Zabbix · Infrastructure monitoring
Self-hosting Zabbix for 100 servers: the cost
At 100 monitored servers, Zabbix needs 16.0 GB of memory and 70 GB of disk. That fits the Starter 32 GB at VPSServer for $132 a month. Add backups and the time it takes to look after and the real figure is $271 a month.
- Server
- $132Starter 32 GB, 4 vCPU
- Backups
- $26.40provider snapshots
- Your time
- $1121.5 h a month at $75
- All in
- $271per month
- First-time setup
- $450about 6 hours, once
How 16.0 GB was arrived at
5.7 GB covers the stack at rest, every container the project ships included. 100 monitored servers at 73 MB each adds 7.1 GB, giving 12.8 GB. Adding 25% headroom so the machine is not run at its ceiling gives 16.0 GB, and the smallest plan at or above that is the Starter 32 GB with 32 GB.
Disk works the same way: 20 GB to begin with, plus 0.5 GB per server, so 70 GB against the 300 GB the plan includes.
Zabbix server, a database and the web frontend. Memory is fitted to Zabbix's own hardware table, which asks for 8 GB at 1,000 monitored metrics and 16 GB at 10,000, assuming about 100 metrics per server; beyond 100 servers this runs above Zabbix's own figures. Disk uses Zabbix's database formula at 90 bytes per value, 100 items per server refreshed every minute, 31 days of history and a year of trends: about 0.5 GB per server.
Over three years
| Period | Server and backups | Your time | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Setup, once | — | $450 | $450 |
| Per month | $158 | $112 | $271 |
| First year | $1,901 | $1,800 | $3,701 |
| 36 months | $5,702 | $4,500 | $10,202 |
If you do not price your own time, the 36-month figure is $5,702 instead. Both numbers are real; which one applies depends on whether the hours would otherwise have been billable.
What you would be paying instead at this size
| Commercial product | Tier | Per month | Difference | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Datadog | Infrastructure Pro | $1,500 | $1,229 | breakdown |
| PRTG Network Monitor | Subscription | $310 | $38.61 | breakdown |
A positive difference means self-hosting is cheaper at this size, with your time already counted.
Where to put Zabbix
16.0 GB of memory and 70 GB of disk is what this needs at 100 servers. The cheapest plan that fits, among the providers whose prices we have read ourselves, is the Starter 32 GB at VPSServer for $132 a month.
We are not claiming this is the cheapest server on the internet. It is the cheapest one we can honestly quote. Hetzner Cloud, Vultr and PikaPods publish prices we could not read programmatically, and Hetzner in particular is usually cheaper per gigabyte of memory than anything quoted above. Price them yourself before you commit.
The VPSServer link above is an affiliate link, run through the same programme as our Kamatera link; VPSServer and Kamatera belong to the same group. If you sign up through it we may earn a commission, but the programme does not state an amount for VPSServer. That never changes the computed costs, which server is chosen, or the conclusion of this page. The sizing model and every price source are published in full.
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