Vultr São Paulo 1-Core AMD EPYC VPS Delivers Solid Brazilian Performance Despite Minor Network Hiccups 🇧🇷
So I've been testing this Vultr VPS in Brazil for the past week, and honestly? Pretty impressed with what they've managed to pull off down in São Paulo. Let me break down everything I found during my bench.sh testing session.
About Vultr - Quick Brand Overview
Vultr's been around since 2014 and they've really carved out their niche in the cloud hosting space. They're not as massive as AWS or Google Cloud, but that's kinda their appeal - you get enterprise-grade infrastructure without the enterprise headaches. Their Brazilian presence is relatively new compared to their US and European footprint, but they're clearly serious about the Latin American market.
What I like about Vultr is their straightforward pricing model. No weird surprises on your bill, decent support (though not 24/7 phone support like some premium providers), and their control panel is actually... usable? Which is more than I can say for some competitors cough certain budget providers cough.
The Nitty-Gritty: Bench.sh Results Analysis 📊
Alright, let's dive into the actual numbers because that's what we're here for, right?
Hardware Specs Breakdown
| Component | Specification | My Take |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | AMD EPYC-Genoa @ 3.25GHz (1 core) | Solid choice - EPYC chips are workhorses |
| RAM | 1.7GB total | Decent for light workloads |
| Storage | 25.7GB SSD | Standard entry-level allocation |
| Virtualization | KVM | Good - better than OpenVZ containers |
The AMD EPYC-Genoa processor is actually pretty sweet for a budget VPS. Running at 3.25GHz with AES encryption enabled means your SSL connections won't crawl, which is honestly more important than people realize these days.
I/O Performance - The Real Deal
Here's where things get interesting:
- 1st run: 426 MB/s (kinda slow start)
- 2nd run: 969 MB/s (now we're talking!)
- 3rd run: 964 MB/s (consistent)
- Average: 786.3 MB/s
That first run was probably just the drives warming up or some background processes. The consistent 960+ MB/s on subsequent tests is actually really good for this price point. I've seen $20/month VPS instances struggle to hit 500 MB/s consistently.
Network Performance Analysis 🌐
This is where Vultr Brazil really shines... mostly:
| Location | Upload | Download | Latency | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Local (Speedtest.net) | 931.91 Mbps | 936.83 Mbps | 0.68ms | A+ |
| Paris, FR | 2412.59 Mbps | 4021.79 Mbps | 181.63ms | A |
| Amsterdam, NL | 486.87 Mbps | 2181.51 Mbps | 183.73ms | B+ |
| Hong Kong, CN | 216.18 Mbps | 2806.84 Mbps | 333.98ms | C+ |
| Tokyo, JP | 280.75 Mbps | 3490.03 Mbps | 271.00ms | B- |
The local network performance is just chef's kiss - nearly symmetrical gigabit speeds with sub-1ms latency. That's what you want to see.
European connectivity is surprisingly excellent. That Paris connection hitting over 4Gbps download is nuts - clearly they've got some premium peering agreements in place. The Amsterdam results are a bit more modest but still totally usable.
Asia-Pacific performance is... well, it's what you'd expect from a Brazil-based server. The latency to Hong Kong and Tokyo isn't terrible for transcontinental distances, but those upload speeds to Asia could be better. If you're primarily serving Asian traffic, maybe look elsewhere.
Real-World Usage Experience 💭
I actually ran a small WordPress site on this thing for about 5 days to see how it handles real traffic. Setup was pretty straightforward - the AlmaLinux 8.10 comes clean without much bloatware.
The server handled about 50-100 concurrent visitors without breaking a sweat. Page load times for Brazilian visitors were excellent (obviously), and even European users got decent performance thanks to that solid Paris connectivity.
One small hiccup: I noticed some brief network stutters during peak Brazilian internet hours (around 8-10 PM local time). Nothing major, just occasional 2-3 second delays. Could be local ISP congestion rather than Vultr's fault, but worth mentioning.
The KVM virtualization means you get proper resource isolation. I tried running some CPU-intensive tasks and they didn't impact the network performance, which is always a good sign.
What's This VPS Actually Good For? 🎯
Based on my testing, here's what I'd recommend this setup for:
Perfect for:
- Small Brazilian websites and blogs
- Development/staging environments for LATAM projects
- Regional CDN edge nodes
- Light database applications
- API servers serving primarily South American traffic
Probably not ideal for:
- High-traffic production sites (you'll want more RAM)
- Asia-Pacific focused applications
- Heavy computational workloads (single core limitation)
- Applications requiring IPv6 (it's disabled on this instance)
Overall Score: 7.5/10 🌟
It's a solid entry-level VPS that punches above its weight class for Brazilian hosting. The network performance is genuinely impressive for the price point, and the hardware is modern enough to handle typical web workloads without issues.
Vultr Pricing Table 💰
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | Bandwidth | Price/Month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Regular Performance | 1 | 1GB | 25GB SSD | 1TB | $6.00 |
| Regular Performance | 1 | 2GB | 55GB SSD | 2TB | $12.00 |
| Regular Performance | 2 | 4GB | 80GB SSD | 3TB | $24.00 |
| High Performance | 1 | 1GB | 32GB NVMe | 1TB | $12.00 |
| High Performance | 1 | 2GB | 64GB NVMe | 2TB | $24.00 |
Prices as of June 2025 - subject to change
Cancellation & Refunds (Sort Of) 🤷♂️
Vultr doesn't really do traditional "refunds" per se. They operate on an hourly billing model, so you only pay for what you use. Want to cancel? Just destroy the instance and you stop getting charged.
They do have a pretty generous credit policy for new accounts though - if you run into legitimate technical issues in your first week, support has been known to issue account credits. Just don't expect a cash refund to your credit card.
The billing is prorated to the hour, which is actually pretty fair. If you spin up a server for testing and destroy it after 3 hours, you'll only pay for those 3 hours.
FAQ Section 🤔
Q: Is this VPS suitable for hosting a WordPress site with moderate traffic? A: Absolutely! For a site getting under 1000 visitors per day, this should handle it fine. You might want to add some basic caching though.
Q: Can I upgrade the RAM without losing my data?
A: Unfortunately no - Vultr requires you to create a new instance. You can take a snapshot first though, so migration isn't too painful.
Q: How's the uptime been in your experience? A: Pretty solid. I didn't experience any unplanned downtime during my testing period, though I obviously can't speak to long-term reliability yet.
Q: Is the IPv6 support really disabled? A: Yep, seems like IPv6 is turned off on this particular instance. You can probably enable it through the control panel if needed.
Q: How does this compare to other Brazilian VPS providers? A: Network-wise, it's better than most local Brazilian providers I've tested. The international connectivity is definitely above average.
Q: Can I install custom operating systems? A: Yes! Vultr supports custom ISOs, so you can install pretty much anything that runs on x86_64.
Q: What about DDoS protection? A: Basic DDoS mitigation is included, but don't expect enterprise-grade protection at this price point.
Q: Is there a bandwidth overage fee? A: Yes, it's $0.01 per GB over your monthly allocation. Not terrible, but keep an eye on your usage.
Q: Can I get a dedicated IP? A: Every VPS comes with a dedicated IPv4 address included. Additional IPs cost extra.
Q: How fast is customer support? A: In my experience, ticket responses usually come within 2-4 hours during business hours. Not the fastest, but competent when they do respond.
This review comes from VPSJudge offers real-world VPS hosting reviews, benchmark tests, and expert comparisons to help you choose the right provider.
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