Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Amazon S3 VS AWS Storage Gateway

Compare Amazon S3 VS AWS Storage Gateway and see what are their differences

Amazon S3 logo Amazon S3

Amazon S3 is an object storage where users can store data from their business on a safe, cloud-based platform. Amazon S3 operates in 54 availability zones within 18 graphic regions and 1 local region.

AWS Storage Gateway logo AWS Storage Gateway

AWS Storage Gateway is a service connecting an on-premises software appliance with cloud-based storage.
  • Amazon S3 Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-11-01

Amazon S3 (Amazon Simple Storage Service) is the storage platform by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that provides an object storage with high availability, low latency and high durability. S3 can store any type of object and can serve as storage for internet applications, backups, disaster recovery, data archives, big data sets and multimedia.

  • AWS Storage Gateway Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-11

Amazon S3 features and specs

  • Scalability
    Amazon S3 automatically scales storage resources to meet user demands, enabling businesses to store a virtually unlimited amount of data without worrying about capacity constraints.
  • Durability
    Amazon S3 is designed for 99.999999999% (11 9's) durability, ensuring that your data is highly protected against loss and corruption.
  • Security
    Amazon S3 offers robust security features, including encryption at rest and in transit, fine-grained access controls, and integration with AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM).
  • Integrations
    Amazon S3 integrates seamlessly with other AWS services such as EC2, Lambda, and RDS, as well as third-party applications, facilitating a cohesive cloud environment.
  • Cost-Effectiveness
    Amazon S3 offers a range of storage classes, allowing users to optimize costs based on their access patterns, from frequently accessed data to long-term archival storage.
  • Global Availability
    Amazon S3 is available in multiple regions worldwide, providing low latency and high availability for users around the globe.

Possible disadvantages of Amazon S3

  • Complexity
    The wide array of features and configurations in Amazon S3 can be overwhelming for beginners, requiring a steep learning curve and careful planning.
  • Cost Predictability
    Although cost-effective, the pricing model of Amazon S3 can be complex due to various factors such as storage volume, data transfer rates, and request frequency, leading to unpredictable costs if not monitored closely.
  • Performance Variation
    While generally offering high performance, the speed of data retrieval from Amazon S3 can vary based on factors like object size, storage class, and region, potentially affecting time-sensitive applications.
  • Limited Migration Tools
    Although Amazon provides data migration services, some users find the migration tools and processes cumbersome, especially when moving large volumes of data from other storage solutions.
  • Vendor Lock-In
    Relying heavily on Amazon S3 and other AWS services can make it difficult to switch providers or develop a multi-cloud strategy, leading to potential vendor lock-in concerns.

AWS Storage Gateway features and specs

  • Hybrid Cloud Capabilities
    AWS Storage Gateway allows seamless integration between on-premises storage and AWS cloud, ensuring a smooth transition and hybrid cloud operations without disrupting existing workflows.
  • Backup and Disaster Recovery
    The service provides robust options for backing up and archiving data to S3, Glacier, and other AWS storage solutions, enhancing data protection and disaster recovery capabilities.
  • Scalability
    AWS Storage Gateway leverages the scalable nature of AWS cloud storage, enabling businesses to scale their storage needs up or down with ease, based on demand.
  • Cost Efficiency
    By offloading storage to AWS, organizations can reduce the need for expensive on-premises storage infrastructure, paying only for the storage they use.
  • Data Security and Compliance
    AWS provides strong security measures, including encryption at rest and in transit, as well as compliance with several industry standards, which helps businesses meet regulatory requirements.
  • Improved Data Management
    The integration with AWS services allows for enhanced data management and analytics capabilities, facilitating better data insights and business intelligence.

Possible disadvantages of AWS Storage Gateway

  • Dependency on Internet Connectivity
    Since AWS Storage Gateway relies on internet connectivity for data transfer to AWS cloud, any network downtime can disrupt access to data.
  • Upfront Learning Curve
    Implementing and managing AWS Storage Gateway may require a learning curve for IT staff, especially those who are not familiar with AWS services.
  • Ongoing Costs
    While AWS Storage Gateway can reduce on-premises infrastructure costs, there are ongoing cloud storage and data transfer fees which can accumulate over time.
  • Data Transfer Latency
    Transferring large amounts of data over the internet to AWS cloud storage can introduce latency, which might not be ideal for applications requiring real-time data access.
  • Potential Vendor Lock-in
    Relying heavily on AWS services may lead to vendor lock-in, making it challenging to switch providers or migrate workloads in the future.

Amazon S3 videos

Introduction to Amazon S3

More videos:

  • Review - Getting Started with Amazon S3 - AWS Online Tech Talks
  • Review - Amazon S3 Review: Amazon S3
  • Review - Amazon S3 Glacier Cloud Storage: What You Need to Know
  • Review - Wasabi vs. Amazon S3

AWS Storage Gateway videos

Cloud Storage in Minutes with AWS Storage Gateway

More videos:

  • Tutorial - What is AWS Storage Gateway | Cloud Storage Gateway Tutorial
  • Demo - AWS Storage Gateway Demo

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Amazon S3 and AWS Storage Gateway)
Cloud Hosting
100 100%
0% 0
Cloud Storage
79 79%
21% 21
Cloud Computing
85 85%
15% 15
Object Storage
88 88%
12% 12

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Amazon S3 and AWS Storage Gateway

Amazon S3 Reviews

Top 7 Firebase Alternatives for App Development in 2024
Amazon S3 is suitable for applications of any size requiring reliable and scalable storage.
Source: signoz.io
Best Top 12 MEGA Alternatives in 2024
Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) is an object storage service with industry-leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance. The service is particularly suitable for enterprise users to manage collect, store, protect, back-up, retrieve, and analyze data.
7 Best Amazon S3 Alternatives & Competitors in 2024
Amazon S3 is short for Amazon Simple Storage Service, a popular web hosting company among developers that also offers object storage service.
Top 10 Netlify Alternatives
Amazon S3 is referred to as Amazon Simple Storage Service. It is basically a cloud storage service that was initially released in 2006. This product of Amazon Web Services (AWS) handles big data analytics, provides online data backups and helps in web-scale computing.
What are the alternatives to S3?
Sometimes Amazon S3 might not be serving you as you need and need some features or want to move out of the big 3 providers due to charges of which you’re not using much of their services. There are many alternatives to object storage that you can use at a far lower cost than what you pay on Amazon S3. And storing data traditionally can become complicated sometimes, whereby...
Source: www.w6d.io

AWS Storage Gateway Reviews

We have no reviews of AWS Storage Gateway yet.
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Amazon S3 seems to be a lot more popular than AWS Storage Gateway. While we know about 198 links to Amazon S3, we've tracked only 7 mentions of AWS Storage Gateway. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Amazon S3 mentions (198)

View more

AWS Storage Gateway mentions (7)

  • Best way to use ftp(s) to s3 for document upload?
    Could Storage Gateway help here? EC2 fronts the FTP endpoint to a file server that is Storage Gateway? Source: over 2 years ago
  • Allow S3 files to be accessed from an on-prem app
    One option is https://aws.amazon.com/storagegateway/ (plus VPN). Source: almost 3 years ago
  • self hosted s3 server?
    That helps, thank you. You might have a look at AWS' Storage Gateway, more specifically the S3 File Gateway. Source: almost 3 years ago
  • Are there tools or service that provide near realtime file sync to s3
    I *think* storage gateway can do this (https://aws.amazon.com/storagegateway/). Also, several of the Amazon FSx services can, I think. They all basically mean you have a remote file system to which you write, and that file system gets backed up to FSx. Source: almost 3 years ago
  • Best way to approach scheduling a call to move data (csv) from my ERP system to S3?
    You can deploy Storage gateway in your local environment, and copy the files to storage gateway, it will automatically sync the files to s3. Source: over 3 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Amazon S3 and AWS Storage Gateway, you can also consider the following products

Google Cloud Storage - Google Cloud Storage offers developers and IT organizations durable and highly available object storage.

VMware vSAN - VMware vSAN is radically simple, enterprise-class software-defined storage powering VMware hyper-converged infrastructure. 

Wasabi Cloud Object Storage - Storage made simple. Faster than Amazon's S3. Less expensive than Glacier.

Azure Storage Explorer - Easily manage your Azure storage accounts in the cloud, from Windows, macOS, or Linux, using Azure Storage Explorer.

AWS Lambda - Automatic, event-driven compute service

Zadara Storage - Enterprise Storage-as-a-Service Solutions (STaaS). On premises or in the cloud. Fully-managed 24/7. Pay only for what you use. Leading companies worldwide trust Zadara Data Storage. Proud to be the best cloud storage option