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Amazon S3 Glacier vs Microsoft Azure Block Storage comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 1, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.3
Amazon S3 Glacier offers cost savings, simplified data management, and security, with room for improvement in support and cost management.
Sentiment score
7.5
Organizations reduced costs significantly using Azure Block Storage, enhancing data protection, reliability, and ROI with promising long-term benefits.
If AWS improves support and cost management, there would be fewer reasons for users to consider other cloud platforms.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.5
Feedback on Amazon S3 Glacier is mixed, noting helpful service but concerns over responsiveness, costs, and regional support.
Sentiment score
5.2
Microsoft Azure Block Storage support is variable, with response times and quality depending on support tiers and payment levels.
There is room for improvement in providing more skilled and comprehensive solutions.
They provide documentation and resolve issues.
The response time for enterprise support needs improvement.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
9.2
Amazon S3 Glacier offers highly scalable infrastructure trusted by many for managing large data volumes and expanding user adoption.
Sentiment score
7.7
Microsoft Azure Block Storage is highly scalable and flexible, automatically adjusting to data increases, though some report capacity limits.
Amazon S3 Glacier auto-scales according to the data.
Glacier has excellent scalability, with elasticity and security that meet industry standards.
Amazon S3 Glacier is infinitely scalable, with no issues on our end.
It is a significant advantage of the product.
The ability to scale is well-supported.
Block Storage allows for extensive scaling, and I can scale it to as much as I want.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.3
Amazon S3 Glacier is highly stable, reliable for cold storage, with robust monitoring and minimal issues, within AWS environment.
Sentiment score
7.9
Many users praise Microsoft Azure Block Storage's stability, though some larger customers report occasional availability and regional reliability issues.
It is specifically designed for cold storage.
Amazon S3 Glacier is quite stable, nine out of ten.
I would rate the stability of Glacier for archival purposes at around eight out of ten.
The stability of block storage could be rated as nine out of ten.
Overall, the stability is very good.
It isn't as stable as sound storage systems in a premise environment.
 

Room For Improvement

Amazon S3 Glacier requires faster retrieval, simplified pricing, better security, user-friendly interface, and enhanced integration, compliance, and support.
Microsoft Azure Block Storage needs better pricing transparency, user support, integration, documentation, and improvements in performance, scalability, and security.
Another improvement is making Glacier available in all regions.
Support could be more robust, with a focus on providing comprehensive solutions even for novel issues.
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.
Its compatibility with various platforms could be enhanced to allow for a seamless operation across different cloud environments.
Some alternatives are cheaper and available for long trial periods before the payment.
Considerations on security regulations and hardware vendor information might be useful.
 

Setup Cost

Amazon S3 Glacier offers cost-effective archival, but complex pricing and hidden costs concern enterprises with large data volumes.
Microsoft Azure Block Storage offers scalable, moderately priced solutions with pay-as-you-go pricing influenced by tier and data access frequency.
Compared to competitors like GCP, AWS can work on reducing hidden costs and overall pricing to retain startups and medium-sized businesses.
The storage cost is minimal, which is beneficial for archival purposes.
While it's generally cost-effective, the pricing model could be clearer.
For medium-sized companies, especially when discussing cost and scalability, it can be quite expensive.
It is pay-as-you-go, related to the size and usage of the storage.
It is reasonable, however, it can be cheaper.
 

Valuable Features

Amazon S3 Glacier is cost-effective for data archiving, offering ease of use, security, scalability, and intelligent data management.
Azure Block Storage provides scalable, secure, and cost-effective storage with seamless integration, redundancy, easy management, and flexible APIs.
Glacier greatly helps in managing storage costs by moving historical data to a lower-cost storage option.
These features facilitate log management and data dumping since the service is versatile enough to handle large volumes of data and provide necessary security.
The most valuable features of Amazon S3 Glacier are its cost-effectiveness for data archiving and its durability.
The tool allows me to download to my device, control access, and manage data with ease.
I can store data, use the storage account as a queue, and the pricing is also quite economical.
The ability to increase and scale out is really easy, allowing us to manage a large amount of data with reduced dependency on scalability issues.
 

Categories and Ranking

Amazon S3 Glacier
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Azure Block Storage
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Public Cloud Storage Services category, the mindshare of Amazon S3 Glacier is 17.4%, up from 15.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure Block Storage is 0.8%, down from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Public Cloud Storage Services
 

Featured Reviews

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.
MatsHagberg Olsson2 - PeerSpot reviewer
Empowers secure data management with affordable tools and minimal hassle
The most valuable feature is that it's very affordable in comparison to competitors. The absolute best feature is the Azure Storage Explorer tool. The tool allows me to download to my device, control access, and manage data with ease. Additionally, the joint use of Azure portal further facilitates management depending on my location.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
34%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Computer Software Company
20%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Block Storage?
We use the solution to develop SaaS platforms on Azure. We utilize various Microsoft components like block storage and databases for this purpose.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure Block Storage?
Pricing could be rated as eight out of ten. It is reasonable, however, it can be cheaper.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Azure Block Storage?
At the moment, I do not have anything specific in mind for improvements. The most important thing for me is accessibility and easy provisioning to multiple servers with different vendors.
 

Also Known As

Amazon Glacier
MS Azure Block Storage
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

King Cpunty, Illumina, Backupify, Nearmap.com, Scribd, Baylor College of Medicine, SoundCloud
Mazda, BlinkBox, Rakuten Showtime, Xbox One, Serko, ChronoDrive
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon S3 Glacier vs. Microsoft Azure Block Storage and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
841,004 professionals have used our research since 2012.