AZURE VS AWS VS GOOGLE
Having difficulty in choosing the right Cloud Platform? This blog
Since its inception Cloud has come far. With its increased utilities people have to use them one way or the other. With a lot of players available in the Cloud Computing market, AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform can easily be rated as best among all.
So, how do you choose which one is the best?
We will try to answer that in this blog by comparing their pros and cons based on their utilities, services and price tags
Historical Background and market presence
The oldest and the most experienced player in the cloud market is Amazon Web Services (AWS). It has a bigger user base, as well as bigger trust and reliability factors. It was publicly launched in 2006. AWS has 66 availability zones with 12 more on the way.In the third quarter of financial year 2023, AWS revenue growth stood at 27 percent.
Microsoft Azure, was launched in 2010. Azure was renamed as ‘Microsoft Azure’ in 2014. Since its inception, Microsoft Azure has shown great progress among its competitors.Azure has 54 regions worldwide and is available in 140 countries all around the world.In the third quarter of financial year 2023, its growth stood at 33 percent.
Google Cloud Platform started off in 2011, in a little more than a decade it has managed to create a good presence in the cloud industry. Google Cloud Platform has been made available in 20 regions around the world with 3 more on their way.Its revenue growth stood by 9 percent.
Services
AWS offers around 200+ services, whereas Azure offers up to 100+ services. Google Cloud, on the other hand, is catching up with Azure and AWS offering around 60+ services.
A comparison can be seen in tabular form below
Compute Services
| Services | AWS | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|---|
| laaS | Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud | Virtual Machines | Google Compute Engine |
| paaS | AWS Elastic Beanstalk | App Service and Cloud Services | Google App Engine |
| Containers | Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud Container Service | Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) | Google Kubernetes Engine |
| Server less Functions | AWS Lambda | Azure Functions | Google Cloud Functions |
Database Services
| Services | AWS | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|---|
| RDBMS | Amazon Relational Database Service | SQL Database | Google Cloud SQL |
| NoSQL: Key–Value | Amazon DynamoDB | Table Storage | Google Cloud DatastoreGoogle Cloud Bigtable |
| NoSQL: Indexed | Amazon SimpleDB | Azure Cosmos DB | Google Cloud Datastore |
Storage Services
| Services | AWS | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|---|
| Object Storage | Amazon Simple Storage Service | Blob Storage | Google Cloud Storage |
| Virtual Server Disks | Amazon Elastic Block Store | Managed Disks | Google Compute Engine Persistent Disks |
| Cold Storage | Amazon Glacier | Azure Archive Blob Storage | Google Cloud Storage Nearline |
| File Storage | Amazon Elastic File System | Azure File Storage | ZFS/Avere |
| Services | AWS | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virtual Network | Amazon Virtual Private Cloud(VPC) | Virtual Networks (VNets) | Virtual Private Cloud |
| Elastic Load Balancer | Elastic Load Balancer | Azure Load Balancer | Google Cloud Load Balancing |
| Peering | Direct Connect | ExpressRoute | Google Cloud Interconnect |
| DNS | Amazon Route 53 | Azure DNS | Google Cloud DNS |
Pricing Comparison
| Services | AWS | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|---|
| Smallest Instance | In the case of AWS, a very basic instance that includes 2 virtual CPUs and 8 GB of RAM will cost you around US$69 per month. | For the same type of instance, i.e., an instance with 2 vCPUs and 8 GB of RAM, in Azure, will cost you around US$70/month. | Compared to AWS, GCP will provide you the most basic instance, containing 2 virtual CPUs and 8 GB of RAM at a 25 percent cheaper rate. So, it will cost you around US$52/month. |
| Largest Instance | The largest instance offered by AWS that includes 3.84 TB of RAM and 128 vCPUs will cost you around US$3.97/hour. | The largest instance offered by Azure includes 3.89 TB of RAM and 128 vCPUs. It costs around US$6.79/hour. | GCP takes the lead here with its largest instance that includes 3.75 TB of RAM and 160 vCPUs. It will cost you around US$5.32/hour. |
Conclusion
AWS is scoring more points in this battle of Azure vs AWS vs Google Cloud. However, this could change. Both Azure and GCP are relentlessly working their way up on the top cloud providers list. AWS has the added advantage of being the first one of its kind, Azure and GCP also have their own set of strengths. Using Azure cloud makes more sense to several organizations that use MS tools since it’s easy to integrate MS tools with Azure cloud. And, GCP offering the best pricing model for the infrastructure, on which Google Search engine and YouTube run, is the only reason customers need to go for GCP.