With cloud computing taking off and how in the market, more companies are considering cloud services for their businesses. But their efforts are impeded by the choice of platform, often between Azure and AWS.

What is Amazon AWS?

AWS offering services are categorized into three types - such as Infrastructure as a service (IaaS), software as a service (SaaS) & platform as a service (PaaS). Launched in 2006, it became the best platform among currently available cloud platforms.

What is Microsoft Azure?

Launched in 2010, this platform has emerged as one of the biggest commercial cloud service providers. It offers a wide range of integrated cloud services and functionalities, including analytics, computing, networking, database, storage, mobile & web applications. They can seamlessly integrate with your environment to achieve efficiency and scalability.

If you, too, are looking to decide between the two, here is a guide to help you make an informed decision:

The first and one of the most important considerations for any organization looking at its options for cloud platforms is computing capabilities. With Azure and AWS, companies can scale up to thousands of processing nodes in a matter of minutes. So, if you are a business looking for quicker and better processing and data analysis, both AWS and Azure would make a good choice. There are differences too: AWS offers EC2 instances that are easy to personalize and scale. On the other hand, Azure’s computing abilities are based on VMs and fortified with various tools, including Cloud Services and Resource Manager.
  • Database services: Microsoft Azure offers the SQL Server database, while Amazon has the Relational Database Service (RDS), which shares some expected benefits, including high availability and durability, automatic replication, etc. AWS and Azure are also compatible with all popular database engines. Now, while the two also support NoSQL and relational databases, Azure also provides rock-solid support for big data via Azure table and Azure HDInsight. However, that is not to say that AWS is not conducive to Big Data operations.
  • Costs: Another crucial factor for evaluation when choosing a cloud platform is cost, i.e., pricing options. First, Azure and AWS offer free-of-charge trials, albeit with restricted storage limits, allowing users to do a trial run with the platforms before buying in. AWS and Azure continue to share similarities even when you move into the paid territory: both offer a pay-as-you-go model, meaning companies can pay by the hour if they so wish. It translates into high-grade flexibility in terms of payments and cost savings for organizations that opt for these cloud service providers.
  • Cloud storage: AWS uses the Simple Storage Service (S3) storage mechanism, automatic replication across various geographies, and ensures high availability. At the same time, Azure uses the Blog storage mechanism and offers two storage classes: hot and cool. It may also be worth noting that Azure uses temporary storage to ensure individual page blobs for VM-based volumes. Hence, AWS S3 storage and Azure Block Storage are pretty similar.

There you have it, folks, some of the primary and most important differences between the two most prominent names in the cloud services market. It is clear today that both Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure have pros and cons. Yet, they also tend to share certain similarities, including their ability to deal with large volumes of data, facilitate the implementation of the Internet of Things (IoT), etc. Nonetheless, the fact remains that the choice between Azure and AWS for your business will entirely depend on the business’s unique requirements and your expectations from the platform. And once you do, pick a platform; it would also be a good idea to engage the services of a trusted vendor for AWS development services or perhaps one for Azure, based on your choice.