Amazon RDS vs Google Cloud Spanner vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google are both solutions in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.2, while Google is ranked #8 with an average rating of 9.0. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 23.4% mindshare in DS, compared to Google’s 4.7% mindshare. Additionally, 98% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Google users who would recommend it.

Amazon RDS

Read 56 Amazon RDS reviews

4,051 Views
4,010 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Google Cloud Spanner

Read 5 Google Cloud Spanner reviews

819 Views
753 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Read 117 Microsoft Azure SQL Database reviews

4,217 Views
4,175 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Amazon RDS

Google Cloud Spanner

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Amazon RDS, Google Cloud Spanner, and Microsoft Azure SQL Database based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft, MongoDB and others in Database as a Service (DBaaS).

To learn more, read our detailed Database as a Service (DBaaS) Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

July 2025

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Helped 861,524 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Amazon RDS is 23.4%, down from 26.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Cloud Spanner is 4.7%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure SQL Database is 15.4%, down from 18.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

Featured Reviews

Samuel Ebite

AICE Graduate at alx_africa

Ensure high availability with robust encryption and seamless backups

Amazon RDS provides data encryption using services like KMS, crucial for securing high-sensitive data and meeting compliance requirements such as HIPAA or PCI DSS. The best practices we've employed with RDS help design a well-architected framework, encompassing security, encryption, scalability with multi-availability zone deployment, and operational excellence with automated backups. RDS features, such as reserved instances, storage auto-scaling, monitoring with technologies like CloudWatch, and proxies, contribute to cost optimization. The solution enhances security with IAM authentication and offers high availability to end users.

Read full review

Ethan Lo

Infrastructuer Security at Premise Data

A stable and scalable relational database that ensures a return on investment for its users

The most valuable feature of the solution is its scalability. Scalability comes with two options, among which Google Cloud Spanner can scale horizontally, compared to other relational databases that scale vertically. You can change Google Cloud Spanner's resource configuration, which is done through processing units. Suppose you set up Google Cloud Spanner initially with a hundred processing units, and then you run out of resources since your database used too much CPU. In the aforementioned scenario, you can scale up or down and face no downtime in the production phase. The solution's features are important when running a company twenty-four hours, seven days a week.

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Charley Hanania

Data Platform Specialist at QS2 AG - Quality Software Solutions

It is very easy to implement, manage, and offers great insights into what is happening inside the engine

Microsoft Azure SQL Database is integrated into other Azure capabilities and has a great foundation being on SQL Server with a long history of security, performance, and usability from a DBA perspective. Once you've set up a server, adding databases is easy. There's a minor challenge with having data in separate databases that you want to connect like we do on premises. I'm looking forward to using some of these new AI-driven functions that have come out around vectorization. Having the data closer to my transactional databases or data makes it easy to augment and enhance the Database and applications I currently use. It's great that Azure SQL now seamlessly integrates with Microsoft Fabric. It's a first-tier service in the cloud that connects to web applications and other databases. The data transformation orchestration capabilities within Database Factory and similar capabilities make it effortless to move that stuff forward.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten...Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten."

"The most valuable aspect of Amazon RDS is it is on the cloud."

"Relational databases excel in extensive normalization, eliminating data redundancy and efficiently structuring tables which leads to a clear and efficient relationship between tables using primary keys."

"The product is very, very easy to use."

"The most valuable features of the solution stem from the fact that it requires an easy setup phase, and it is also easy to use while not being too heavy on its users."

"The most valuable features of Amazon RDS are its scalability, reliability, and intelligence."

"It's a fully managed database, so that makes our life easier from the operational standpoint. That is the key, basically."

"Amazon RDS fulfills PCI requirements, which is a valuable feature for us."

More Amazon RDS pros

"The application deployment in the cloud is the best feature of the infrastructure."

"We can scale the solution if we need to."

"It is a very scalable solution."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is its scalability. Scalability comes with two options, among which Google Cloud Spanner can scale horizontally, compared to other relational databases that scale vertically."

"Google Cloud Spanner is stable."

"The solution is a fairly mature product. It provides good stability."

"The most valuable aspect of SQL Azure is the SQL language itself. It's open and everybody can use it at my company. Also, we thought in the beginning that the response time would be inadequate, but it's actually decent. It's much better than expected. Then again, I'm not a programmer, but that's what I hear from our development team."

"We've saved time setting up the databases. While I'm not involved in the maintenance, I'm sure that's also a big factor. It's hosted in the cloud, so we don't have to maintain the servers."

"The SQL connector effectively syncs data to our database."

"It's easy to work with large amounts of data, query it, and bring it back to a visualization tool to show it to the end users."

"We like the ease of integrating it with our on-premises environment. We use a hybrid model. We have a SQL Server on-premises, and we have an integration with the cloud version. We do CPU or disk intensive processes on-premises. For accessibility, we offload onto the cloud. When you do a lot of IO and things like that in the cloud, Microsoft charges for the CPU activity."

"Coding does not require much effort."

"I like that Microsoft Azure SQL Database is almost identical to an on-premise SQL Server except for a few things, like how you edit rows and some jobs that you can't run."

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database pros

Cons

"The technical support from Amazon could improve. I would rate them a six out of ten as they do not fully meet my expectations."

"One of the challenges of AWS RDS is that it doesn't support performance insight. So we need to write our own script or use third-party tools."

"There are some advanced monitoring queries that we cannot execute because Amazon doesn't give admin privileges to the end users."

"Amazon cannot guarantee the stability of some extensions, and there is a need for different extensions to meet PCI requirements."

"With my limited experience, I have noticed that documentation management could be improved. It could be better."

"The product's high price is an area of concern where improvements are required."

"As a customer of Amazon RDS, you don't have super-user privileges, and that is the only drawback where improvements are required."

"The solution is a bit expensive."

More Amazon RDS cons

"The cost can be a bit high."

"The tool lacks to offer AI features."

"Google came up with something called Cloud Spanner Emulator, which fails to work like the real product if I want to develop some code and run a database locally on my machine."

"I want to improve the deployment of cameras and surveillance infrastructure."

"The tool needs to improve horizontal scaling."

"The default 1433 port for communication should be customizable because most hacks or attacks are attempted when creating any application or database on the default port."

"It should have better profiling capabilities."

"It does take some time to learn about the environment."

"I think this product can improve its integrations with business intelligence software. The integrations are always cumbersome due to the approvals, passwords, et cetera."

"If there are areas for improvement, one aspect could be the user interface. It could be made more user-friendly and similar to Google BigQuery's interface."

"Microsoft could improve its documentation and support."

"Microsoft Azure SQL Database would benefit from enhanced documentation, along with ongoing improvements to scalability and cost-effectiveness."

"The initial setup was very complex."

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of using this solution is similar to that of having your own data center."

"On a scale from one to ten, where ten is the most expensive, and one is the cheapest, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."

"Licensing fees are paid on an annual basis."

"The solution’s pricing could be cheaper."

"By using a combination of Reserve Instances and On-Demand pricing, you can reduce the cost."

"Amazon RDS is less expensive than other solutions."

"Amazon RDS is cheaper compared to other tools."

"The solution is fairly priced."

More Amazon RDS pricing and cost advice

"Google Cloud Spanner is an expensive solution."

"Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side."

"It is expensive."

"The solution is expensive."

"I'm not sure what the exact price is, but it's a moderate amount. It's not too expensive."

"Offers options for paying the license on a yearly or a monthly basis."

"It's reasonably priced and when you compare it with other products in the cloud environment, it's cheaper."

"I find that they are relatively expensive, especially when compared to AWS, where the prices are notably lower."

"It is quite expensive. I would definitely recommend not using the pay-as-you-go model because this will just mean all your money will go to Microsoft. So, really make sure to control resource usage as much as possible."

"It requires a license. As compared to its competitors, such as Oracle, it is affordable and reasonable."

"We have had some issues with the licensing of the solution."

"It is expensive for us. We are looking for something less expensive and thinking of migrating the whole system."

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Manufacturing Company

University

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

12%

Retailer

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

27%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon RDS?

The product's installation phase is easy.

See all answers

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

The pricing for Amazon RDS is reasonable.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon RDS?

User interface needs improvement for using IPS and cloud watch to scale and utilize read replicas, enabling performan...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Google Cloud Spanner?

Google Cloud Spanner has all the features of a traditional relational database, including schemas, SQL queries, ACID ...

See all answers

What do you like most about Google Cloud Spanner?

Google Cloud Spanner is stable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud Spanner?

Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side. I am not sure if this is a rumor or if it's fake...

See all answers

What do you like most about SQL Azure?

The automated scalability feature of SQL Azure has proven to be highly beneficial, particularly when deployed in the ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SQL Azure?

The pricing of Microsoft Azure SQL Database is not cheap, affecting user uptake. A gradual reduction in price could i...

See all answers

What needs improvement with SQL Azure?

Pricing could be improved to make Microsoft Azure SQL Database ( /products/microsoft-azure-sql-database-reviews ) mor...

See all answers

Comparisons

MongoDB Atlas vs Amazon RDS

Compared 25% of the time

Google Cloud SQL vs Amazon RDS

Compared 21% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Amazon RDS

Compared 19% of the time

Oracle Exadata Cloud at Customer vs Amazon RDS

Compared 5% of the time

Yugabyte Platform vs Amazon RDS

Compared 3% of the time

More Amazon RDS Competitors

MongoDB Atlas vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 16% of the time

Google Cloud SQL vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 12% of the time

SingleStore vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 12% of the time

Redis vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 10% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 9% of the time

More Google Cloud Spanner Competitors

Google Cloud SQL vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 32% of the time

MongoDB Atlas vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 15% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 5% of the time

vCloud Air vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 4% of the time

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS

July 2025

Download Amazon RDS product report

Buyer's Guide

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

July 2025

Download Google Cloud Spanner product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

June 2025

Download Microsoft Azure SQL Database product report

Also Known As

RDS

Google Spanner

No data available

Overview

Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) is a web service that makes it easier to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud. It provides cost-efficient, resizeable capacity for an industry-standard relational database and manages common database administration tasks.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Cloud Spanner is the first and only relational database service that is both strongly consistent and horizontally scalable. With Cloud Spanner you enjoy all the traditional benefits of a relational database: ACID transactions, relational schemas (and schema changes without downtime), SQL queries, high performance, and high availability. But unlike any other relational database service, Cloud Spanner scales horizontally, to hundreds or thousands of servers, so it can handle the highest of transactional workloads. With automatic scaling, synchronous data replication, and node redundancy, Cloud Spanner delivers up to 99.999% (five 9s) of availability for your mission critical applications. In fact, Google’s internal Spanner service has been handling millions of queries per second from many Google services for years.

Google

Microsoft Azure SQL Database is a relational database-as-a-service that delivers predictable performance, scalability, business continuity, data protection, and near-zero administration to cloud developers and solution architects. This is the deep technical library for Azure SQL Database.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Edmodo

Streak, Optiva, Mixpanel

adnymics GmbH, LG CNS, Centrebet, netfabb GmbH, MedPlast, Accelera Solutions, Sochi Organizing Committee, realzeit GmbH

Buyer's Guide

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

July 2025

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