Cloud Wars: AWS Vs. Azure Vs. Google Cloud

AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud are three cloud services that are the creations of three large worldwide corporations with a global customer base and a constant commitment to improving their services and
products.

You must know the differences between AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud solutions when purchasing Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) solutions. And this discussion is necessary since the question is not if you should use cloud computing but rather the cloud service you require.

Where AWS provides global cloud services via its large repository of data centers spread across the globe, Azure provides seamless integration functions with Microsoft’s tools. Google Cloud Platform or GCP rules the market in the price section, which is one of the most prominent concerns for users.

In the sections ahead, we will explore the differences between these three cloud services in a bit more detail.

Introducing AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform

AWS or Amazon Web Services
AWS, a paid-subscription type of on-demand Cloud Computing platform for single users (people), businesses, and governments, was founded and maintained by the online marketing behemoth.

Amazon Web Services is the cloud market's oldest and most experienced service provider, having pioneered this type of service model in the industry to some extent. AWS has an advantage over competitors in terms of the user base (which is greater), trust, and reliability due to its experience and early market debut.

Google Cloud Platform
Google Cloud services include a suite of different cloud-based computing services running on the same infrastructure that Google uses for its services like Google Search, YouTube, etc.

Begun in 2011, GCP has been able to maintain a solid position in the cloud business since then. Google Cloud was built to help Google's own products, such as the Google Search engine and YouTube, perform better.

They have, however, already released their enterprise services, allowing anyone to use the Google Cloud Platform.

Microsoft Azure
Microsoft's Azure cloud computing platform was launched in 2010 to provide users and companies with a secure cloud computing platform. Azure was renamed 'Microsoft Azure' in 2014; however, the term
'Azure' is still frequently used.

Since its inception, Microsoft Azure has achieved great development in comparison to its competitors. One of the most essential features of Microsoft's Azure cloud solutions is the opportunity to use a wide
range of cloud-based services without having to invest in new hardware. Due to this, the cloud computing system's installation and management costs see a substantial decrease.

Major Points of Differentiation Between Three Major Cloud Services

1. Availability Zones

Availability zones are data center areas or locations from where a company provides and runs its cloud services. More availability zones means the coverage of cloud services will also be higher. Technically, it corresponds to;

1. Higher uptime

2. Fewer lags

3. Lesser downtime

4. Better availability of services.

GCP has 73 availability zones in 24 locations, AWS has 200 data centers in 84 availability zones, and Azure has 164 availability zones in 54 regions.

Due to the higher number of availability zones of AWS, it can provide cloud computing services in over 245 countries. And Azure has services in 140 countries. Even though we can clearly see that AWS has the biggest presence, it's Azure that has the strongest network of cloud solutions.

2. Compute Capabilities

Software computation is the mix of computing factors, including processing power, memory, storage capacity, etc. Cloud services with better compute capabilities can deliver better performance
and solutions.

AWS: The Elastic Compute Cloud, or EC2, is used by Amazon Web
Services to supply safe and resizable compute capacity to the cloud
architecture. Besides having complete compatibility with Windows and
Linux-based systems, EC2 supports a larger number of instances while showing evidence of handling a larger number of GPI instances.

High GPI instances lead to high-performance computation and auto-scaling capabilities. AWS has been expanding its containerization offerings in addition to the computational services. It has its own Fargate services and supports Docker and Kubernetes.

Azure: With Microsoft Azure, not EC2 but Virtual Machines represent
the compute services. VMs are compatible with Linux, Windows, Oracle, IBM, SAP, and SQL Server. With all of this interoperability, Azure virtual machines are also more secure and have hybrid cloud capabilities.

Integrations such as artificial intelligence and machine learning are also possible with Azure. Azure offers two container services: Azure Container, which is built on Kubernetes, and Azure Container Registry, which manages Docker Hub and Azure Container Registry.

Google Cloud Compute: GCP’s computational engine includes both predefined and custom functionality, such as predefined machine kinds, pre-second billing, and Linux and Windows support.

You can also include automated discounts and a carbon-neutral infrastructure, which is beneficial because it decreases energy consumption significantly. By linking to Kubernetes, Google
Compute Engine is also ready for containerization and microservices systems.

3. Storage Capacity

Amazon Web Services: AWS has three storage systems meant
for cloud computing;

1. Simple Storage Service (S3) - Meant for object storage

2. Elastic Block Storage (EBS) - Used for persistent block storage

3. Elastic File System (ELS) - Used for file storage

AWS interacts with a SQL-compatible database called Aurora, and it also uses relational database services, including Dynamo DBL, NoSQL database, and ElastiCache.

Google Cloud Platform: GCP has a hyper-active and unified object storage system, making the data storage functions easier. It includes both predefined and custom functionality, such as predefined machine kinds,
pre-second billing, and Linux and Windows support. In terms of database, GCP provides SQL-based Cloud SQL and an RDBMS, Cloud Spanner. For a NoSQL database system, GCP uses Cloud Bigtable and Cloud Datastore.

Conclusion | Which One to Use?

After considering the key components of a cloud services provider, we can deduce that every system has its own way of execution and leverages different components. Hence, it is important to identify your requirements and match them with the offerings. With careful planning and analysis of your needs, you can identify the cloud services that can satisfy them while considering the costs.