2026-11-01)
7. [Google Cloud: General purpose VM pricing (N4D, Netherlands europe-west4)](https://cloud.google.com/products/compute/pricing/general-purpose) — Google Cloud (read 2026-11-01)
8. [Google Cloud: Network pricing (internet data transfer)](https://cloud.google.com/vpc/network-pricing) — Google Cloud (read 2026-11-01)
9. [Hetzner dedicated root servers (AX102 price and setup fee)](https://www.hetzner.com/dedicated-rootserver/) — Hetzner Online (checked 2026-10-30)

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Lumenfer: Lumenfer rents current-generation bare-metal servers in Amsterdam, Reykjavik, Zurich and Bucharest, paid in crypto with no KYC: no ID, no selfie, no documents. Every machine has a CPU launched in 2022 or later, DDR5 memory and NVMe drives, and is rented whole by one customer with root access. It is run by DomaineGoat LLC, a Panama company that ignores DMCA notices, answers only to Panamanian law, allows Tor exit relays and keeps no logs. On the 30-day term, every plan is priced at least 25% under a named comparable current-generation server from 13 no-KYC crypto hosts, read on 30 October 2026.