Aws vs Azure vs Gcp: Comparing the Big 3 Cloud Platforms

Cloud computing has revolutionized the way organizations work, and advancing us to a new technology era. Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform are the top cloud service providers that dominate the worldwide cloud market.

Nowadays, most enterprises are moving towards the cloud and even multi-cloud environments to harness the benefits offered by cloud computing, such as:

• Decreased CapEx
• Reduced infrastructure maintenance
• Increased availability
• Scalability

Of course, the Big 3 cloud providers possess the experience and expertise to provide a reliable and feature-rich cloud platform. But, before committing to a specific cloud platform, you must do your due diligence and compare each platform to fully understand their capabilities and differences.

In this post, we will see how these platforms stack up against the others.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

The current market leader of the cloud computing platforms, Amazon Web Services is a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc. AWS is the most mature cloud platform offering a wide range of services to practically everyone: individual developers, large enterprises, and even governments.

AWS started its life as an internal cloud offering. By 2006, it had evolved into a publicly available cloud platform with services like Amazon S3 cloud storage and elastic compute cloud (EC2). AWS now offers more than 200 fully featured services to cater to any demand and serve millions of users.

Prominent AWS customers include:

• Expedia
• Netflix
• Coinbase
• Formula 1
• Coca Cola
• Intuit
• Airbnb
• Lyft
• Coursera
• Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

(Explore our AWS Guide, a series of articles & tutorials.)

Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Azure is the second-largest cloud platform. Debuting in 2010, Azure has evolved into a cloud platform with more than 200 products and services. Today, it is among the fastest-growing cloud platforms.

As Microsoft offers Azure, it provides a wide array of services tailored particularly for Microsoft-centric enterprises—making the switch to a cloud or a hybrid-cloud environment smooth for many organizations. In use by more than 95% of Fortune 500 companies, Microsoft Azure has a proven track record in catering to enterprise users.

Importantly, Azure is not limited to Windows-based services. It also supports open-source languages, technologies, and platforms, giving anyone the freedom to build and support any application.

Well-known Azure customers include:

• DAIMLER AG
• McKesson Group
• Asos
• Center of Disease Control (CDC) – US
• National Health Service (NHS) – UK
• HSBC
• Starbucks
• Walgreens
• 3M
• HP
• Mitsubishi Electric
• Renault

(Explore popular Azure certifications.)