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Google Compute Engine vs IBM Public Cloud 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

Google Compute Engine
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS) (10th)
IBM Public Cloud
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
PaaS Clouds (12th), IoT Platforms (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Cloud Services solutions, they serve different purposes. Google Compute Engine is designed for Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS) and holds a mindshare of 0.5%, up 0.2% compared to last year.
IBM Public Cloud, on the other hand, focuses on PaaS Clouds, holds 3.2% mindshare, down 4.5% since last year.
Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS)
PaaS Clouds
 

Featured Reviews

Arundeep Veerabhadraiah - PeerSpot reviewer
A highly scalable and seamless platform which is easily automated
One of GCE's best features is the managed instance groups. We typically use managed instance groups for high availability. You can set certain parameters for managed instance groups where if the load of the computer or server increases beyond 80%, for example, the solution will automatically spawn another instance, and the load will be automatically divided between two systems. If the load is 80% of one of the VMs or GCEs, once the load is divided, it comes down to 40%, so the availability of your systems goes up. However, that all depends on the parameters or configurations we put on the instance group. You also have regular health checks on these managed instance groups, which are configurable. If these health checks determine something wrong with the VM, they will automatically kick off or spawn a new GCE instance. This way, the outage time is less. Previously, on-premises, unless somebody reported the issue to the helpdesk saying that a particular service was unavailable, then a support team would need to troubleshoot what went wrong, which takes a long time. At least 30 minutes to one hour. But by using these managed instance groups, we can reduce the outage time, and second, we can configure them with minimal resources, bringing down our cost. And if the load increases, the managed instance groups automatically respond to new things. Subsequently, our costs decrease. We have a wide range of VMs. There are general-purpose VMs that can be used for hosting general-purpose applications. If some of our applications are memory intensive, then we have a lot of VMs in the M1 series. We can use a range of memory-optimized VMs for these things. We have C-series VMs for compute-intensive applications. If we use some mathematical formulas and require a very high throughput from that, there are GPU-optimized VMs used for machine learning or 3D visualizations in rendering software. GPU-enabled VMs are pretty powerful and responsive. Again, the best part is that we can spin them up when we need them, and once we're done with our work, we can shut them down, allowing tremendous cost savings for any customer. Previously, if we wanted a very high-configuration VM, we had to own the entire hardware and have it on our on-prem data center. And once we'd done with a particular activity, the system would just be lying there on our premises. That is not the case now. We use and decommission it, so we're only billed for the time we're using the product. One of the best things is the preemptible VMs or Spot VMs. These are the cheapest VMs in Google Cloud, but it has a string attached to it where Google can shut down these VMs whenever Google teams split. You only get about 90 seconds notice before they shut down this particular VM. There are scenarios where customers can use these preemptible VMs, for example, when running a batch job. Batch jobs are run once or twice daily, depending on the customer's requirement. Once we are done running these batches, we can decommission the VM. Even if, in the middle of this batch job, Google shuts down these VMs, we can pick up the processing from wherever the VM left off. These are some of the beautiful things we have on Google Cloud concerning the Compute Engine.
Shivakumar Kuppannan - PeerSpot reviewer
No hidden charges, 100% stable, and allows us to have bare metal servers for dedicated workload
It pretty much has all the features. There are many applications and features, and because of that, we need to walk through or study all the material and do hands-on. We need clear documentation or support for using IBM Public Cloud. The UI is fine, and everything else in terms of usability and configuring the cloud is also fine. The only thing is that when we're stuck or get an error, we need some technical support. Normally, for any cloud, we get a lot of information on the web, but that is missing in the case of IBM Public Cloud. We need some technical support documents. That is the only thing missing in IBM Public Cloud.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Google is managing all hardware. You don't need to provision or pre-provision your computer engine."
"One of GCE's best features is the managed instance groups."
"The main motive for choosing Google Compute Engine is pricing."
"The most valuable feature is auto-scaling."
"The solution helps to direct SSH into the machine at the click of a button. It also helps to deploy container images right from the UI. There is no need to manage the containers on the machine. I also like the tool’s Spot provision model."
"The overall product rating is nine out of ten."
"From a feature perspective, I find API integration, automation capabilities, and features like preemptive and Spot instances valuable. Migration tools have also been useful."
"Everything is simple and useful. The initial setup is not challenging."
"I've found the stability to be excellent. The performance is good."
"What I like most in IBM Public Cloud is how easy it is to create serverless functions. They are called IBM functions, but in AWS, they are called Lambda functions. Those are pretty standard, and another thing I like the most is that you have fewer restrictions on the amount of data you can transfer across those functions. IBM Public Cloud is way more flexible than AWS. I also like that IBM Public Cloud is pretty straightforward to integrate. As long as you have all the tools IBM provides you, getting everything up and running is straightforward."
"One of the features that I really like about IBM Cloud is the flexibility where you can order your own hardware."
"There is no installation for this product because it is a cloud product."
"The availability is second to none. Customer support is very good."
"The initial setup was very easy. It's quite straightforward. Deployment took about fifteen minutes. Everything is well organized."
"This is a predictable and dependable service."
"It is a scalable product. You can scale it up and down."
 

Cons

"It would be better if there was an option to change the background. Like in Gmail, there's an option to change your theme."
"Sometimes support takes time to reply."
"The licensing process is not a very straightforward process."
"Sometimes support takes time to reply."
"Google Compute Engine does not have many options at a lower tier level. If they had more options it will be better. For example, Amazon AWS or Microsoft Azure, have more options and different types of instances, of VMs we can select."
"Google Compute Engine needs to have multi-region support. It would also be nice to have a tracking mechanism."
"It is not very user-friendly for non-experienced users"
"I would like to improve the solution’s UI while deploying a container. It is sometimes hard to figure out the container’s details and format that you want to deploy. The tool does not give you a guide to find out the error and why the container is not starting up which could be because you have configured it wrong. This is always a hit on the setup."
"I would like to see a more user-friendly deployment process in the next release of this solution."
"The solution needs to be more autonomous. It should let the DL go to allow for more jobs on the cloud. It could have a better interface as well."
"Maybe performance enhancers and reports could be better improved. If they do so, it would be better. Of all the drawbacks I saw, this would be the biggest enhancement."
"It will be challenging to implement if you do not have any experience."
"While they have about 99% of what we need, the only exception, perhaps, was the push notification feature that was discontinued. They delayed the replacement product."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"The initial setup and the pricing are areas that need improvement."
"The deployment can be a bit of a pain. There are a lot of packages and a lot of options and it can require complex configuration to get it right."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is reasonably priced, considering its scalability features. If we want to extend the server's capacity, we can do it, and I think it's reasonable."
"Google Compute Engine is not the least expensive solution. Microsoft Azure, and Microsoft One, are offering a less expensive solution. The price is based on usage. Whenever we use it, we have to pay for only usage. It is a pay-as-you-go model."
"Google is providing money for learning Google Compute Engine. They offer a $300 free trial to new customers. Any beginner can easily get started."
"In terms of improvement, one is definitely the licensing piece. So there is a feature, the BYOL (Bring Your Own License) licensing piece, to bring your own license. It is not that straightforward. It requires some support from Google to get it sorted, access those licenses, and configure those licenses."
"I rate GCE's pricing a five out of ten since it's affordable."
"Google Compute Engine's pricing is flexible and the best of all other alternatives."
"It's $60,000 to $70,000 a month to replace about $10,000 a month in data center costs."
"We are using the trial version of this solution, so we have not paid anything."
"The price of IBM Cloud is very cheap compared to competitors AWS and Azure."
"It pretty much has a standard price. There is no hidden price with IBM Public Cloud."
"The licensing fees are straightforward and predictable."
"IBM Public Cloud is pretty cheap. They have an ongoing free tier that basically won't expire, so as long as your solution is small enough, you can have a test set that you can use for demos, which will cost you almost nothing."
"In order to be competitive, you have to commit to a contract for at least one year, but you pay a fixed monthly fee."
"IBM has a lesser price compared to other cloud service providers like Azure and AWS."
"Pricing is not as fair as Amazon or Azure."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
18%
Computer Software Company
18%
University
14%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
13%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Google Compute Engine?
Everything is simple and useful. The initial setup is not challenging.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Compute Engine?
Google resources are cheaper compared to AWS and Microsoft Azure. Among the three, Google is the cheapest option.
What needs improvement with Google Compute Engine?
Google has a lack of focus on their products. They have many products in various areas of the market, but they do not productize or appeal to the market effectively. They should concentrate on prod...
Which is preferable - IBM Public Cloud or Microsoft Azure?
IBM Public Cloud is IBM’s Platform-as-a-Service. It aims to provide organizations with a secure cloud environment to manage data and applications. One of the features we like is the cloud activity ...
What needs improvement with IBM Cloud?
The front end is not pervasive, so it is very difficult get the status of your current services or account from a mobile device.
What do you like most about IBM Public Cloud?
The most valuable feature of IBM Public Cloud is the AI integrations.
 

Also Known As

No data available
IBM Bluemix
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Allthecooks, BetterCloud, Bluecore, Cosentry, Evite, Ezakus, HTC, Infectious Media, iStreamPlanet, Mendelics, SageMathCloud, Sedex, Treeptik, Wibigoo, Wix, zulily, Zync
Uvionics Tech, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Alpha Modus, Inventive, Web Business Consulting, FindBrok, SilverHook Powerboats, United Way of Allegheny County
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Oracle and others in Infrastructure as a Service Clouds (IaaS). Updated: January 2025.
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