Google Cloud Spanner vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB comparison

Google and Microsoft are both solutions in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category. Google is ranked #9 with an average rating of 9.0, while Microsoft is ranked #6 with an average rating of 8.2. Google holds a 5.1% mindshare in DS, compared to Microsoft’s 2.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Google users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

Google Cloud Spanner

Read 5 Google Cloud Spanner reviews

836 Views
769 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Read 102 Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB reviews

6,178 Views
494 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Google Cloud Spanner

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 2025

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB and Google Cloud Spanner compete in cloud-based database services. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB seems to have the upper hand due to its flexible pricing and strong customer support, although Google Cloud Spanner's advanced features appeal to those seeking cutting-edge technology.

Features: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB excels with its multi-model capabilities, global distribution efficiency, and high availability. Google Cloud Spanner is notable for strong consistency, horizontal scalability, and SQL support, making it suitable for complex transactional data requirements.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB could enhance its advanced feature set to compete better with high-end solutions. Further automation in scalability processes might also be beneficial. While Google Cloud Spanner is advanced, its pricing could be more adaptable to smaller enterprises. Simplifying the learning curve would broaden its user base.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is recognized for its straightforward deployment and robust customer support, which is ideal for ease of use. Google Cloud Spanner requires a steeper learning curve and more resources for deployment, reflecting its technical depth.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB typically offers adaptable pricing options appealing to budget-conscious users seeking quick ROI. Google Cloud Spanner, with premium pricing, aims for long-term performance and scalability benefits, attracting enterprises focused on substantial returns.

To learn more, read our detailed Google Cloud Spanner vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Google Cloud Spanner vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

July 2025

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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

Google Cloud Spanner

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

9th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

6th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

102

Ranking in other categories

NoSQL Databases (3rd), Managed NoSQL Databases (1st), Vector Databases (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Google Cloud Spanner is 5.1%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is 2.8%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

Featured Reviews

Ethan Lo

Infrastructuer Security at Premise Data

A stable and scalable relational database that ensures a return on investment for its users

The most valuable feature of the solution is its scalability. Scalability comes with two options, among which Google Cloud Spanner can scale horizontally, compared to other relational databases that scale vertically. You can change Google Cloud Spanner's resource configuration, which is done through processing units. Suppose you set up Google Cloud Spanner initially with a hundred processing units, and then you run out of resources since your database used too much CPU. In the aforementioned scenario, you can scale up or down and face no downtime in the production phase. The solution's features are important when running a company twenty-four hours, seven days a week.

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MichaelJohn

Director | Data & AI at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Very efficient for application-facing scenarios

There are several areas for improvement. Firstly, having a local development emulator or simulator for Azure Cosmos DB would be beneficial. It would be very handy to have a Docker container that developers can use locally. Although, I know there is a free tier and so on and so forth, having a local environment would be nice. For example, SQL Server is very portable. You can even install it on your machine. That is the number one thing that is missing in Azure Cosmos DB. The second improvement area is the IDE of choice. That means how you interact with Azure Cosmos DB. For example, with SQL Server, you have SQL Server Management Studio. I know there is a little bit of support for Azure Cosmos DB in Azure Data Studio, but it is not heavily advertised or it does not feel like first-class citizen support. Developer experience or developer tooling is missing in terms of interacting with the database. Better developer tools or an IDE for interacting with Azure Cosmos DB would enhance the developer experience. Lastly, there is some mixed messaging about what Azure Cosmos DB is, given its multiple APIs. There are so many Azure Cosmos DB APIs available. There is NoSQL. There are MongoDB, Gremlin, and others. There is still some mixed messaging for others who are new to Azure Cosmos DB about what Azure Cosmos DB is. Is this like MongoDB, but then there is also MongoDB in Azure Cosmos DB? I know it well, and I know that the default one is just NoSQL, but others I have interacted with over the last ten years or so get confused.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We can scale the solution if we need to."

"It is a very scalable solution."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is its scalability. Scalability comes with two options, among which Google Cloud Spanner can scale horizontally, compared to other relational databases that scale vertically."

"Google Cloud Spanner is stable."

"The application deployment in the cloud is the best feature of the infrastructure."

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB offers the response times needed for advanced analytics applications."

"Big data, along with data analysis, is one of the valuable features."

"I like the way you can create and delete records. You pass a JSON, and then it creates a record."

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB simplifies the process of saving and retrieving data."

"Azure Cosmos DB offers efficient indexing and low search latency, making searching fast and efficient and ensuring peace of mind in database operations."

"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is its real-time analytics capabilities, which allow for turnaround times in milliseconds."

"The best feature about Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is its interface, which is awesome for accessing data."

"It handles large-scale operations efficiently, such as tracking views, logs, or events."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pros

Cons

"The tool lacks to offer AI features."

"Google came up with something called Cloud Spanner Emulator, which fails to work like the real product if I want to develop some code and run a database locally on my machine."

"The tool needs to improve horizontal scaling."

"The cost can be a bit high."

"I want to improve the deployment of cameras and surveillance infrastructure."

"An improvement would be a more robust functionality around updating elements on a document, or some type of procedural updates that don't require pulling the entire document."

"The main area of improvement is the cost, as the expense is high. Also, when writing processes into Cosmos, sometimes the threshold is met, which can be a problem if developers have not written the code properly, limiting calls to five thousand."

"A limitation in Azure Cosmos DB is the 2 MB document size. Developers need more systemic support in chaining multiple documents if more than 2 MB is required."

"A minor improvement would be enabling batch operations through the UI. Currently, to delete all documents in a collection, we must use an API, which some of my team finds inconvenient for admin tasks."

"Areas of improvement for Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB include indexing. While it makes data retrieval easier, it also increases costs."

"Microsoft's support services are inadequate, especially during critical incidents."

"I have to say technical support is not very good as it takes too long. Sometimes it can take them two or three days to respond to your ticket."

"One of the most frustrating aspects of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB right now is that you can only store one vector per document."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side."

"The solution is expensive."

"Google Cloud Spanner is an expensive solution."

"It is expensive."

"If you are a small organization or startup building from scratch without the Microsoft Startup Founder Club support, it could be expensive."

"The pricing model of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is a bit complex."

"Cosmos DB is a PaaS, so there are no upfront costs for infrastructure. There are only subscriptions you pay for Azure and things like that. But it's a PaaS, so it's a subscription service. The license isn't perpetual, and the cost might seem expensive on its face, but you have to look at the upkeep for infrastructure and what you're saving."

"The customer had a high budget, but it turned out to be a little bit cheaper than what they expected. I am not sure how much they have spent so far, but they are satisfied with the pricing."

"Pricing, at times, is not super clear because they use the request unit (RU) model. To manage not just Azure Cosmos DB but what you are receiving for the dollars paid is not easy. It is very abstract. They could do a better job of connecting Azure Cosmos DB with the value or some variation of that."

"Our experience with the pricing and setup cost is that it aligns with what we expect based on the pricing we see. However, I would absolutely like it to be less if possible."

"The pricing for Cosmos DB has improved, particularly with the new pricing for Autoscale."

"With heavy use, like a large-scale IoT implementation, you could easily hit a quarter of a million dollars a month in Azure charges if Cosmos DB is a big part of it."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Legal Firm

13%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What is your primary use case for Google Cloud Spanner?

Google Cloud Spanner has all the features of a traditional relational database, including schemas, SQL queries, ACID transactions, and provides excellent integration and monitoring tools as well as...

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What do you like most about Google Cloud Spanner?

Google Cloud Spanner is stable.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud Spanner?

Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side. I am not sure if this is a rumor or if it's fake news, but I believe that having BigQuery and GCP together could be a little cos...

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What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The initial setup is simple and straightforward. You can set up a Cosmos DB in a day, even configuring things like availability zones around the world.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The pricing for Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is good, but there is a developer factor to consider. It could be economical or expensive depending on usage. Guidance about query consumption of Request U...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The only area Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB can improve on is its documentation; while it is solid and very useful, enhancements in the indexing documentation would help users save costs and make it mo...

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Comparisons

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Compared 22% of the time

MongoDB Atlas vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 18% of the time

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Compared 10% of the time

Google Cloud SQL vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 9% of the time

Yugabyte Cloud vs Google Cloud Spanner

Compared 5% of the time

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Chroma vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 11% of the time

Pinecone vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 10% of the time

MongoDB Enterprise Advanced vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 6% of the time

Amazon DynamoDB vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 6% of the time

Neo4j Graph Database vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 6% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

August 2025

Download Google Cloud Spanner product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

August 2025

Download Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB product report

Also Known As

Google Spanner

Microsoft Azure DocumentDB, MS Azure Cosmos DB

Overview

Cloud Spanner is the first and only relational database service that is both strongly consistent and horizontally scalable. With Cloud Spanner you enjoy all the traditional benefits of a relational database: ACID transactions, relational schemas (and schema changes without downtime), SQL queries, high performance, and high availability. But unlike any other relational database service, Cloud Spanner scales horizontally, to hundreds or thousands of servers, so it can handle the highest of transactional workloads. With automatic scaling, synchronous data replication, and node redundancy, Cloud Spanner delivers up to 99.999% (five 9s) of availability for your mission critical applications. In fact, Google’s internal Spanner service has been handling millions of queries per second from many Google services for years.

Google

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is a globally distributed, multi-model database service providing scalability, user-friendliness, and seamless integration, suitable for managing large volumes of structured and unstructured data across diverse applications.

Azure Cosmos DB is renowned for its scalability, stability, and ease of integration, offering robust support for multiple data models and APIs. Its capacity for handling unstructured data efficiently and providing real-time analytics makes it ideal for applications requiring high performance and global distribution. With features like automatic failover and integration with Microsoft products, users benefit from cost optimization and secure data handling. Enhancement opportunities include simplifying queries, improving documentation, and expanding backup and analytics functionalities.

What are the most important features of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

Scalability and Autoscaling: Efficiently handles growing data and user demands.
Multi-Model Support: Adapts to different data models seamlessly.
Global Distribution: Provides low-latency access across multiple regions.
Automatic Failover: Ensures high availability and reliability.
Integration with Microsoft Products: Offers seamless connectivity with Azure services.

What benefits should users look for in Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB reviews?

Performance and Speed: Exceptionally fast processing for real-time data analytics.
Cost Optimization: Tools for managing expenses effectively.
Secure Data Handling: Implements strong data security measures.
Flexible Data Ingestion: Supports diverse data ingestion methods.

Azure Cosmos DB is frequently used in sectors like web, mobile, IoT, and analytics. It supports applications as a key-value store, processes real-time data, and enables global scalability with low-latency access. Its big data management capabilities and integration with Azure services enhance its utility across industries.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Streak, Optiva, Mixpanel

TomTom, KPMG Australia, Bosch, ASOS, Mercedes Benz, NBA, Zero Friction, Nederlandse Spoorwegen, Kinectify

Buyer's Guide

Google Cloud Spanner vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

July 2025

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