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Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Amazon S3 Glacier comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Amazon EFS (Elastic File Sy...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Storage (4th), File and Object Storage (8th)
Amazon S3 Glacier
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Public Cloud Storage Services (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Cloud Services solutions, they serve different purposes. Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) is designed for Cloud Storage and holds a mindshare of 8.4%, down 10.0% compared to last year.
Amazon S3 Glacier, on the other hand, focuses on Public Cloud Storage Services, holds 17.4% mindshare, up 15.2% since last year.
Cloud Storage
Public Cloud Storage Services
 

Featured Reviews

MuhammadAzhar Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Auto-scaling capabilities enhance file management while reducing downtime
The most valuable feature of Amazon EFS is its auto-scaling capability. It's really easy to configure EFS by just creating it and running a command to directly configure it with my servers. It supports unlimited use, and charges are applied based on the file usage at the end of the month. The solution offers reduced downtime and increased durability through its auto-scaling features.
ArunDhwaj - PeerSpot reviewer
Versatile data storage improves security and supports increasing data volumes
Amazon S3 Glacier offers robust security features and practically infinite storage, where we can store all kinds of media swiftly. It supports various data types, including semi-structured and raw formats. These features facilitate log management and data dumping since the service is versatile enough to handle large volumes of data and provide necessary security.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product's initial setup phase is easy, as per the configurations."
"Amazon EFS offers the flexibility of scaling as needed without requiring pre-provisioned storage."
"The most beneficial feature of the product for data storage stems from the fact that it serves as a shared file storage."
"Amazon EFS is extremely stable, as it is managed by AWS."
"Amazon EFS is extremely stable, as it is managed by AWS."
"The first valuable thing is it is scalable."
"Elastic File Systems allow me to share data, provision, and manage capacity and performance in AWS."
"Its elasticity and flexible pricing are the most valuable. For Amazon EFS, you are charged based on the storage. It is also very fast and stable with a very simple and intuitive interface."
"The pricing is low, and it's dedicated to archiving is valuable to us."
"The solution is great for storing data you don't usually need access to. It's also well-integrated with Amazon S3."
"Amazon S3 Glacier is a scalable and easy-to-manage solution with good read-write capability."
"I like the price. If you compare Glacier to others, the prices in terms of what you store beyond retention are much lower."
"The biggest advantage of the product is that AWS always copies the tool internally."
"The deployment process was straightforward."
"Amazon S3 Glacier offers robust security features and practically infinite storage, where we can store all kinds of media swiftly."
"The main advantage of Glacier is its low cost. It is incredibly cheaper than other storage options, especially for objects you don't access frequently. Glacier would add value if you have a staging area for objects you only need to access occasionally. Since we have data in terabytes between S3 buckets, we can significantly reduce our storage and cost footprint by using Glacier."
 

Cons

"I don't have notes on improvements."
"EFS could be improved by including a one-click setup."
"Amazon EFS is more costly compared to other storage options available from AWS."
"Elastic File Systems can be expensive due to the nature of data transfer costs, using services like SSTP, and potentially being costly in a rate-shift context."
"The user activity needs to be more connected."
"When we faced some issues, the support team took a lot of time to resolve them."
"The initial setup requires prior experience and technical skills."
"The product's stability has some shortcomings where improvements are required."
"A couple of times, we faced outage issues that caused us problems."
"The product needs to improve cloud security."
"The product’s pricing must be improved."
"Although Amazon S3 Glacier is cheap, its data retrieval cost is very high compared to other solutions."
"Amazon S3 Glacier's data retrieval time is slow compared to other AWS storage services and should be improved."
"The cost of retrieval in Glacier is quite high."
"The solution's pricing is too expensive and could be improved."
"There is room for improvement in handling GDPR compliance better. GDPR is about personal data protection and retention. It would be great if S3 Glacier could handle compliance items related to this, especially with upcoming legislation like the California law, which restricts data storage time and allows users to request data deletion."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product charges are based on the amount of data stored."
"Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) offers a pay-as-you-go model, so whenever you use its services, you need to pay."
"The main challenge with EFS is its cost, which is slightly higher compared to EBS or S3. For one GB or ten GB of data, S3 is much cheaper. EFS could cost around $30 to $50 per month for similar usage."
"I would rate the pricing 7 out of 10."
"The solution's price is mid-ranged."
"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."
"We pay a monthly licensing fee for Amazon S3 Glacier."
"Amazon S3 Glacier is expensive."
"We don't pay for licenses. We pay based on consumption data, considering how much data is stored."
"Amazon S3 Glacier is a little expensive solution."
"Amazon S3 Glacier is a cost-effective solution for archiving."
"The tool is too expensive."
"Amazon S3 Glacier has good pricing."
"Amazon S3 Glacier is very cheap, but the cost becomes a concern when you have a very large amount of data."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
18%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
34%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

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...
What do you like most about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?
The product's initial setup phase is easy, as per the configurations.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?
Amazon EFS is more costly compared to other storage options available from AWS.
Which is better - Amazon's S3 Glacier or EBS (Elastic Block Store)?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon's S3 Glacier or Elastic Block Store data storage software was the better fit for us. We decided to go with Amazon's S3 Glacier, whi...
What do you like most about Amazon S3 Glacier?
I like creating buckets where data can be segregated at a high level and then routing the appropriate data to each designated bucket. In terms of value, I would say that the tool gets the job done ...
What needs improvement with Amazon S3 Glacier?
I would like to see improvements in the transfer rate as it takes quite a long time to retrieve data from Glacier compared to standard S3 storage. Additionally, improvements in configuration manage...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Amazon Glacier
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Arcesium, Atlassian, Seeking Alpha, Zend
King Cpunty, Illumina, Backupify, Nearmap.com, Scribd, Baylor College of Medicine, SoundCloud
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon S3 Glacier and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
839,422 professionals have used our research since 2012.