Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

AWS Direct Connect vs Tailscale comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

AWS Direct Connect
Ranking in Enterprise Infrastructure VPN
13th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Tailscale
Ranking in Enterprise Infrastructure VPN
14th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.6
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
ZTNA (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Enterprise Infrastructure VPN category, the mindshare of AWS Direct Connect is 1.8%, down from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tailscale is 5.1%, down from 7.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Infrastructure VPN Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
AWS Direct Connect1.8%
Tailscale5.1%
Other93.1%
Enterprise Infrastructure VPN
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2231871 - PeerSpot reviewer
Product Manager at a comms service provider with 201-500 employees
Offers secure high-bandwidth connectivity without internet-related risks
Regarding the benefits from the multiple virtual interfaces in the product, there is no interface for the product; it is just a connection that we have. It is an ethernet connection we offer. The customer, from the customer side to AWS, receives an ethernet point-to-point connection, and that is it. The interface and everything along with the communication with AWS, the customer has to do by themselves to build the routes and everything. The connection speed that our clients are using ranges from 100 megabits up to 10 gigabits. The main concern is the port costs. Clients do not report technical problems, so it is mainly always an issue of money. The solution is nice, but sometimes they avoid it because the port costs are high. This is not a problem AWS has exclusively; Azure has the same costs, and these port costs are quite expensive. I would rate this review as an 8 out of 10.
reviewer2797194 - PeerSpot reviewer
Software Engineer
Securing private cloud workflows has protected sensitive AWS resources with fine-grained access
The best features Tailscale offers are highlighted by the fact that setting up Tailscale was straightforward, at least once you are following the documentation and the guides. The security is valuable, as there are many providers available, but Tailscale fulfills the requirements that we had, allowing us to access and expose internal apps without exposing them to the general internet. The complex site-to-site connections are replaced using VPNs, and we can SSH into our remote desktops or SSH into our EC2 machines in our AWS regions in a secure way. About the features that make Tailscale stand out for me, with access control lists, we can fine-grain what can be accessed and by whom. It solved our base use case, which is keeping our secured infrastructure behind a private VPN, and that is why we started using it in the first place. Tailscale has had more positive impacts on my organization regarding security.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"AWS Direct Connect provides a secure and encrypted connection over the internet."
"The platform's most valuable feature for us is its robust network performance."
"AWS Direct Connect allows me to connect our on-premise infrastructure directly with AWS infrastructure."
"It is a stable solution."
"It is a highly scalable solution."
"AWS Direct Connect allows me to connect our on-premise infrastructure directly with AWS infrastructure."
"Direct Connect provides an improved connection quality and a diversified link, which contributes to high availability and failover capabilities."
"AWS Direct Connect is highly secure and much faster compared to normal network infrastructure."
"The security is valuable, as there are many providers available, but Tailscale fulfills the requirements that we had, allowing us to access and expose internal apps without exposing them to the general internet."
 

Cons

"Having more locations could improve the convenience of using the service."
"One area that needs improvement is the cost of the ports, which is a concern as these charges are quite high."
"Its terminologies are challenging to interpret."
"It is complicated to do additional BGP configuration for the product."
"There is no room for improvement in Direct Connect right now."
"I would like to see better traffic visibility and higher throughput security, especially for organizations that require more than what the current limit allows."
"It can be difficult to configure compared to cloud-based GUIs."
"AWS Direct Connect should support cross-cloud connections, such as migrations between Azure and AWS, for disaster recovery purposes on different cloud platforms."
"Regarding how Tailscale can be improved, I think for free users, there are some limited options."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is an expensive solution."
"It has reasonable pricing in terms of the features offered."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Enterprise Infrastructure VPN solutions are best for your needs.
881,707 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
12%
University
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Comms Service Provider
16%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise3
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS Direct Connect?
AWS Direct Connect provides a secure and encrypted connection over the internet.
What needs improvement with AWS Direct Connect?
We encountered issues with the connection. The VPN was not connecting on multiple occasions.
What is your primary use case for AWS Direct Connect?
I'm not an end user of any of those SAP products. I wanted to have a comparison between different solutions for process mining and process modeling, but I'm not an end user of any. I have Microsoft...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers
Bamboo Health, Duolingo, Shiguredo, Instacart, Corelight, Machinify, Bolt, Mercari, Cobalt, Yugabyte, Jasper, VersaBank, Zego, Gini and Finter
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, OpenVPN, Check Point Software Technologies and others in Enterprise Infrastructure VPN. Updated: January 2026.
881,707 professionals have used our research since 2012.