COVID-19 is here and to most people across the globe, the wonders of 2019 are almost fading.
But one thing we cannot forget is that 2019 was the year of comparing the market domination by the three cloud providers, i.e. AWS vs Azure vs Google Cloud market share comparison.
Businesses across the world are switching from self-hosted data storage infrastructure to cloud storage solutions. While some companies will always require on-premise data storage technology, they’ve begun to rely wholly on cloud facilities.
Ultimately, the development team focuses on production instead of concentrating on the infrastructure that supports these applications. Still, busy shifting their businesses to the cloud, a physical infrastructure continues to exist that’s constantly maintained and kept up to date.
Presently, three major cloud solutions providers dominate the market: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), as well as Microsoft Azure. While Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft’s Azure continue to grow, AWS stays at the helm in terms of the market share.
Each of these platforms has its unique properties and pricing that suits the wide variety of consumers of mobile applications.
As a subsidiary of Amazon.com, AWS offers an on-demand cloud computing platform to people, businesses, government institutions, and other organizations on paid-subscription bases.
It was released to the public back in 2006 to offer services like EC2 – Elastic Compute Cloud, S3 – Simple Storage Service, et al.
In 2009, other offerings like EBS – Elastic Block Storage were released and provisions like CDN – Content Delivery Network and CloudFront officially joined the AWS family. AMS is the elder of the other players in the cloud industry hence it’s established a bigger consumer base, higher trust, and huge reliability compared to other cloud service providers.
Features
AWS provides almost all features that are required in the cloud computing market.
Their provisions enable users to navigate easily and gain access to cloud services like information storage, computing power, and numerous functionalities required for the development of applications. The AWS comes with various products grouped into different categories.
Besides the above-mentioned features, AWS offers developer accessories, management accessories, mobile services as well as application services.
Since its inception back in 2006, besides its broad range of cloud services, AWS has modified its pricing for the provision of cloud computing solutions.
Its prices are always competitive with other cloud platforms. Due to the constant competition and structures for pricing in the cloud realm, prices have continued to drop over the years. AWS is popularly known for its provision of payless tiers of services for newbies and business startups.
Also, application developers are allowed to buy servers by the second, instead of purchasing by the minute. Regarding the type of service required for use, it is easy to contract a sound AWS price structure.
Advantages
AWS offers application developers more than fifteen years of enterprise infrastructure. AWS admin teams constantly work to advance this platform hence the application development teams benefit from this improvement.
From the perspective of management abilities and skills, AWS features the best capabilities in the industry.
Of course for any developer, they will want to use a platform that comes with a wide range of selections to choose from, and AWS is that platform.
Microsoft Azure
Initially known as the Azure and released in 2010, Microsoft Azure was meant to offer a reliable cloud computing solution for enterprises.
In 2014, it was re-branded “Microsoft Azure” although the single-word name “Azure” still commands its popularity. Since it was incepted, Azure has proved to be a reputable cloud computing platform for businesses across the globe.
Features
Like AWS, the Azure cloud platform provides a complete variety of capabilities for application development requirements. Azure enables the deployment and management of virtual machines as a scale.
With this platform, it’s possible to process or compute at all capacities of your choice in just a matter of minutes. Additionally, if the tailored software requires to operate large scale parallel batch computing, azure can handle this as well.
Now, comparing the three platforms, the above-mentioned is a peculiar property to both AWS and Azure over GCP.
Moreover, all Azure features are integrated into the systems and other processes, providing more power for the development of enterprises.
Regarding the pricing for azure computing solutions, the costs mainly depend on the sorts of products that the development team requires.
Nevertheless, the prices for Azure solutions are comparable to those for AWS. For instance, an hourly server may cost between $ 0.099 and $ 0.149.
Of course, by measuring this pricing in terms of “per instance” the prices are not consistent. Most importantly, Azure prices are competitive across the cloud computing market.
Advantages
In addition to offering a complete set of capabilities at customizable prices, Microsoft Azure is among the top fastest cloud solutions in the industry.
Businesses searching for a cloud solution that stands out in deployment speed, flexibility, and functionality, then they may choose Microsoft Azure as their option; they lead in terms of speed.
Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
Released in 2011, GCP has managed to become a competitor in the global cloud computing industry in less than a decade.
Offered by Google, GCP is a cloud computing suite that operates on the same architecture that’s used by Google for its consumers like YouTube, GSE – Google Search Engine, et al. It was initially meant to increase Google’s strength of internet solutions like GSE and YouTube.
Today, Google offers enterprise solutions so that users can use GCP operating on the same infrastructure as other Google services.
Features
GCP comes with a wide variety of services. Business owners and application developers can perform high-level computing, storage, as well as networking using GCP.
Besides having fewer services compared to AWS and Azure, all the necessary storage and application development capabilities are available in GCP.
Whereas GCP may be lagging in terms of features, it compensates for this in pricing.
This platform embraces the pay-as-you-go pricing. It is famously known for its pay-per-second billing model unlike the pay-per-minute billing in AWS and Azure. It also offers discounts for long-term consumption.
Google, being the largest search engine service provider, is also pressurizing other cloud computing service providers to lower their prices; to make cloud computing economical.
Advantages
Since Google supports business-level security, GCP offers some level of security. Their security team performs security practices like encrypting data, building several authentication layers, as well as 3rd party validations. In terms of security buffering, GCP comes number one.
AWS vs MicrosoftAzure vs GCP
Availability Zones
Out of the three cloud service providers, AWS is the earliest implying that they’ve had the chance and time to grow and expand their cloud network.
Ultimately, AWS hosts in different locations globally. Regardless, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud host in various parts of the world, but their variability occurs in regard to the number of availability zones.
For instance, AWS is featured in 66 availability zones and 12 more are coming. Azure covers 54 zones across the world and its services span across 140 nations. Google Cloud only covers 20 availability zones with 3 on the way.
Market Share
Regarding market share, AWS beats the other two cloud solutions providers with a big margin.
Analysts project AWS to lead the cloud market by over 30%, Microsoft Azure comes second with about 16% of the global market share while Google Cloud is the third with 10% of the global market share.
In terms of market share, both Azure and GCP might appear lagging behind AWS but the two are having a tremendous rate of growth.
In 2019 alone, GCP registered an 83% growth rate while Azure came second with 75% while AWS lagged behind the two in terms of growth rate with only 41%.
Of course, AWS, being the earliest of the three cloud providers, owns larger community support as well as a user base implying AWS boasts of high-profile and reputable consumers like Netflix, Airbnb, Samsung, et al.
Azure is not left behind as it’s consistently securing some high-profile customers. Currently, approximately 80% of Fortune 500 firms contract cloud services from Azure. Major customers include Fujifilm, Apple, Johnson Controls, et al.
Google Cloud operates on the same infrastructure as GSE and YouTube, and consequently, some high-profile firms have put their trust in GCP. Some reputable customers of GCP services include PayPal, HSBC, Dominos, et al.
AWS, Azure, and GCP offer different cloud computing solutions necessary for fundamental business operations. Their differences are defined by the number of services available in each cloud provider.
In summary, AWS provides approximately 200+ cloud solutions, Azure offers around 100+ solutions, and Google Cloud provides about 60+ services.
These services are classified in domains of the database, storage, networking as well as compute.
Conclusion
Wrapping up the AWS vs. Microsoft Azure vs. GCP comparison, we need to know the significance of the three cloud giants and which cloud computing provider wins regarding various aspects.
In terms of establishment, AWS was established five years before the other hence it takes the trophy. In terms of availability zones and market share, AWS boasts of a higher number of availability zones and commands about a third of the total global shares. In terms of growth rate, GCP has the highest growth rate.
The three platforms boast of high-profile consumers. Regarding the number of services offered, AWS provides the highest number. Azure is the leader in terms of integration with open source as well as on-premise systems like MS tools.
Regarding pricing models, Google Cloud has the best customer-friendly pricing models. Although AWS scores most points in this rivalry, it’s not defined how long it will stay at the helm as both Azure and GCP are tirelessly working their way to the top position.
But, it is not about which is the best cloud provider, rather it is about which cloud provider offers the best services for your particular needs.
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Jamsheer K, is the Tech Lead at Acodez. With his rich and hands-on experience in various technologies, his writing normally comes from his research and experience in mobile & web application development niche.
I’m glad to find another amazing app development blogger.
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