Amazon RDS vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft are both solutions in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.3, while Microsoft is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.7. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 25.0% mindshare in DS, compared to Microsoft’s 15.9% mindshare. Additionally, 98% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

Amazon RDS

Read 54 Amazon RDS reviews

5,264 Views
4,374 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Read 117 Microsoft Azure SQL Database reviews

6,648 Views
2,858 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Amazon RDS

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 12, 2024

Amazon RDS and Microsoft Azure SQL Database are strong players in the cloud database market. Based on the comparisons, each product has distinct advantages that cater to different needs.

Features: Amazon RDS offers automated backups, ease of scalability, and high availability. Microsoft Azure SQL Database has advanced machine learning capabilities, integration with other Azure services, and built-in security features.

Room for Improvement: Amazon RDS could improve its support, reduce downtime during maintenance, and enhance its performance analytics. Microsoft Azure SQL Database needs better performance analytics, improved documentation for complex setups, and more intuitive user interfaces.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Amazon RDS is easier to deploy and integrates well with AWS services, but its customer service receives mixed reviews. Microsoft Azure SQL Database has a straightforward deployment process and an effective support team, especially for enterprises already using Azure.

Pricing and ROI: Amazon RDS offers competitive pricing with good ROI for small and medium businesses, but costs can increase with higher usage. Microsoft Azure SQL Database is more expensive but the added features and integration justify the cost, providing good ROI for enterprises needing comprehensive solutions.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon RDS vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database

April 2025

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Helped 848,989 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:

Categories and Ranking

Amazon RDS

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

2nd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

1st

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

117

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Amazon RDS is 25.0%, down from 27.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure SQL Database is 15.9%, down from 18.4% 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

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

"It offers an easy-to-use interface that allows me to monitor instances and update necessary features conveniently."

"The scalability is the best, and I have no issues with the ability to scale."

"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 solution’s scalability, usability, and availability are valuable to us."

"It handles large-scale data migrations perfectly. Amazon RDS's performance is quite good. Charges are incurred after you utilize the service"

"The provisioning is much faster. You don't have to prepare hardware or install software. You just need to create an instance and you have a database."

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

"It is easy to use, flexible, and powerful."

More Amazon RDS pros

"The scalability and simple management of the infrastructure are the most valuable features."

"I rate Microsoft Azure SQL Database nine out of 10."

"The Power Virtual Agents help us go through documents and load data into SQL."

"The ability to maintain different environments, such as development and production databases, is valuable."

"The product is easy to set up."

"We don't have to manage it much. It is managed by Microsoft, which makes it easy for us because there is no admin overhead for managing the servers. It is also easily scalable. During peak hours, it can scale higher."

"Microsoft Azure SQL Database is fairly easy to use and set up for our DBA teams, who use it for various applications and tools like RabbitMQ."

"The best thing about the solution is that it is tightly integrated with Azure Functions and Azure App Service, making it easy to deploy to the cloud."

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database pros

Cons

"The Performance Monitor they have is a little clanky, at least in regards to the UI."

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

"I would like to see improvements in the tool's automatic restart."

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

"The security features could be improved."

"The Amazon RDS engine could provide features for additional databases, such as Db2. It could also provide support for other databases, such as NoSQL databases, DynamoDB, and Apache Cassandra. They could all stay under one hood."

"I like using Amazon RDS because it offers quick operations for me. However, there are times when understanding how to use some of the services can be challenging, even with documentation. If I could add a feature, I'd improve navigation for related services."

"They should add a feature for manual SQL patching in RDS."

More Amazon RDS cons

"They could improve Azure SQL by adding some of the features available on-prem, such as cross-database queries and the ability to run particular jobs. We need to migrate those to something else, like a function or logic app."

"Adding users to Azure SQL could be easier. You need to script it out, but it would be nice if it had a UI where you can click and add them."

"The solution has to scale up its expertise for hosting Oracle."

"There are certain shortcomings when it comes to the stability of the product, especially if I consider the fact that there can always be some bug-related issues in the tool."

"The initial setup was very complex."

"We need improvement in the latency between availability zones. The managed SQL MI does not allow us to control the zone it runs in, which affects latency."

"In terms of support, they don't give much support."

"SQL Azure could improve the feature set. They are catching up to Microsoft SQL Server."

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of Amazon RDS is reasonable."

"The solution's price is good."

"The substantial initial credit and cost-effectiveness make Amazon an attractive option."

"The cost depends on the kind of instance we use."

"The solution is expensive."

"Amazon RDS could improve by reducing the price."

"The solution's pricing needs improvement."

"Amazon RDS is cheaper compared to other tools."

More Amazon RDS pricing and cost advice

"When looking at the long-term expenses associated with running software on an on-premises server, the costs are almost equivalent but when we include insurance for devices, onsite fees for servers, and other related costs, we may find that this is a cost-effective solution."

"The license is based on the number of users."

"SQL Azure's licensing cost is expensive."

"There is no licensing cost for the solution."

"In terms of the cost, SQL Azure is a pay-per-use solution, particularly because it's a cloud subscription, so you pay as much as you use it."

"It is reasonable."

"If we use a smaller or free-sized Microsoft Azure SQL Database, it is extremely cost-effective and much cheaper than on-premise enterprise licenses, which are expensive."

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

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

14%

University

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

72%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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?

One key improvement would be adding support for multi-storage paradigms, including columnar support, as seen in TiDB. The serverless support with Aurora could also be enhanced. Additionally, having...

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 cloud.

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 improve accessibility and user numbers, making it easier for users to adopt the s...

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 ) more accessible. A reduction in price might encourage more users and bring more pro...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 28% of the time

Google Cloud SQL vs Amazon RDS

Compared 23% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Amazon RDS

Compared 17% of the time

Google Cloud Spanner vs Amazon RDS

Compared 5% of the time

Oracle Exadata Cloud at Customer vs Amazon RDS

Compared 4% of the time

More Amazon RDS Competitors

Google Cloud SQL vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 42% of the time

MongoDB Atlas vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 17% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 7% of the time

vCloud Air vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 2% of the time

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Compared 2% of the time

More Microsoft Azure SQL Database Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS

April 2025

Download Amazon RDS product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Azure SQL Database

April 2025

Download Microsoft Azure SQL Database product report

Also Known As

RDS

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)

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

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

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database

April 2025

Free Report: Amazon RDS vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon RDS vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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