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GPU Cloud Rental vs Buy Calculator
Compare hourly cloud GPU rental against buying local hardware for your AI workload. Find your break-even month and the cheaper path.
Pick a cloud instance
Pick a local GPU
Workload & costs
Cloud
Storage / IP retention.
Local
PSU, case, CPU, RAM.
After projection period.
Typical: 40-90%.
Cloud total (24 mo)
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Local total
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Local electricity
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Effective $/hour (cloud)
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Break-even
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Verdict
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Month-by-month cost
| Month | Cloud cumulative | Local cumulative | Difference | Status |
|---|
Cloud instance snapshot
| Instance | GPU | VRAM | $/hr | 30-day 4hr/day |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RunPod RTX 4090 (Secure Cloud) | RTX 4090 | 24 GB | $1.49 | $179 |
| Vast.ai RTX 4090 (spot-ish market) | RTX 4090 | 24 GB | $0.79 | $95 |
| Lambda Cloud 1x A100 SXM | A100 80GB SXM | 80 GB | $1.99 | $239 |
| Lambda Cloud 1x H100 SXM | H100 80GB SXM | 80 GB | $2.49 | $299 |
| CoreWeave 1x A100 | A100 80GB | 80 GB | $2.25 | $270 |
| CoreWeave 1x H100 | H100 80GB | 80 GB | $2.99 | $359 |
| AWS g5.2xlarge (1x A10G) | A10G 24GB | 24 GB | $1.01 | $121 |
| AWS p4d.24xlarge (8x A100) | 8x A100 40GB | 320 GB | $32.77 | $3932 |
| AWS p5.48xlarge (8x H100) | 8x H100 80GB | 640 GB | $98.32 | $11798 |
| Google Cloud A3 VM (8x H100) | 8x H100 80GB | 640 GB | $93.24 | $11189 |
| Azure NC24ads A100 v4 | A100 80GB | 80 GB | $3.60 | $432 |
| Azure ND96isr H100 v5 | 8x H100 80GB | 640 GB | $99.12 | $11894 |
When cloud wins
- • Sporadic workloads (under ~2 hours/day).
- • Need instant access to H100/A100 without upfront capital.
- • Teams in different time zones sharing hardware.
- • Scaling training jobs horizontally for short bursts.
- • Want to avoid maintenance, noise, and power constraints.
When buying wins
- • Daily inference or fine-tuning over many months.
- • Low electricity rates and space for a local rig.
- • Sensitive data that must stay on-premise.
- • Want to resell GPU later to recover part of the cost.
- • Can use the machine for other tasks when not training.