I’ve been a (very) long time Digital Ocean user, but I see more and more people moving to AWS these days. Has anyone used both and do you have a preference? My priorities, frankly, are pricing and ease of use. I know there are many more options such as Linode, but I’m going to stick to either DO or AWS, partly because @Tim_Parnell 's excellent Lifeboat recommends doing so. I have been using a number of DO instances to serve traditional websites as well as small Xojo Web apps.
Lightsail specifically is pretty easy though. It has its limitations but it works well for a number of my customers.
If it’s Lightsail vs. Digital Ocean and your only concern is cost, Lightsail is cheaper.
However, Amz is sneakier about price increases and treats their delivery drivers like crap. Digital Ocean has also put up with my sometimes snippy tickets with extreme professionalism (where I certainly was not). So for the non-tangible reasons, I like Digital Ocean better.
I went to check on pricing today now that I’m at my desk, and while they have different price levels, take a good look at the features. Lightsail offers 2CPUs for that extra dollar at the base level, and many of us just learned about the 2CPU recommendation.
There isn’t an easy answer to this one, that’s kind of why I test on both providers when I’m building Lifeboat.
I’ve tried both AWS and Digital Ocean, and I like Digital Ocean better because it’s simple to use, especially for hosting websites or small apps. AWS has more features, but it can be a bit confusing. Digital Ocean is easier to handle and is good if you want to save money. Plus, their support is really helpful.
Really pleased with Digital Ocean in conjunction with Lifeboat to manage my apps. 18 months and i can’t recall any downtime. Price and reliability work for me.