Since its inception, Cloud Native Development has made great strides. Cloud Computing is no longer about whether you choose to use it or not. Now, the question becomes which cloud platform you should use. AWS, Azure and Google Cloud Platform are the three top cloud providers in the Cloud Computing market. How do you choose which one? How can you end the AWS vs Azure debate and choose between Google Cloud or AWS? This blog will answer all your questions.
Cloud computing has made great strides since its inception. Cloud computing is no longer an option. It's a matter of choosing the right cloud service.
There are many cloud platforms available today. However, Amazon Web Services, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) are the most popular cloud providers. AWS, Azure and GCP are engaged in a three-way battle for cloud supremacy.
What are the differences between these "big three" cloud service providers? How do you choose the right platform for your company?
You will need to compare AWS vs Azure and Google Cloud if you are forced to make a decision. This article will discuss AWS vs Azure and Google Cloud. We'll examine the top three cloud services to determine which one is the winner.
Key strengths
The needs and workloads of each customer will determine which cloud vendor is best for them. Multi-cloud is a term that describes organizations using multi cloud providers for different purposes or in different areas of their operations.
There are, however, a few key differences that distinguish the approaches of these three companies, which can help end-users decide which one is best for them.
The market leader in AWS is still based on its strength, which has more than 175 users across all aspects of computing, storage, data, analytics, mobile, development tools, management tools and enterprise applications.
AWS is, without a doubt, the market leader in developer functionality. This is due to its wide range of services and its advantage of being the first to move. AWS has done a great job translating its scale into economic benefits, even though there are times when the cloud can prove prohibitive," McQuire of CSS Insight stated.
Ray Wang, Constellation Research's founder and principal analyst, identifies similar strengths in the AWS proposition. However, he also points out that pricing on AWS is a challenge because many companies don't understand the metrics, the impact on architectural decisions, and the costs associated with certain services.
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Microsoft, on the other side, is a popular choice for C-level executives who have established relationships with the vendor. They know they can access many of their enterprise computing requirements in one place, including productivity and enterprise software, as well as flexible cloud computing resources that their developers can use.
Wang also considers Microsoft "a strong second to AWS" because it combined Azure, Office 365, and Teams. Although Microsoft is often viewed as the best global option, most clients use more than one cloud vendor.
All three vendors have strong machine-learning capabilities, as they can draw upon deep research expertise from within the company. However, this is an area where Google stands out, as customers seek to tap into the same magic that has powered Google at an unprecedented scale for the past two decades.
Google is also known for its expertise in open-source technologies, particularly containers. This is due to its central role in Kubernetes orchestration and Istio service mesh development, rapidly becoming industry standards.
McQuire is optimistic about Google Cloud development services and has positioned the vendor as the "market's fiercest competitor." Under the new CEO Thomas Kurian, McQuire says that McQuire believes the company is "the market's fiercest rival". McQuire also said that the vendor's engineering strength and the way customers can access and engage Google engineers, especially for co-development, is tipping the scales in McQuire's favour. Open source is a key feature of the company's culture. Customers who value these areas are more likely to embrace them.
Wang added: "Those organizations looking for good AI and machine-learning capabilities, as well as translate, search, and security, have been gravitating towards Google Cloud Platform.
"The arrival of Thomas Kurian has created a product- and roadmap-oriented structure that better aligns with enterprises' needs. This has created more opportunities for competition in the cloud duopoly between AWS and Azure.
Services and features
Overview
Cloud computing provides services on-demand, such as app storage and processing power via the internet. All these resources can be accessed via the internet on a pay-per-use basis.
Businesses can rent cloud-based services instead of investing in computing equipment or incurring upfront costs. They are only charged for the actual use of their services. Because they offer similar services to different clients, cloud service providers benefit from large economies of scale.
There are many benefits to moving to the cloud:
- Cost-cutting
- Flexibility
- Rapid innovation
- Loss avoidance
- Agility
- Quality control
- Security improvements
- Competitive advantage
- Sustainability
- Efficiency increases
A summary of the three major cloud platforms
AWS
Amazon Web Services, a division of Amazon.com, Inc., is the dominant player in cloud computing platforms. AWS is the most established cloud management platform. It offers various services that can be used by almost anyone, from individuals to small businesses to governments.
AWS was initially a private cloud service that Amazon employees used. It has evolved into a public cloud platform that businesses can access with features such as Amazon S3 cloud storage or elastic computing cloud (EC2) since 2006. AWS offers over 200 fully-functional services that can be used to satisfy millions of users and meet every need.
AWS customers include:
- Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
- Expedia
- Coinbase
- Netflix
- Coca-Cola
- Formula 1
- Airbnb
- Intuit
- Coursera
- Lyft
Read More: What is the Difference Between Microsoft Azure and SharePoint in 2022?
Microsoft Azure
Microsoft Azure is the second largest cloud management platform. Azure, launched in 2010, has evolved to be a cloud-based platform offering over 200 products and services. It is one of the fastest-growing cloud platforms.
Microsoft Azure provides a variety of services that are tailored specifically for Microsoft-centric businesses. This makes it easy for many companies to transition to a hybrid cloud or cloud environment. Microsoft Azure is used by over 95 per cent of Fortune 500 companies. It has a proven track record of providing enterprise services.
Azure is not just for Windows-based services. Azure supports open-source platforms and technologies as well as programming. This allows anyone to create and maintain any program.
These are some of the companies that use Azure:
- Starbucks
- DAIMLER AG
- Asos
- McKesson Group
- Center for Disease Control (CDC), USA
- HSBC
- HP
- Walgreens
- Mitsubishi Electric
- Renault
- 3M
Google Cloud Platform
Google Cloud Platform (GCP) is a Google-offered suite of Cloud Computing services. It runs on the same infrastructure Google uses internally to power its end-user products like YouTube and the Google Search engine.
Google Cloud Platform was launched in 2011. It has been a success story in just a decade. Google Cloud's initial purpose was to improve the Google Search engine and YouTube. They have now added their enterprise services, so anyone can use the Google Cloud Platform. It shares the same infrastructure with YouTube and Google Search.
GCP now includes Google Workspace and corporate Android as well as Chrome OS.
GCP is one of the newest Big three cloud service providers compared to AWS or Azure. It offers a wide range of cloud services that can be used to support any application.
The following customers use GCP:
- Toyota
- Nintendo
- Target
- Unilever
- Spotify
- Paypal
- The Home Depot
- UPS
AWS Vs Azure vs Google Cloud Availability Zones
AWS is the first cloud domain. This means they have had more time for their network to grow and establish itself. AWS hosts many locations around the world. Azure and GCP also host in multiple locations worldwide, but the availability zones differ.
- AWS currently has 66 available areas, with 12 more in the works.
- Azure is available in 140 countries and has 54 regions around the globe.
- Google Cloud Platform is now available in 20 countries around the globe, with three more regions on the horizon.
AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud: Who Uses It?
AWS is the oldest cloud market player, so it has a larger user and community support. AWS is home to more well-known and high-profile customers such as Netflix, Unilever (BMW), Samsung, Unilever, BMWs, Samsung, MI, Zynga, and many others.
Azure is also seeing an increase in high-profile clients. Azure currently has nearly 80 per cent of Fortune 500 customers. Johnson Controls and Polycom are some of the major customers.
However, Google Cloud has the same infrastructure as YouTube and Google Search. This is why many large companies trust Google Cloud. Google Cloud has many major clients, including HSBC and PayPal, 20th Century Fox (Bloomberg), Dominos, and others.
These cloud providers offer various cloud computing services, which are essential for basic businesses. The number of services these cloud providers offer makes the difference. Let's now look at the service offerings offered by these cloud providers.
Choosing the right cloud platform for your business - Microsoft Azure, Amazon AWS, vs Google Cloud
Of course, the three major cloud providers have the expertise and capability to provide reliable and feature-rich cloud infrastructure. Before you commit to one platform for your business, make sure to do your research and understand each platform's capabilities and iniquities.
A quick look at cloud platform comparisons might lead you to believe that AWS must have an unrivalled edge over Azure. But, a closer inspection reveals that it is not so easy.
Look at the top factors you should consider when selecting the right cloud platform for your company.
Availability
As we have stated, Amazon Web Services is the first company to offer cloud services. This means they have had more time to build their networks globally. They also have more availability zones than their competitors. Amazon Web Services currently offers more than 84 availability zones worldwide.
This is more than the 24 available regions of Google Cloud, which have 73 zones.
Microsoft Azure is an excellent alternative to Google if you are looking for something quickly. There are 60+ regions in over 140 countries.
Market Share
A Statista report for the fourth quarter of 2021 shows that AWS holds 33% of the market, Azure has 22%, and Google Cloud has just 9%.
Computing, storage, and network
AWS' primary computing service is its EC2 instances. These can be customized with a variety of features. AWS Lambda and the EC2 Container Service, Elastic Beanstalk to deploy apps, ECS For Kubernetes, Autoscaling, and Elastic Beanstalk are all available.
Azure's computing offering is centred around its Virtual Machines (VMs). Still, many other tools, such as Cloud Services and Resource Manager, can help with cloud application deployment.
Google's configurable Compute Engine allows virtual machines (VMs) to be created in its data centres. They are quick to boot, can store persistent disks, are high-performance, and can be configured to meet customer needs.
AWS web development services include Simple Storage (S3) and Elastic Block Storage (EBS), Glacier archive backup, Import/Export big data transfer service, Glacier Archive (EFS), and Storage Gateway, which interoperates with on-premise settings.
Microsoft Azure Storage includes Azure Blob storage and Queue and Table storage options. Azure Backup, Import-Export and Site Recovery are all included.
These platforms offer powerful networking capabilities, including on-premise connectivity and automatic server load balancers.
Services Available
The key difference between the three companies is the number of services offered. Various businesses can use cloud platforms because of their flexibility.
Amazon Web Services provides the best services to customers. AWS provides around 200 services. Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure offer approximately 90 and 200 services, respectively.
AWS is the first company to enter the market. It also has the largest number of products. It provides infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) in many forms, including storage, computing, content delivery and networking.
Azure offers many services, including data management, reliability, computation, and networking. Google Cloud Platform is another great alternative due to its cost-effectiveness, privacy, and payment and instance configuration flexibility. It also has machine learning capabilities and traffic security.
Read More: Microsoft Azure Cloud Computing Services - How It Helps Enterprises
Tools
Businesses can access various resources and tools through enterprise cloud servers. This section will explore the various tools offered by AWS, Azure and Google Cloud.
AWS Tool:
AWS is a pioneer in bringing Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things to enterprises. SageMaker allows them to train employees and perform machine learning. Users can access the Lambda serverless computing environment and upload apps from their serverless repository. AWS allows you to add a variety of IoT enterprise solutions.
Azure Tools:
Azure Tools offers Cognitive Services and Artificial Intelligence Enhancement. Cognitive Services is an API-based tool that allows on-premises integration with Microsoft software and business apps.
Functions are the only serverless solution that orchestrates and manages complex workloads. It'sEvents drive it. Microsoft Edge is Microsoft's IoT solution. It can be used for business analytics and administration.
Google Tools:
Google's cloud-based enterprise benefits also include natural language translation and voice. This will help businesses move from global collaboration to machine learning application development. TensorFlow is also available. It's a large open-source library. Its Internet of Things (IoT) and serverless systems remain in their early stages of development.
Pricing
If you are considering a cloud migration, pricing can be an important incentive. Prices have steadily declined as cloud providers compete for customers' attention.
AWS:
The price calculator makes it easy to understand the price. We strongly recommend double-checking the final price before you buy due to the many types of taxes and charges.
Microsoft Azure:
Microsoft Azure's pricing model is simpler. It has a billing area that lets you see all of it. Azure also offers a price calculator to help you determine the cost of cloud-based services.
Google Cloud:
Google's pricing structure is straightforward. It stands out for its customer-friendly pricing. To attract customers, it aims to lower the prices charged by the two main cloud providers. It is, therefore, one of the most popular cloud servers for small businesses.
Ease-of-use
AWS is the clear winner in terms of ease of use. AWS offers many advantages for those new to cloud platforms or unfamiliar with them. Its user-friendly, feature-rich dashboard is the first.
Amazon Web Services also offers extensive Documentation. If you wish to host an instance (EC2), go to the Instance section or enter your query into AWS search. Then choose Documentation to view a video or textual guide.
Azure is a better option than AWS, where adding people and authorizing each account can be cumbersome. Azure lacks guidance and Documentation. Google Cloud, on the other hand, is much easier to use due to explicit guidance, extensive Documentation, an organized dashboard, and organized data.
Multi-Cloud Computing - Options for Hybrid Computing
Although they aren't heavily invested in multi-cloud hybrid offerings, all three providers offer more flexibility to clients.
AWS options
- Amazon EKS Anywhere
- AWS Snowball
- AWS Outposts
- AWS Snowcone
- AWS Local Zones
- AWS Wavelength
- VMware Cloud on AWS
- Amazon ECS Anywhere
Azure options:
- Azure Backup
- Azure Security Center
- Azure Arc
- Azure Stack
- Azure Active Directory
- Azure Blob Storage
- Azure Centinel
Google Cloud Hybrid, Multi-Cloud
- Take a look at
- Authors
- Cloud Build
- Traffic Director
- Cloud Run for Anthos
- Operation
Why choose to Cloud Computing Services?
Cloud computing is a revolutionary way to transform the way you work. However, it's not about whether you should get it. Cloud computing is a viable option that could benefit your company. Take your time to choose the right cloud service provider.
Cloud services are best in class to help businesses modernize their IT environments. Our cloud experts provide:
- Cost-effective, reliable and trustworthy cloud consulting services.
- Cloud professional services.
- Cloud-managed service that gives businesses an edge.
Organizations can use our cloud services to improve productivity and reduce IT resource and expense requirements.
We help businesses to be more flexible to changing market conditions by easing cloud adoption. This allows them to make better decisions and maximize their ROI. Talk to our experts for more information about our services.
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Conclusion
Despite Amazon Web Services (AWS) being the industry leader in storage and services, Microsoft Azure is rapidly expanding to rival AWS. Microsoft Azure development services is particularly hot with its strong focus on the enterprise. Google continues to expand its reach through integration with open-source software and third-party companies.
It all depends on your specific use case. Multi-cloud solutions are becoming more popular as the industry matures. This allows businesses to reap the benefits of all cloud services without being tied to anyone.
