Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner • Hacker News Board

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#211

Post by vb-8448 » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:49 PM UTC

_el1s7 wrote: post #207

> 30 MySQL databases (248 GB of data) > 34 Nginx virtual hosts across multiple domains > GitLab EE (42 GB backup) > Neo4J Graph DB (30 GB graph database) > Supervisor managing dozens of background workers > Gearman job queue > Several live mobile apps serving hundreds of thousands of users He's doing all of that on a single server?! I'm not against vertical scaling and stuff, but 30 db instances in one server is just…

It's an average of 8GB per database, I guess he serves multiple clients and decided to "segregate" each client on its instance. If it's acceptable for the business it's nothing wrong with his setup.

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#212

Post by _el1s7 » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:50 PM UTC

leetrout wrote: post #209

_el1s7 wrote: post #207

> 30 MySQL databases (248 GB of data) > 34 Nginx virtual hosts across multiple domains > GitLab EE (42 GB backup) > Neo4J Graph DB (30 GB graph database) > Supervisor managing dozens of background workers > Gearman job queue > Several live mobile apps serving hundreds of thousands of users He's doing all of that on a single server?! I'm not against vertical scaling and stuff, but 30 db instances in one server is just…

> 30 db instances They didn't say that and the article didn't allude to that. 1 instance with 30 databases.

Ah yes that's probably true, but still having 30 apps in a single db instance doesn't seem better...

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#213

Post by uxcolumbo » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:50 PM UTC

acdha wrote: post #99

uxcolumbo wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's nuts. Why do they want a pic of your passport. Absolutely no to this - reason enough to go with AWS or alternatives. And why are ppl willingly giving it to hosting providers? Unnecessarily exposing yourself to identity theft if they get compromised.

They have to operate within the laws of the countries they’re physically located in. Those countries want to know that they’re not hosting illegal content, providing services to crime rings, Russia or North Korea, etc. If Hetzner allows you to host something and you use it for illegal acts, they aren’t going to jail to shield you for €10/month.

Hosting companies managed to shutdown illegal sites without requiring you to submit your pics and passport first.

And if someone wants to do illegal things, what's stopping them from submitting a fake ID?

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#214

Post by anticorporate » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:50 PM UTC

rzz3 wrote: post #167

grey-area wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the service and how critical that website is. Sometimes it's completely acceptable that a server will run for 10 years with say 1 week or 1 month of downtime spread over those 10 years, yes. That's the sort of uptime you can see with single servers that are rarely changed and over-provisioned as many on Hetzner are. Some examples: Small businesses where the website is not core to operations and is more…

What struck me though is that OP did so much work to migrare the server with zero downtime. The _single_ big server. Something’s off here.

I run internal services on DO that I've considered moving to Hetzner for cost savings.

Could I take it down for the afternoon? Sure. Or could I wait and do it after hours? Also sure. But would I rather not have to deal with complaints from users that day and still go home by 5pm? Of course!

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#215

Post by jpablo » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:52 PM UTC

  If you’re migrating a large MySQL database and you’re not 
  using mydumper/myloader, you’re doing it the hard way.

If you aren't using xtrabackup you are doing it wrong. I recently migrated a database with 2TB of data from 5.7 to 8.4 with about 15 seconds of down time. It wouldn't have been possible without xtrabackup. Mysqldumper requires a global write block, I wouldn't call blocking writes for hours a "zero downtime migration".

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#216

Post by littlecranky67 » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:53 PM UTC

mariopt wrote: post #128

Every time I see this kind of article, no one really bothers about sb/server redundancy, load balancers, etc. are we ok with just 1 big server that may fail and bring several services down? You saved a lot of money but you'll spend a lot of time in maintenance and future headaches.

To be fair, modern dedicated servers at hetzner have two power units, and come with a redundand ssd/hdd raid-1 config. AFAIK both ssd and power unit having hotplug capability, so in case either fails they can be replaced with zero downtime.

Given the downtimes we saw in the past year(s) (AWS, Cloudflare, Azure - the later even down several times), I would argue moving to any of the big cloud providers give you not much of a better guarantee.

I myself am a Hetzner customer with a dedicated vServer, meaning it is a shared virtual server but with dedicated CPUs (read: still oversubscribed, but some performance guarantee) and had zero hardware-based downtime for years [0]. I would guess their vservers are on similar redundant hardware where the failing components can be hotswapped.

[0] = They once within the last 3 years sent me an email that they had to update a router that would affect network connectivity for the vServer, but the notification came weeks in advance and lasted about 15 minutes. No reboot/hardware failure on my vServer though.

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#217

Post by supermatt » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:53 PM UTC

mariopt wrote: post #128

Every time I see this kind of article, no one really bothers about sb/server redundancy, load balancers, etc. are we ok with just 1 big server that may fail and bring several services down? You saved a lot of money but you'll spend a lot of time in maintenance and future headaches.

They already were on "1 big server" (a single VPS at digital ocean) and moved to another "1 big server" (a managed server at hertzner).

They saved money and lost nothing.

Now, if they so wish, they could use a portion of that to increase redundancy - but that wasn't the point of the article.

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#218

Post by godot » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:54 PM UTC

If I remember correctly (it has been a while since I looked), Hetzner although is a lot cheaper on the price sheet, they're European region by default and then if you look to get US region servers at Hetzner, the pricing is a lot higher and similar to Digital Ocean. Is that still the case?

For OP though who is a Turkey-based company and want European region servers anyway, it might make sense.

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#219

Post by surgical_fire » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:55 PM UTC

mariopt wrote: post #128

Every time I see this kind of article, no one really bothers about sb/server redundancy, load balancers, etc. are we ok with just 1 big server that may fail and bring several services down? You saved a lot of money but you'll spend a lot of time in maintenance and future headaches.

The vast majority of services are actually alright with a little downtime here and there. In exchange, maintenance is a lot simpler with less moving parts.

People underestimate how far you can go with one or two servers. In fact, what I have seen in ky career is many examples of services that should have been running on one or two servers and instead went for a hugely complex microserviced approach, all in on Cloud providers and crazy requirements of reliability for a scale that never would come.

Re: Migrating from DigitalOcean to Hetzner

#220

Post by coryrc » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 4:55 PM UTC

jijijijij wrote: post #192

grey-area wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the service and how critical that website is. Sometimes it's completely acceptable that a server will run for 10 years with say 1 week or 1 month of downtime spread over those 10 years, yes. That's the sort of uptime you can see with single servers that are rarely changed and over-provisioned as many on Hetzner are. Some examples: Small businesses where the website is not core to operations and is more…

I feel like 95% of the web falls into this category. Like, have you ever said "That's it, I am never gonna visit this page again!", because of temporary downtime? Unless you are Amazon and every minute costs you bazillions, you are likely gonna get the better deal not worrying about availability and scalability. That 250€/m root server is a behemoth. Complete overkill for most anything. As a bonus, you are gonna be h…

Exactly. I've never not bought something because the website was temporarily down. I've even bought from b&h photo!

Even if Amazon was down, if I was planning to buy, I'd wait. heck, I got a bunch of crap in my cart right now I haven't finished out.

Intentional downtime lets everyone plan around it, reduces costs by not needing N layers of marginal utility which are all fragile and prone to weird failures at times you don't intend.