Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Azure File Storage VS Google Cloud Filestore

Compare Azure File Storage VS Google Cloud Filestore and see what are their differences

Azure File Storage logo Azure File Storage

Try Azure File Storage for managed file shares that use standard SMB 3.0 protocol. Share data with on-premises and cloud servers, integrate with apps, and more.

Google Cloud Filestore logo Google Cloud Filestore

Fully-managed cloud file storage
  • Azure File Storage Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-11
  • Google Cloud Filestore Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-08-19

Azure File Storage features and specs

  • Scalability
    Azure File Storage can seamlessly scale up to support your data storage needs without sacrificing performance, ensuring that businesses can grow without concerns about storage limitations.
  • Managed Service
    As a fully managed service, Azure takes care of the maintenance, updates, and infrastructure, reducing administrative overhead for IT teams, and allowing them to focus on other business-critical tasks.
  • Integration
    Azure File Storage integrates well with other Microsoft products such as Windows Server and other Azure services, enabling a cohesive and efficient ecosystem for consistent and smooth user experiences.
  • Access Control
    Provides robust access control through Azure Active Directory, setting up specific permissions, ensuring that data remains secure and only accessible to authorized users.
  • Cross-platform Access
    Supports the SMB protocol, allowing access from various operating systems including Windows, Linux, and macOS, enabling diverse environments to interact seamlessly with the storage service.

Possible disadvantages of Azure File Storage

  • Cost
    Costs can accumulate rapidly, especially in scenarios involving large volumes of data, frequent access, or high redundancy, potentially leading to substantial operational expenses.
  • Complex Pricing Model
    The pricing model can be complex with various tiers and charges based on operations, data redundancy, and outbound data transfer, making it difficult to predict the exact costs effectively.
  • Latency
    While generally fast, there can be latency issues, particularly in situations where files are accessed from regions that are geographically distant from the storage location, affecting performance.
  • Limited Customization
    Compared to on-premise solutions, there is limited capacity for customization of the infrastructure and may not meet specific needs of certain businesses that require tailor-made setups.
  • Dependency on Internet Connectivity
    Azure File Storage relies on stable internet connectivity, which can be a risk for businesses situated in areas with unstable networks or outages, impacting the ability to access data.

Google Cloud Filestore features and specs

  • High Performance
    Google Cloud Filestore provides high-performance file storage with low latency and high throughput, which is ideal for applications that require rapid access to large datasets.
  • Seamless NFS Integration
    Filestore supports the Network File System (NFS) protocol, allowing for easy integration and mounting with existing applications and systems that are NFS-compatible.
  • Scalability
    It offers flexible storage capacity, allowing users to start with a small server and scale up as needed without significant overhead or downtime.
  • Managed Service
    Being a fully managed service, Filestore eliminates the need for complex setup and ongoing maintenance, enabling users to focus on their core business processes.
  • Data Redundancy
    Filestore provides built-in data redundancy to protect against data loss, which enhances the reliability of the stored data.

Possible disadvantages of Google Cloud Filestore

  • Cost
    The pricing for Google Cloud Filestore can become high, especially for large-scale deployments or extensive use cases, potentially impacting the overall budget.
  • Regional Limitations
    Filestore services are not available in all Google Cloud regions, which might complicate deployments across global infrastructures.
  • Limited Protocol Support
    Currently, Filestore primarily supports the NFS protocol, limiting use cases where other protocols like SMB or CIFS may be required.
  • Complex Configuration
    While it is a managed service, setting up and configuring Filestore to meet specific performance requirements can be complex and may require expertise.
  • Latency
    Network latency can be an issue if the Filestore is not closely located to the compute resources, affecting the performance of latency-sensitive applications.

Azure File Storage videos

No Azure File Storage videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

Add video

Google Cloud Filestore videos

VSPARKZ | GCP Filestore | Google Cloud Filestore DEMO - How to create and access Filestore ?

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Azure File Storage and Google Cloud Filestore)
Cloud Storage
51 51%
49% 49
Project Management
57 57%
43% 43
Work Collaboration
57 57%
43% 43
FTP Client
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

Share your experience with using Azure File Storage and Google Cloud Filestore. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
Log in or Post with

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Azure File Storage should be more popular than Google Cloud Filestore. It has been mentiond 14 times since March 2021. 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.

Azure File Storage mentions (14)

  • A Step by Step Guide on How to Migrate from AWS to Azure
    If your workloads require shared storage, Azure Files is a nice pick. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • Searching for online alternative for a synology
    Azure Files perhaps? Or if you need frequently accessed files to be quicker then Azure File Sync. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • How To Upload and Delete files in Azure Blob Storage Using Blazor Apps With .NET 7
    ​To know more details: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/products/storage/files/. - Source: dev.to / about 2 years ago
  • Hosted, mappable storage?
    If you have a use case that affords any kind of budget, maybe consder Azure Files. It is an SMB share you access over the internet. Basically, windows file server but hardened and entirely managed by Microsoft. This is as hands-off as it gets for an SMB share. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Microsoft cloud drive options
    I have a client that (finally!) decided to go all-in on Azure; I had prepared the owner to expect additional costs based on their need for a file share -- I was expecting to have to use Azure Files. Source: over 2 years ago
View more

Google Cloud Filestore mentions (4)

  • FreeBSD 14.0 Delivering Great Performance Uplift
    It's basically still the only game in town for a high performance shared posix filesystem with multiple writers and builtin support in basically all operating systems. As an application developer, I probably wouldn't choose to design a system that needed it. However there are lots of good reasons why a company in 2023 might decide to use this NFS based product: https://cloud.google.com/filestore?hl=en. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Gcsfuse: A user-space file system for interacting with Google Cloud Storage
    Hi, Brandon from GCS here! If you're looking for all of the guarantees of a real, POSIX filesystem, you want to do fast top level directory listing for 100MM+ nested files, and POSIX permissions/owner/group and other file metadata are important to you, Gcsfuse is probably not what you're after. You might want something more like Filestore: https://cloud.google.com/filestore Gcsfuse is a great way to mount Cloud... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Open-source Media Streaming Service for Kubernetes
    At Redactics we needed a way to provide writeable persistent storage to multiple Kubernetes pods. Cost effective ReadWriteMany storage options are generally somewhat limited, in our experience. Using Amazon S3 or the like was also not a great option for us, because the Redactics SMART Agent uses Apache Airflow and the KubernetesPodOperator for a number of its workflow steps - many of which run in parallel. This... - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
  • Choosing a shared storage for GKE
    It sounds like you're looking for Filestore. You can mount Filestore shares as NFS in GKE deployments, and every deployment sees the same set of files. Source: almost 3 years ago

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Azure File Storage and Google Cloud Filestore, you can also consider the following products

Cyberduck - A libre FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, S3, Backblaze B2, Azure & OpenStack Swift browser.

Google Cloud Resource Manager - Resource Manager provides methods that you can use to programmatically manage your projects on Google Cloud Platform.

Igloo Software - Igloo is a modern intranet, it connects people with the information they need to do their best work.

IBM Cloud File Storage - IBM Cloud File Storage is flash-backed, durable, fast, and flexible NFS-based file storage.

DriveHQ - DriveHQ is the first Cloud IT solution provider with the best customer support.

HPE Nimble Storage - Hit the app-data gap? HPE Nimble Storage flash arrays and solutions with predictive analytics ensure fast, reliable access to data for data center and cloud applications.