There has always been strong competition for leadership in public cloud computing. There are two of the strongest competitors. The two competitors are:

Google Cloud
Azure

There has always been a big debate if which one is better than another. Both of these top cloud companies have a stronghold in commanding lead in the infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS) market. In this article, we will help you decide which one of these is better and get to know about the differences between them. You can also checkout Free Best Google Cloud Certification & Training Courses.

What is Azure?
What is Google Cloud Platform?
Azure vs Google Cloud
- Pricing
- Storage Services
- Key Tools

But first, let us get to know more about both of them.

What is Azure?

Talking about Azure. It is Microsoft’s public cloud service. This cloud service is available in 54 different geographical regions, with nearly 162 availability zones. Azure provides a robust Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) portfolio. Along with that it also provides Platform as a Service (PaaS) features, particularly for Windows applications. If you are interested in learning Azure checkout Azure Sample Questions.

In Addition, Azure is also known for its specialized services. These specialized services are there for big data and analytics, data warehousing, game, and mobile app development, etc.

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What is Google Cloud Platform?

GCP is an abbreviation for Google Cloud Platform. If we compare Google’s cloud services to Azure, we can say that it is relatively new to the cloud services industry. In 2019, it was official that Google Cloud services are available in almost 20 geographical regions. All in all, it has a limited reach with the benefits of Google’s exceptional scale.

Google, due to having its connection with Kubernetes comes in handy as the GCP is capable of providing strong support for containers.

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Azure vs Google Cloud

Pricing

Microsoft Azure:

Let us look at Azure from a pricing perspective. In case of having 1-3 years commitment for reserved VM instances, Azure provides a significant discount. Another one of the discounts that you can avail of is when you run Microsoft software on-premises. Only then you can get an Azure Hybrid Benefit discount of up to 40% off. There are other discounts available, such as the large discounts for developing and testing Azure instances for Visual Studio users. Another option to avail of a good discount is the Azure free tier with minimal services. Using that, you can get a lot of popular services for 12 months, and later you can pay $200 to try any other paid service. You might also be interested in Azure certification.

Google Cloud:

Let’s look at Google Cloud from a pricing perspective. If you are a Google cloud user and you continue using the same instance for a given month, then you can easily avail of the sustained use discount of up to 30%. Another one of the discounts that can give you up to 57% off if you can agree to a long-term commitment to using a VM. Like Azure, GCP also has a free tier service that lets you use some free basic services. But, again, you can pay $300 to try other services.

Storage Services

Microsoft Azure:

Let us look at the different storages that are provided by Azure.

In the case of Object Storage, you can check Azure Blob Storage. This type of storage lets you have the REST API, PowerShell, and CLI access.

Another, one of the Azure storages advances Ultra Disk SSD amidst up to 2GB/second, 1.6m IOPS. This is the Azure Managed Disks (HDD/SSD) storage.

If you want to store your files, then you can use Azure Files. Azure Files gives you entrance to files via standard SMB protocol.

Google Cloud:

Let us look at the different storages that are provided by Google Cloud.

In the case of Object Storage, you can use the Basic Google cloud storage. What it does is that it optimizes price and performance by applying Object Lifecycle Management.

GCP provides a benefit by offering the lowest price for HDD/SSD. This is their Persistent Disk (HDD/SSD) storage.

Google also lets you store your files, as they have NAS access and integrates with GKE

Key Tools

Microsoft Azure:

Microsoft Azure has two different types of key tools, and they are:

Cognitive Services
Supporting MSFT Software

Cognitive Services are specially designed for when there is heavy storage regarding artificial intelligence. Azure has a machine learning service and a bot service. Moreover, the more cognitive services of the Azure also include Bing Web Search API, Computer Vision API, Text Analytics API, Face API, and Custom Vision Service. Azure also has several management and analytics services for IoT. Azure serverless computing service is known as Functions.

Azure has some top-notch tools that are all working toward supporting on-premises Microsoft software. Moreover, there is an Azure Backup service. This service works by linking the Windows Server Backup in Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows Server 2016.

Google Cloud:

Google cloud has two different types of key tools, and they are:

Big on AI
IoT to Serverless

GCP has a big focus in the areas of AI and machine learning. Google leads when it comes to the development in the field of AI. This is all thanks to TensorFlow. TensorFlow is an open-source software library for developing machine learning applications.

When the talk comes about the APIs, GCP is always there. APIs are there for natural language, speech, translation, and more. Similarly, it also provides the IoT and serverless services, up till now they are still in beta previews.

Conclusion:

Both Microsoft Azure and GCP works effectively. But, GCP always manages to have an upper hand. despite having lesser features is always manages to shine in-store pricing and ease of its use. Yet, again Windows and a lot of Microsoft software, then, of course, Azure is the best option for you. On the other hand, if you have a Web-based startup that you want to scale quickly, then we recommend you explore the Google Cloud Platform.

Why Google Cloud is better than Azure?