Laravel Cloud vs. Cloudways
Laravel Cloud is the purpose-built Laravel hosting platform — push from Git, scale automatically, and never touch a server. Cloudways is a managed layer over generic providers that still leaves Laravel-specific work to you.
Start in Cloud with $5 in free usage credit.
Laravel Cloud
Laravel Cloud delivers deployments in under a minute without configuration hassles. Everything from infrastructure to scaling and security runs automatically, purpose-built for Laravel.
- Fully managed infrastructure platform built exclusively for Laravel applications. Bring your repo and we handle the rest.
- Creating a Laravel Cloud account prevents the need for creating a separate server account.
- Autoscaling, auto-hibernation, zero-downtime deployment, and security are included out of the box.
Cloudways by DigitalOcean
Cloudways is a managed hosting layer that sits on top of providers like DigitalOcean, AWS, and Google Cloud. However, you're still manually configuring queue workers, database backups and recovery, and scaling.
- Managed hosting across top cloud providers including DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, and Linode.
- Manual configuration still required for scaling, queue workers, and Laravel optimization.
- Git deployment requires manual webhook configuration and SSH key setup, lacking a streamlined push-to-deploy workflow.
Over 20K teams deploy faster with Laravel Cloud
Why Laravel Cloud is better
Launch in under a minute
from Git to live with fully managed infrastructure.
Build and ship faster
with native Laravel integration across your stack.
Scale and save costs automatically
with built-in auto-hibernation.
Start building
with $5 of usage credit.
“We've built countless projects with Laravel, and we're accustomed to the seamless productivity it offers during development. What Laravel Cloud brought to the table was that same level of efficiency, but now for deployments and infrastructure, allowing us to scale instantly without worrying about downtime.”
Nika Jorjoliani
Head of Engineering at Redberry
Get the Cloud vs. Cloudways comparison guide
Download the side-by-side PDF guide and review every difference at your own pace.
Who should choose Laravel Cloud vs. Cloudways?
Cloud is the Laravel-native default. Cloudways still fits teams who want generic PHP hosting.
Laravel Cloud
Choose Laravel Cloud if you want a Laravel-native platform that removes server management entirely and scales automatically with your traffic.
Cloudways by DigitalOcean
Choose Cloudways if you prefer control over your infrastructure and host multiple types of PHP applications beyond Laravel.
Frequently asked questions: Laravel Cloud vs. Cloudways
Cloudways is a managed layer over generic providers (DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, Linode) and still requires you to configure scaling, queue workers, and Laravel-specific optimizations. Laravel Cloud is purpose-built for Laravel — you push from Git and Cloud handles compute, scaling, databases, queues, scheduled tasks, and security automatically.
Cloudways charges fixed monthly plans per server, regardless of usage. Laravel Cloud uses pay-as-you-go pricing with auto-hibernation — apps that aren't receiving traffic scale down to zero so you stop paying for idle compute.
Yes, but Laravel Cloud offers a single-click GitHub integration with builds and zero-downtime deploys included. Cloudways requires manual webhook configuration and SSH key setup for a comparable workflow.
Choose Laravel Cloud if you want a Laravel-native platform with autoscaling, managed services, and pay-as-you-go pricing. Choose Cloudways if you specifically want to host multiple types of PHP applications beyond Laravel and prefer fixed monthly server plans.
Ready to ship?
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