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Amazon S3 vs Google Cloud Storage Nearline comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 1, 2024

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

Amazon S3
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
85
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Google Cloud Storage Nearline
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
8th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Public Cloud Storage Services category, the mindshare of Amazon S3 is 15.3%, up from 11.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Cloud Storage Nearline is 6.1%, down from 10.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Public Cloud Storage Services Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Amazon S315.3%
Google Cloud Storage Nearline6.1%
Other78.6%
Public Cloud Storage Services
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2774889 - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Has reduced storage costs and improved data management through automated lifecycle and seamless service integration
The best features that Amazon S3 offers are high durability and availability with virtually unlimited storage, lifecycle management for automated tiering and cost control, versioning to retain and recover data changes, and integration with services such as Glue, Athena, EMR, Lambda, along with strong security via IAM roles, bucket policies, and encryption. These features help by ensuring data is always available, securely stored, and easily accessible for pipelines. Lifecycle policies reduce manual cleanup, versioning safeguards against accidental deletions, and integrations allow us to directly run analytics or trigger workflows without moving data around. Amazon S3 event notifications help automate tasks such as triggering ETL jobs or Lambda functions on new data arrivals, and features such as cross-region replication ensure data redundancy and compliance, while fine-grained access control makes it easy to manage permissions across teams securely. My organization has seen improvements in data accessibility, reduced infrastructure costs, and simplified data management through Amazon S3. We now have a unified scalable storage layer that supports analytics, backups, and migrations seamlessly, leading to faster workflows and better decision-making.
Seamless integration with cloud services improves workflows but documentation needs enhancement
One area that needs improvement is the documentation, which I find to be disorganized and not user-friendly. The lack of comprehensive walkthrough guides for specific use cases makes it difficult to follow. To enhance the experience, more detailed examples, guides, and tutorials from start to finish would be beneficial. Additionally, the cost compared to other providers like Amazon could be regarded as a downside.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"An important feature of the Amazon S3's system is that it offers encryption while the files are at rest. This is crucial in ensuring the security of the files being restored and addressing potential security risks. That's what I would emphasize."
"Some of the most valuable features are how convenient and easy to use S3 is. It's nicely integrated with AWS and is available on the AWS console."
"Amazon S3 is scalable and available."
"The most valuable features of Amazon S3 are the performance and hibernation data options. Additionally, there is a feature that provides faster website access that is helpful."
"I rate the technical support from Amazon for S3 a ten out of ten."
"I find the cost-effective models particularly suitable for our needs."
"The best thing about S3 is the security."
"Amazon S3 is very stable. I don't worry about data stored in the S3 bucket as it's safe."
"The API integration with the storage packet is the solution's most valuable feature."
"We didn't face any downtime last year using the solution."
"There are no issues with the integration of Google Cloud Storage Nearline with other Google services."
"The most valuable feature of Nearline is the access. It's helpful to move data that is generated once a month, such as salary information, to Nearline."
"The capacity and space on offer are excellent."
"It can isolate files and stop them from corrupting other files."
"Google is always introducing new features and tends to have a new release every month."
"It provides the necessary support and flexibility to manage data storage effectively, especially during times of variable data flow."
 

Cons

"It is expensive for storing."
"We need the mapping to Windows. That feature is needed in S3."
"One aspect I would mention is the naming in Amazon S3. If I create an S3 bucket with a specific name, such as 'Roberto bucket,' I cannot create it in another account with the same name."
"You need to fully understand the solution's best practices to get the most out of its security features."
"It is difficult to retrieve files in an emergency because the public cloud has data limits for immediate downloads so they often take twelve hours."
"Amazon S3's unit of measure for expansion should be smaller."
"However, this sign is not compliant with internet regulations."
"We would like Amazon to reduce the price of storage."
"Documentation is an area for improvement in Google Cloud Storage Nearline."
"One area that needs improvement is the documentation, which I find to be disorganized and not user-friendly."
"The UI could be a little bit more effective."
"They need a better, more visual, user interface for folders and files."
"The pricing is quite high."
"The solution needs to offer better System Information and Event Management (SEIM). I'd like to discover how we could implement something like that within Google's cloud."
"Nearline security could be better. The solution could integrate better with SEIM tools."
"The pricing could be improved. It's completely non-competitive at this time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is okay."
"This solution has reasonable pricing and a low cost."
"For pricing, I would give it a six or seven out of ten."
"The price of the Amazon S3 is reasonable. There are not any licensing costs, they have a pay-as-you-use model."
"It's worth the price considering its functionality."
"The price of the Amazon S3 is low. The license model is based on what you use."
"The cost of Amazon S3 could be better. As the number of data increases, you'll pay more for Amazon S3. It's around $200, which is okay, but my company uses it less often."
"The pricing is good."
"Right now, for the number of servers and the storage that I have, I would say I'm charged between $125 and $150 per month."
"Google Cloud Storage Nearline is very inexpensive. It costs us less than $50 a month to store our files. We use approximately 10 terabytes. Overall, I would rate the product a five out of five for affordability."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Construction Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise39
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise2
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon S3?
Since using Amazon S3, storage costs have reduced by around 35% to 40% through lifecycle tiering, data availability improved to 99.9% which minimizes downtime, ETL processing time decreased by appr...
What needs improvement with Amazon S3?
The only downside is the scalability limitations. I don't know if that is from AWS or my subscription.
What is your primary use case for Amazon S3?
I use Amazon S3 mainly for backup purposes, specifically for the backup of the internal and user data of the end users or our customers.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud Storage Nearline?
My experience with the licensing and cost of Google Cloud Storage Nearline has been positive.
What needs improvement with Google Cloud Storage Nearline?
Documentation is an area for improvement in Google Cloud Storage Nearline. Documentation might cause some issues during deployment in future updates of Google Cloud Storage Nearline. Other than tha...
What is your primary use case for Google Cloud Storage Nearline?
I have integrated Google Cloud Storage Nearline with BigQuery for analytics.
 

Also Known As

S3, Simple Storage Service
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Netflix, Airbnb, Thomson Reuters, Zillow, Alert Logic
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon S3 vs. Google Cloud Storage Nearline and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.