Hetzner VPS — Research & Instance Reference
Reference note combining live console data for the hermes production instance with general Hetzner Cloud pricing research. Compiled 2026-07-11.
1. Current Instance: hermes
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Server type | CPX32 (Regular Performance, shared vCPU) |
| Server ID | #146745741 |
| Name | hermes |
| Status | ON (running) |
| vCPU | 4 |
| RAM | 8 GB |
| Disk (local) | 160 GB |
| Public IPv4 | 49.13.85.175 |
| Public IPv6 | 2a01:4f8:c013:94a2::/64 |
| Location | Falkenstein, Germany |
| Network zone | eu-central |
| Labels | env: production, purpose: hermes |
| Backups | Enabled |
| Floating IP | Not attached |
| Traffic | 0/20 TB used (20 TB included) |
| Created | ~2026-07-01 (10 days before this note) |
This is the box that runs the vault's automation layer — per README, Hermes runs "on Mihir's own machine/VPS, not the cloud," and this CPX32 instance is that VPS.
Hetzner Project Account
- Project: Default (Owner: Mihir Patel, 1 member)
- Resources: 1 server, 2 Primary IPs, 0 volumes/load balancers/firewalls/networks/buckets/storage boxes/DNS zones
2. Pricing — This Instance
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Listed price | €35.49 / month |
| Hourly rate | €0.0569 / hour |
| Billed usage, July 2026 (partial month, as of console snapshot) | €16.65 |
| VAT applied | 0% |
Console footnote confirms: "All prices incl. 0% VAT."
Why 0% VAT
Hetzner is a German company and charges VAT based on customer location:
- EU consumers → local VAT rate charged.
- EU businesses with a valid VAT ID → reverse-charge (0%, VAT handled by the customer's own tax filing).
- Non-EU customers (Canada included) → no VAT charged at all — it's treated as an export outside the EU.
Since the account is Canada-based, the CPX32 bill is VAT-free by default; the €35.49/mo and €0.0569/hr figures are the full price, not a pre-tax figure.
Billing mechanics
- Billed hourly, rounded up to the full hour.
- Hourly charges accumulate but are capped at the monthly price — running 24/7 never exceeds €35.49/mo.
- Deleting the server mid-month only bills for hours actually used (no proration penalty).
- Backups (enabled on
hermes) are a separate line item, typically ~20% of the server's base price — likely the source of the gap between the €16.46 shown on the server's own usage counter and the €16.65 total shown on the account-wide Usage page.
Cost in CAD (reference conversion only — invoice is in EUR)
At ~1 EUR = 1.618 CAD (July 2026 spot rate):
| EUR | CAD (approx.) | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | €35.49 | ≈ CA$57.42 |
| Hourly | €0.0569 | ≈ CA$0.092 |
Actual CAD cost will vary slightly with the exchange rate on the invoice date and any foreign-transaction fee charged by the card/bank used to pay.
3. Hetzner Cloud Server Tiers — General Reference
EU pricing (Germany/Finland unless noted). US region ≈ +0–2%, Singapore ≈ +20–40%. All figures exclude VAT logic covered above — non-EU customers pay these as shown.
Cost-Optimized (CX) — Germany/Finland only
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | €/hour | €/month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CX23 | 2 | 4GB | 40GB | €0.0088 | €5.49 |
| CX33 | 4 | 8GB | 80GB | €0.0136 | €8.49 |
| CX43 | 8 | 16GB | 160GB | €0.0256 | €15.99 |
| CX53 | 16 | 32GB | 320GB | €0.0473 | €29.49 |
ARM (CAX) — Germany/Finland only
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | €/hour | €/month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CAX11 | 2 | 4GB | 40GB | €0.0096 | €5.99 |
| CAX21 | 4 | 8GB | 80GB | €0.0168 | €10.49 |
| CAX31 | 8 | 16GB | 160GB | €0.0336 | €20.99 |
| CAX41 | 16 | 32GB | 320GB | €0.0657 | €40.99 |
Regular Performance (CPX) — all regions ← hermes is here
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | €/hour | €/month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CPX22 | 2 | 4GB | 80GB | €0.0312 | €19.49 |
| CPX32 | 4 | 8GB | 160GB | €0.0569 | €35.49 |
| CPX42 | 8 | 16GB | 320GB | €0.1114 | €69.49 |
| CPX52 | 12 | 24GB | 480GB | €0.1610 | €100.49 |
| CPX62 | 16 | 32GB | 640GB | €0.2083 | €129.99 |
Dedicated (CCX) — all regions
| Plan | vCPU | RAM | Storage | €/hour | €/month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CCX13 | 2 | 8GB | 80GB | €0.0689 | €42.99 |
| CCX23 | 4 | 16GB | 160GB | €0.1378 | €85.99 |
| CCX33 | 8 | 32GB | 240GB | €0.2219 | €138.49 |
| CCX43 | 16 | 64GB | 360GB | €0.4423 | €275.99 |
[!todo] Prices above were pulled from a third-party aggregator (costgoat.com, dated late June 2026), not scraped directly from hetzner.com's live pricing page. Re-verify against the Hetzner Cloud Console pricing calculator before using these for anything beyond rough comparison — Hetzner adjusted several tiers earlier in 2026.
4. VPS vs. Private Hardware on Home Internet — Decision Note
Question considered: replace the CPX32 VPS with owned hardware running 24/7 on a home connection, for the same Hermes automation workload.
Recommendation: keep the VPS. At ~CA$57/mo, the CPX32 buys three things that are expensive to replicate at home:
- Uptime — a datacenter with redundant power/network vs. a home connection subject to ISP outages and local power loss.
- A static, server-legitimate IP — most residential ISPs assign dynamic IPs and many prohibit running servers in their terms of service; home hosting would need DDNS and carries ToS risk.
- Isolation — the VPS keeps an internet-facing box off Mihir's home LAN. Self-hosting means patching and securing an exposed machine sitting on the same network as personal devices.
Home hardware only wins financially if:
- The workload materially outgrows a CPX32 (4 vCPU / 8GB is comfortable headroom for cron-driven automation like AgentStack/Hermes/synthesis-fullsweep and AgentStack/Hermes/synthesis-incremental), or
- Electricity + upfront hardware cost, amortized, beats several years of VPS billing — rarely true once personal time spent on patching/uptime babysitting is priced in.
Current workload (AI Digest scraping every 4h, weekly/monthly Hermes synthesis, vault lint/fix passes) does not appear to be compute-bound enough to justify the switch.