Validated on 1 March 2021 • Posted on 19 June 2018
DigitalOcean Droplets are Linux-based virtual machines (VMs) that run on top of virtualized hardware. Each Droplet you create is a new server you can use, either standalone or as part of a larger, cloud-based infrastructure.
Organize Droplets with tags to group and filter Droplets by role, automatically include Droplets in firewall or load balancer configurations, or target multiple Droplets at once with the API.
Monitor Droplet performance with default graphs for bandwidth, CPU usage, and disk I/O. Install the DigitalOcean metrics agent for extended graphs like CPU load average, memory usage, and disk usage.
Upgrade a Droplet’s internal kernel to the latest supported version, modify your Droplet to boot into a specific non-default version, or use the DigitalOcean GrubLoader kernel to switch legacy Droplets from external kernal management to internal kernel management.