The verdict in three sentences
AWS Frankfurt gives you the deepest toolset and a German data center, but its parent company remains subject to the US Cloud Act and its egress pricing makes bills hard to predict. Hetzner and IONOS offer hosting governed solely by EU law for 5 to 90 EUR per month, at the cost of slightly more operations work. For a Berlin company collecting prospect data through web forms, an EU-owned cloud with a European CDN is in 2026 the easiest choice to defend in front of a data protection officer.
The three options compared for a corporate Next.js website
An IT director choosing hosting for a new corporate website rarely compares like for like. AWS sells a broad cloud platform, Hetzner and IONOS sell more or less managed infrastructure. Here is the 2026 order of magnitude for a site of 80 to 150 pages, 40,000 visits per month and a headless back office.
| Criterion | Hetzner Cloud | IONOS Cloud or VPS | AWS Frankfurt (eu-central-1) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base monthly cost | 5 to 40 EUR | 10 to 90 EUR | 40 to 150 USD (EC2 or Fargate) |
| Bandwidth | 20 TB included, then about 1 EUR per TB | Unlimited on most VPS | About 0.09 USD per GB after 100 GB |
| Data location | Germany (Nuremberg, Falkenstein), Finland | Germany (Berlin, Frankfurt) | Germany (Frankfurt), US-owned company |
| Cloud Act exposure | No | No | Yes |
| Contractual SLA | 99.9% | 99.95% to 99.99% | 99.99% on multi-AZ setups |
| Internal operations time | 2 to 4 h per month | 1 to 3 h per month | 2 to 5 h per month |
| BSI C5 attestation | Partial | Yes | Yes |
On paper, AWS looks comparable. In practice, a Next.js app on Fargate with a load balancer, CloudFront and NAT gateway often lands at 120 to 200 USD per month before any traffic spike.
GDPR, Cloud Act and transfers outside the EU: what the DPO will ask
A corporate website collects personal data: contact forms, quote requests, job applications, analytics cookies. Since the 2023 EU-US Data Privacy Framework, using a certified US provider is legally possible, yet the Cloud Act still lets US authorities request data held by a US company, even in Frankfurt. Many German DPOs, and most public buyers, now require an EU-owned host.
| Requirement | Hetzner or IONOS | AWS Frankfurt | Impact for the company |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard contractual clauses | Not needed | Yes, via the AWS DPA | 1 to 3 weeks of legal review |
| Record of processing activities | EU processor | US-owned processor | Heavier transfer impact assessment |
| Public tender eligibility | Accepted | Often challenged | Possible loss of contracts |
| External GDPR audit cost | 2,500 to 4,000 EUR | 3,500 to 6,000 EUR | 1,000 to 2,000 EUR gap |
| Log access and retention | Fully controlled | Controlled but complex | Traceability for regulator inquiries |
A hybrid setup works well: static and ISR pages served from a Hetzner or IONOS server in Germany, a European CDN (Bunny or IONOS CDN) at 10 to 50 EUR per month, and forms writing to a database hosted in Germany.
Performance: aiming for a TTFB under 200 ms from Berlin
Perceived performance depends more on architecture than on the host. A statically generated Next.js site behind a CDN reaches a TTFB of 30 to 80 ms across Germany. Server rendering on every request on an entry-level VPS can exceed 400 ms at peak. Field data (Core Web Vitals) affects Google ranking: an LCP under 2.5 s on 75% of mobile visits is the target.
For 40,000 monthly B2B visits, a 4 vCPU, 8 GB server at 15 to 35 EUR per month plus a CDN handles the load with comfortable headroom. The AWS premium shows mostly in managed services you may not need for a corporate website.
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Jonas, IT director of a 400-employee industrial services company in Berlin, is rebuilding the group website in Next.js. AWS option: Fargate, load balancer, CloudFront and backups at about 170 EUR per month, so 2,040 EUR per year, plus 2,500 EUR of legal review for transfer clauses. Hetzner option: server at 30 EUR, CDN at 25 EUR, backups at 8 EUR, so 63 EUR per month and 756 EUR per year, plus 3 h of monthly operations billed 90 EUR per hour by the agency, so 3,240 EUR. Both options are close on first-year cost, but Hetzner removes the GDPR objection that blocked two public tender bids per year, each worth about 150,000 EUR in potential revenue.
FAQ
Is AWS Frankfurt GDPR compliant in 2026?
AWS is certified under the Data Privacy Framework and offers a DPA, which makes processing legal. The residual risk is the Cloud Act, which many DPOs and roughly 70% of public buyers rule out in their specifications (2026 estimate).
What does Hetzner hosting really cost for a corporate site?
Budget 5 to 40 EUR per month for the server and 10 to 30 EUR for CDN and backups. With agency-managed operations, the total lands between 150 and 400 EUR per month.
Hetzner or IONOS for a Next.js website?
Hetzner is the cheapest per vCPU with 20 TB of traffic included. IONOS offers stronger SLAs up to 99.99%, a BSI C5 attestation and German-language enterprise support.
What SLA should we require?
A 99.9% SLA allows about 8 h 45 min of downtime per year, enough for a B2B showcase site. For a client portal or transactional site, aim for 99.95%, under 4 h 30 min per year.
Can we move from AWS or Vercel to an EU cloud without rebuilding?
Yes, a Next.js site runs in standalone mode inside a Docker container. Migration usually takes 3 to 8 working days, about 2,500 to 6,000 EUR depending on platform-specific features.
Let's scope your project. We price hosting, migration and managed operations for your Next.js site on an EU-owned cloud, with an indicative budget of 3,000 to 8,000 EUR and go-live in 2 to 4 weeks. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.
Mohamed Bah
Fondateur, Kolonell
Passionate about digital and entrepreneurship in Africa, Mohamed has been helping Sénégalese businesses with their digital transformation since 2020. Founder of Kolonell, he believes every SME deserves a professional and accessible online présence.
