Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Amazon S3 comparison

The compared Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) and Amazon S3 solutions aren't in the same category. Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) is ranked #6 in CS , with an average rating of 8.4. Amazon S3 is ranked #1 in PCSS , with an average rating of 8.7, and holds a 11.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 98% of Amazon S3 users who would recommend it.

Amazon EFS (Elastic File Sy...

Read 12 Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) reviews

1,574 Views
1,380 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Amazon S3

Read 79 Amazon S3 reviews

6,400 Views
3,500 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Amazon EFS (Elastic File Sy...

Amazon S3

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) and Amazon S3 based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Cloud Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3 Report (Updated: March 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3

March 2024

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Helped 824,067 peers since 2012

Categories and Ranking

Amazon EFS (Elastic File Sy...

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Storage (6th), File and Object Storage (9th)

Amazon S3

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Public Cloud Storage Services (1st)

Q&A Highlights

Jitendra Patel

Technology Lead, Global Database Services at Johnson & Johnson

Mar 31, 2022

What is the true cost of storing database backup to Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Amazon S3?

It depends on the storage capacity you are looking for and expected data growth. You would need to ascertain these numbers before looking at backup volumes, and potential costs.

See all answers

Featured Reviews

Shailesh Tripathi

Senior Cloud Engineer at a tech consulting company with 10,001+ employees

Useful for storing details of projects and has an easy configuration

I will recommend the product to others. We are partners. Our clients moved from on-premise setup to the cloud. We suggested AWS to them. We have configured the product based on the best practices. We also monitor the solution for recommendations in the Security Hub. We try to get the data encrypted properly within our repository. Overall, I rate the product a nine out of ten.

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HenryAragon

Storage Administrator at a insurance company with 501-1,000 employees

Offers different tiers, enable encryption but there's a lot of complexity

The best thing about S3 is the security. I can enable encryption at rest using a KMS server, a key management server. Key management servers encrypt data, and you need the key to decrypt it. Without the key, you can't access the data. Amazon allows you to use your own servers or theirs. They offer Amazon encryption, which you decide on when you create the bucket. The bucket also has all the other features like versioning. We can do versioning and life cycles. The biggest plus for me as a storage admin is the different tiers: standard, infrequent access, Glacier, and Glacier Deep Archive. The differences between these tiers are cost and data retrieval speed. Standard tier data is considered "hot," meaning it's accessible anytime, but it's expensive. If you want to archive data you won't need often, or if you have ample time to retrieve a backup, the most cost-effective option is Glacier Deep Archive. It's very cheap, but the disadvantage is that when you request data, it takes up to 24 hours to become accessible. There are no limitations on how much you can store, but the biggest limitation is that you cannot use Glacier Deep Archive from the console. You can't go into the AWS console and copy something directly into Deep Glacier, but you can do it from the command line. If you have programmatic access, there's a command to put data directly into Glacier Deep Archive. We don't use anything AI on AWS right now. The AI stuff isn't really too useful for us yet. We're just playing around with Copilot from Microsoft, which is more on the Azure side. We haven't leveraged any AWS AI stuff yet. We've basically just been playing around with Amazon Bedrock, but haven't done anything in production with it.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The initial setup was straightforward."

"Elastic File Systems allow me to share data, provision, and manage capacity and performance in AWS."

"The product's initial setup phase is easy, as per the configurations."

"The solution's technical support is good."

"Elastic File Systems allow me to share data, provision, and manage capacity and performance in AWS."

"The most beneficial feature of the product for data storage stems from the fact that it serves as a shared file storage."

"We are not that big of a cloud user. We just use it for the storage of our bytes. The most valuable aspect is the storage."

"The first valuable thing is it is scalable."

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) pros

"The most valuable features of the Amazon S3 are its ease of use and integration"

"The most valuable feature is the automated replication of the data."

"The solution's peak-up time is good."

"We can store incremental data and get high availability and fault tolerance."

"The most valuable features of Amazon S3 are the accuracy and the life cycle policies, which help when moving from Amazon S3 to Amazon Glacier."

"I don't have any problems with the solution. It's issue-free."

"The main aspect we like is that it's been easy to use."

"The solution's most valuable feature is its security, as it does not provide public access."

More Amazon S3 pros

Cons

"The platform's connectivity could be improved to be more comparable to S3 buckets, which offer better API availability."

"Its deployment process could be faster while installing the Python package directly into the environment."

"It should be simplified. There are people who don't have cloud experience. It should be storage that we are able to just connect to."

"The user activity needs to be more connected."

"It could be better in connecting with Windows Server instances."

"Specifically, when it comes to the file system for the learning system, we encountered performance issues with both Azure and AWS."

"The product's stability has some shortcomings where improvements are required."

"The lack of transparency in the costs attached to the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) cons

"Maybe it could be a bit cheaper."

"There's a lot of complexity."

"A feature that should be included is to find and provide a HIPPA compliant solution for the Presigned URL."

"No direct connector is available to connect Amazon S3 with other tools like MicroStrategy."

"I would like a batch downloading option added to the AWS console."

"In the next release, I think that it would be good to have wizards that would update into specific applications, for example, a one-touch configuration in Pagemaker."

"The upload speed for data and documents is sometimes slow."

"The tool's speed is comparatively low, especially considering that there are some other services where we can store data, like EBS."

More Amazon S3 cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) offers a pay-as-you-go model, so whenever you use its services, you need to pay."

"I would rate the pricing 7 out of 10."

"It has flexible pricing. You are charged based on your storage."

"The product's price depends on the services and the size and capacity at which it is used in a business environment."

"The solution's price is mid-ranged."

"The product charges are based on the amount of data stored."

"With S3 Standard, there is not a charge for deletion of objects."

"I have seen the pricing on AWS, but I believe it's a discount price for organizations."

"There is a license needed to use this solution and it is reasonably priced."

"One can manage the price of the tool. The tool is worth the money if we want to store the data in Amazon S3."

"The pricing is good."

"The cost varies based on the type of subscription you chose."

"The price of the Amazon S3 is low. The license model is based on what you use."

"This solution has reasonable pricing and a low cost."

More Amazon S3 pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

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Answers from the Community

Jitendra Patel

Technology Lead, Global Database Services at Johnson & Johnson

Mar 31, 2022

What is the true cost of storing database backup to Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Amazon S3?

Hi @Vipin Garg, @Oscar Mejia , @Shaban AL-Ahmad , @Nibrask Alambilat Kaniyat , @Marcelo Lucas and @Krishna Rao , Do you possibly have any answers to assist @Jitendra Patel with this question?

See 2 answers

goforitandy

IT Consultant at Woohoogeeks

Mar 22, 2022

It depends on the storage capacity you are looking for and expected data growth. You would need to ascertain these numbers before looking at backup volumes, and potential costs.

Read full answer

Evgeny Belenky

Director of Community at PeerSpot (formerly IT Central Station)

Mar 31, 2022

Hi @Vipin Garg, @Oscar Mejia , @Shaban AL-Ahmad , @Nibrask Alambilat Kaniyat , @Marcelo Lucas and @Krishna Rao , Do you possibly have any answers to assist @Jitendra Patel with this question?

Read full answer

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

18%

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

76%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Which file storage system is better - Amazon EFS (elastic file storage) or Azure File Storage?

Amazon EFS is easy to set up: you can use the AWS management console, API, or command-line. Amazon EFS can grow to petabytes and deliver consistent low latencies and high levels of throughput. This...

See all answers

What do you like most about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?

The product's initial setup phase is easy, as per the configurations.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?

The product charges are based on the amount of data stored, with different hot and cold storage costs. Cold storage is inexpensive but slower to access.

See all answers

What do you like most about Amazon S3?

We can easily connect to the AWS resources.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon S3?

S3 offers multiple classes, allowing you to move data to cheaper classes for cost savings. AWS provides solutions to monitor your budget.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon S3?

In terms of security, I struggled with setting permissions and access control initially.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Azure File Storage vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 60% of the time

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 11% of the time

Amazon S3 Glacier vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 8% of the time

Google Cloud Storage vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 8% of the time

Azure NetApp Files vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 5% of the time

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) Competitors

Oracle Cloud Object Storage vs Amazon S3

Compared 22% of the time

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Amazon S3

Compared 19% of the time

Microsoft Azure File Storage vs Amazon S3

Compared 14% of the time

Google Cloud Storage vs Amazon S3

Compared 10% of the time

Amazon S3 Glacier vs Amazon S3

Compared 6% of the time

More Amazon S3 Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

December 2024

Download Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) product report

Buyer's Guide

Amazon S3

December 2024

Download Amazon S3 product report

Also Known As

No data available

S3, Simple Storage Service

Learn More

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Overview

Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) provides simple, scalable file storage for use with Amazon EC2 instances in the AWS Cloud. Amazon EFS is easy to use and offers a simple interface that allows you to create and configure file systems quickly and easily. With Amazon EFS, storage capacity is elastic, growing and shrinking automatically as you add and remove files, so your applications have the storage they need, when they need it.

When mounted to Amazon EC2 instances, an Amazon EFS file system provides a standard file system interface and file system access semantics, allowing you to seamlessly integrate Amazon EFS with your existing applications and tools. Multiple Amazon EC2 instances can access an Amazon EFS file system at the same time, allowing Amazon EFS to provide a common data source for workloads and applications running on more than one Amazon EC2 instance.

It’s designed for high availability and durability, and provides performance for a broad spectrum of workloads and applications, including Big Data and analytics, media processing workflows, content management, web serving, and home directories.

Amazon Simple Storage Service is storage for the Internet. It is designed to make web-scale computing easier for developers.

Amazon S3 has a simple web services interface that you can use to store and retrieve any amount of data, at any time, from anywhere on the web. It gives any developer access to the same highly scalable, reliable, fast, inexpensive data storage infrastructure that Amazon uses to run its own global network of web sites. The service aims to maximize benefits of scale and to pass those benefits on to developers.

Sample Customers

Arcesium, Atlassian, Seeking Alpha, Zend

Netflix, Airbnb, Thomson Reuters, Zillow, Alert Logic

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3

March 2024

Free Report: Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3 and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.

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See our Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3 report.

We monitor all Cloud Storage reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.