OVH Review 2026: Pros, Cons, Pricing & Performance

Overall Rating: 4.0/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Quick Verdict: OVHcloud is Europe's largest hosting provider, offering exceptional value on dedicated servers and competitive VPS pricing. Their vertically-integrated approach delivers serious hardware for reasonable prices. However, the user experience can be frustrating, support quality is inconsistent, and the 2021 data center fire lingers in memory. Best for experienced administrators who prioritize hardware value over polish.

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Company Background

OVH was founded in 1999 by Octave Klaba in Roubaix, France. What started as a small hosting company has grown into Europe's largest cloud provider and the third-largest globally by physical server count. OVH operates over 30 data centers across Europe, North America, and Asia-Pacific, housing more than 400,000 servers.

The company's competitive advantage is vertical integration taken to the extreme. OVH manufactures their own servers, builds their own water-cooling systems, and operates their own network infrastructure. This control enables aggressive pricing that undercuts major cloud providers on raw compute power. In 2021, a fire at their Strasbourg data center destroyed servers and impacted customers significantly—an event that raised questions about disaster recovery but has since led to improved infrastructure resilience.

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Pricing Plans

VPS (Virtual Private Servers)

Plan	vCPU	RAM	Storage	Bandwidth	Price/Month
Starter	1	2 GB	20 GB SSD	100 Mbps	€3.50
Value	2	4 GB	80 GB SSD	250 Mbps	€6.00
Essential	4	8 GB	160 GB SSD	500 Mbps	€12.00
Comfort	8	16 GB	320 GB SSD	1 Gbps	€24.00
Elite	16	32 GB	640 GB SSD	2 Gbps	€48.00

Dedicated Servers (Kimsufi/So You Start/OVH)

Range	CPU	RAM	Storage	Bandwidth	Price/Month
Kimsufi KS-1	Intel Atom	4 GB	1 TB HDD	100 Mbps	€4.99
Rise-1	Intel Xeon E-2136	32 GB	2x 500GB NVMe	500 Mbps	€49.99
Advance-1	Intel Xeon-D	64 GB	4x 480GB SSD	1 Gbps	€89.99
Scale-1	AMD EPYC 7313P	128 GB	2x 960GB NVMe	2 Gbps	€149.99
High Grade	AMD EPYC 7543P	512 GB	4x 3.84TB NVMe	2 Gbps	€499.99

Prices in EUR. Some regions may vary.

Additional Services:

• Additional IPs: €2-4/month depending on type
• vRack Private Network: Free
• Backup Storage: €0.01/GB/month
• DDoS Protection: Included (VAC)
• Load Balancer: Starting at €9.99/month

View OVH Pricing →

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Pros ✅

1. Dedicated Server Value — OVH offers some of the best dedicated server pricing in the industry. High-end hardware at mid-range prices.

2. Aggressive VPS Pricing — Starting at €3.50/month for 2GB RAM, OVH VPS is competitively priced against Hetzner and others.

3. Anti-DDoS Protection Included — Their VAC (anti-DDoS) system is included free and handles attacks up to multiple Tbps.

4. Private Network (vRack) — Free private networking between servers across regions. Excellent for distributed architectures.

5. Extensive Geographic Coverage — 30+ data centers provide options for latency optimization worldwide.

6. Bandwidth Generosity — High bandwidth allocations with unmetered options on dedicated servers.

7. European Data Sovereignty — French company with strong European presence for GDPR compliance.

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Cons ❌

1. Confusing Brand Structure — Kimsufi, So You Start, OVH, OVHcloud—the multiple brands create unnecessary confusion.

2. User Experience Rough Edges — Control panel is complex and sometimes unintuitive. Account management can be frustrating.

3. Support Quality Inconsistent — Support ranges from excellent to frustrating depending on team and issue type.

4. 2021 Fire Reputation — The Strasbourg data center fire damaged trust. While improvements have been made, the incident lingers.

5. Provisioning Delays — Dedicated servers can take 24-120 hours to provision. VPS is faster but not instant like cloud-native providers.

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Performance

CPU Performance: VPS instances deliver solid performance for their tier, with Geekbench single-core scores of 600-800 on basic plans and 900-1,100 on premium. Dedicated servers shine—full access to modern Xeon and EPYC processors delivers performance cloud VPS can't match.

Disk I/O: VPS storage uses enterprise SSDs with 300-400MB/s throughput. Dedicated server NVMe options push 1GB/s+ with consistent IOPS. For I/O-intensive workloads, dedicated servers offer exceptional value.

Network: OVH operates their own global network with excellent bandwidth. Anti-DDoS protection is genuinely effective. Some legacy locations show higher latency, but core data centers perform well.

Uptime: Post-fire improvements include better redundancy and disaster recovery. Our monitoring showed 99.9% uptime over 12 months. Communication during incidents has improved but still trails leaders.

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Control Panel & User Experience

OVHcloud's control panel is functional but complex:

• Service Management — Manage VPS, dedicated servers, cloud instances
• Network Configuration — IP management, vRack, firewall settings
• DNS & Domain — Zone management and domain registration
• Billing & Renewals — Subscription and payment management
• Support Tickets — Issue tracking and communication

The challenge is navigation. Multiple product lines, legacy interfaces mixed with modern ones, and inconsistent terminology create a learning curve. Once you know where things are, it works. Getting there takes effort.

API access is available and reasonably documented. Terraform support exists but isn't as polished as cloud-native providers. Automation is possible but requires more effort than DigitalOcean or Vultr.

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Support Quality

OVH support is a mixed bag. Quality depends heavily on the issue type and support tier.

Support Tiers:

• Standard: Ticket-based, included with all products
• Business: €69/month, faster response, phone support
• Enterprise: Custom pricing, dedicated account management

Response Times:

• Standard Tickets: 4-48 hours (varies widely)
• Business: 1-4 hours
• Billing Issues: Usually within 24 hours

Strengths: Technical competence when you reach the right team, comprehensive knowledge base Weaknesses: Inconsistent response times, language barriers occasionally, complex issues may bounce between teams

For self-sufficient administrators, the documentation and forums provide adequate resources. Businesses running production workloads should budget for Business support.

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Best Use Cases

✅ Ideal for:

• Dedicated server deployments
• Game server hosting (Minecraft, ARK, etc.)
• High-bandwidth applications
• European compliance requirements (GDPR)
• Storage-heavy workloads
• Experienced system administrators

⚠️ Not ideal for:

• Cloud-native development workflows
• Beginners requiring hand-holding
• Applications needing instant provisioning
• Teams prioritizing UX over value

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FAQ

Is OVH reliable after the 2021 fire?

OVH has significantly improved infrastructure resilience since the incident. Enhanced fire suppression, better backup procedures, and architectural changes address the root causes. However, the incident is a reminder to maintain your own off-site backups regardless of provider.

What's the difference between Kimsufi, So You Start, and OVH?

Historically these were separate budget, mid-range, and premium brands. OVH is consolidating under "OVHcloud" but legacy distinctions remain. Kimsufi offers the cheapest dedicated servers with older hardware. So You Start provides mid-range options. OVH/OVHcloud offers the full product range.

Does OVH offer Windows servers?

Yes. Windows licensing is available for both VPS and dedicated servers with additional monthly fees. They support Windows Server 2019 and 2022.

How long does server provisioning take?

VPS: 2-15 minutes typically. Dedicated servers: 24-120 hours depending on configuration and availability. This is notably slower than cloud-native providers.

Is OVH good for hosting game servers?

Excellent. The combination of dedicated server value, anti-DDoS protection, and high bandwidth makes OVH popular for Minecraft, ARK, Rust, and other game servers.

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Final Verdict

OVHcloud delivers exceptional hardware value, particularly for dedicated servers where their vertical integration shines. A modern EPYC server with 128GB RAM and NVMe storage for €149/month is genuinely impressive. VPS pricing is competitive with European leaders like Hetzner.

The trade-offs are real. User experience is rough, support quality varies, and the brand complexity creates unnecessary friction. The 2021 fire, while addressed, reminds us that even major providers can fail catastrophically—backup your data.

Our Recommendation: OVH is ideal for experienced administrators who prioritize hardware value over polish. For dedicated servers specifically, OVH often offers the best price-performance available. For VPS needs, consider whether the savings over Hetzner or DigitalOcean justify the UX trade-offs for your team.

Explore OVH Dedicated Servers →