Cloud pricing comparison
Microsoft AzurevsGoogle Cloud Platform
Azure vs Google Cloud
Compute Pricing
Reference comparison for Azure Virtual Machines and GCP Compute Engine. The table below is a non-authoritative snapshot; use the catalog for provenance-backed current rows.
Microsoft Azure
- Regions
- 60+
- VM sizes
- 600+ sizes
- Pricing models
- Pay-as-you-go, Spot, RI 1yr, RI 3yr
- Auto discounts
- None (manual RI required)
Google Cloud Platform
- Regions
- 40+
- Machine families
- 500+ types
- Pricing models
- On-Demand, Preemptible, CUD 1yr, CUD 3yr
- Auto discounts
- Sustained-use (up to 30%)
Instance pricing comparison
Reference pay-as-you-go / on-demand snapshot for East US / us-central1. Prices per hour.
| Workload | vCPU | RAM | Azure | GCP | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
General purpose 2 vCPU / 8 GB | 2 | 8 GB | $0.0960/hr Standard_D2s_v3 | $0.0971/hr n2-standard-2 | Azure −1% |
General purpose 4 vCPU / 16 GB | 4 | 16 GB | $0.1920/hr Standard_D4s_v3 | $0.1942/hr n2-standard-4 | Azure −1% |
Memory optimized 8 vCPU / 64 GB | 8 | 64 GB | $0.5040/hr Standard_E8s_v3 | $0.4740/hr n2-highmem-8 | GCP −6% |
Compute optimized 16 vCPU / 32 GB | 16 | 32 GB | $0.6800/hr Standard_F16s_v2 | $0.7672/hr c2-standard-16 | Azure −11% |
GPU — H100 (1×) | 8 | 80 GB | $18.6300/hr NCH100v4 | $12.3560/hr a3-highgpu-1g | GCP −34% |
Reference-only rows for orientation, not live provider pricing. GCP sustained-use discounts may lower effective costs for persistent workloads.
Coverage & pricing models
| Capability | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|
| Regions | 60+ | 40+ |
| Instance / VM types | 600+ | 500+ |
| Pricing models | 4 | 4 |
| Spot / preemptible | Yes | Yes |
| Reserved (1 yr) | Yes | Yes |
| Reserved (3 yr) | Yes | Yes |
| Sustained-use discounts | No | Yes |
| Savings plans | No | No |
Feature availability
| Feature | Azure | GCP |
|---|---|---|
| Global load balancing | ||
| Managed Kubernetes (free CP) | ||
| Arm-based instances | ||
| Spot / preemptible instances | ||
| Committed-use discounts | ||
| Sustained-use auto-discounts | ||
| Custom machine types | ||
| Confidential VMs | ||
| Carbon-neutral regions | ||
| Active Directory integration | ||
| Windows Server licensing incl. | ||
| Free tier (12 months) |
When to choose each cloud
Choose Azure when
- You are a Microsoft-first org using M365, Active Directory, or Teams
- Windows Server and SQL Server licensing bundling reduces TCO
- Your compliance requirements favor the broadest global region footprint
- Confidential computing and Azure Trusted Launch VMs are requirements
- Hybrid connectivity with on-premises datacenters via ExpressRoute is needed
Choose GCP when
- Sustained-use auto-discounts will benefit your steady-state compute
- Custom machine types let you avoid overpaying for fixed instance shapes
- Vertex AI, BigQuery, or Cloud TPUs are central to your ML stack
- You are a Google Workspace org and want unified identity management
- H100/A100 GPU pricing at scale is a deciding cost factor
Also compare
Open provenance-backed Azure and GCP pricing
Search, filter, and compare catalog rows with source badges and freshness metadata when normalized provider pricing has been imported.