Azure Blob Storage Vs Amazon Glacier – What’s the Difference?

Data stored in the cloud often grows exponentially. The major cloud storage systems allow you to manage costs of the increasing storage needs based on the factors such as how frequently you access data stored in the cloud, whether you require low latency or can wait for a certain time for retrieval, and for how long you need to store data in the cloud. Data can be of different types based on how it is generated, used, stored, and accessed during its lifetime. This article will discuss two major cloud storage services that allow you to store data depending upon its pattern of use. These services are Azure Blob Storage offered by Microsoft Azure, and Amazon Glacier offered by Amazon Web Services.

Azure Blob Storage – A Quick Review

Data can come from multiple sources and take the form of silos in a considerably short time. These data silos are expensive to store and challenging to manage. Azure provides you a single modern platform to inexpensively store massive amounts of data, enabling you to effectively handle it and extract maximum value from it. Azure Blob Storage is a scalable, durable, and highly secure cloud storage platform. It is capable of handling intense workloads, which means Azure Blob Storage can meet any capacity to accommodate your data.

What Makes Azure Blob an Ideal Cloud Storage Platform?

There can be a scenario where data is frequently accessed and processed throughout its lifetime. There can be another scenario where data is actively accessed close to the point when it is generated and hardly accessed as it starts aging. Also, there can be the third scenario where data is accessed rarely or not even once after the storage. Azure Blob Storage takes all these scenarios into account and offers you the ability to store data at minimal costs based on its access pattern, retention period, etc. Through hot, cool, and archive access tiers, Azure Blob Storage provides you distinct access tiers with varying pricing models so that you don’t have to pay for what you don’t use.

Amazon Glacier – A Quick Review

Amazon Glacier is a set of secure, durable, and a low-cost Amazon S3 cloud storage classes called as Amazon S3 Glacier and Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive. Amazon Glacier is designed for long-term backup and data archiving. It claims to deliver 99.99% durability along with comprehensive security and compliance capabilities. To offer the service at a low-cost Amazon S3 Glacier gives you three options for access to archives with time ranging from a few minutes to several hours. S3 Glacier Deep Archive offers two access options where access time can be from 12 to 48 hours.

Why Azure Blob Storage Can be a Better Choice than AWS Glacier?

Azure Blob Storage can be a better enterprise solution for data storage and archiving because of its elasticity and convenience. With hot, cool, and archive tiers, applications can receive better options for smooth data management. Unlike Amazon Glacier, Azure Archive Blob Storage doesn’t force you to manage your data in sets. Also, the retrieval process is unarguably fast.

The low pricing of Amazon Glacier comes at its own cost. The retrieval of data is possible only with a delay of several hours. In the Azure Blob Storage vs Amazon Glacier comparison, the former stands out with its ability to retrieve archived data in real-time. What’s more? Azure Blob allows you to enjoy as low latency as you get with normal cloud storage.

Apps4Rent – Your One-Stop Shop for All Azure Products and Services

The sky is the limit in the cloud storage, no matter whether Azure Blob Storage wins over Amazon Glacier or vice versa. Take a few minutes to evaluate your storage needs and decide which service can produce more benefits. However, if your think Azure Blob Storage is for you, contact Apps4Rent today for Azure managed services. We are Tier 1 Microsoft CSP with a robust team of Microsoft certified professionals to extend our expertise. We are available 24/7 via phone, chat, and email.