Azure dominates enterprise cloud infrastructure with 23% global market share and superior integration with Microsoft enterprise tools, while Oracle Cloud excels in database workloads and offers aggressive pricing for existing Oracle licensees. Azure is the safer choice for most enterprises; Oracle Cloud is better for database-heavy workloads.
Azure vs Oracle Cloud — Side-by-side comparison on A Versus B
Enterprise cloud platform with 200+ services covering compute, AI, analytics, and compliance.
Database-first cloud platform optimized for Oracle workloads with 47+ data centers
Global Market Share. Monthly Cost (4-vCPU VM, 16GB RAM, US East). Microsoft Enterprise Integration. Database Performance (Oracle Database). AI/ML Service Portfolio. Compliance Certifications. Available Regions Globally
Choose Azure if you're an enterprise heavily invested in Microsoft products, need broad cloud service variety, or require maximum global availability and compliance options. Choose Oracle Cloud if you're running Oracle Database at scale, want aggressive pricing on database licenses, or have existing Oracle on-premises investments you need to migrate efficiently.
Microsoft Azure: 200+ | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $0.018 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $0.002 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Exclusive OpenAI partnership | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure Stack Hub (enterprise-grade) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 60+ regions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 40 regions
Microsoft Azure: Container Instances (mature) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 23% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 52% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 9%
Microsoft Azure: 60+ | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 6/10 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 7/10 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Excellent (Stack/Arc) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 10/10 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Large | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Strong (AKS) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Via Synapse | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 5-15 seconds (Synapse) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 1-2x faster (HDInsight baseline) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $0.40-$2.00 (VM-dependent) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure only (with hybrid via Stack) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure ML, AutoML (separate setup) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Deep (Office 365, Teams, Dynamics, Power BI native) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure Purview, Synapse governance, encryption | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 6-12 months (full cloud migration) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 420 seconds | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 1x baseline | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 40+ frameworks | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Database and table-level basic | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 60+ native | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 500+ | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $2,000-$4,000 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Limited (requires workarounds) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 60+ regions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Limited free tier; specific allocations by service | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 10 Tbps standard protection | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $21.77/month (B1s instance) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Varies ($25-500+ for multi-service bundle) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: ~50-100ms (varies by region) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Supported Programming Languages (Workers/Serverless)
Microsoft Azure: Node.js, Python, Java, .NET, Go, C# (Functions) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 60 minutes (Premium Support) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $15-20 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $30-50 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 99.95% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 30-60 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 25+ | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $200 (30 days) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 23% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 3%
Microsoft Azure: $290 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): $185
Microsoft Azure: 70+ services | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 35+ services
Microsoft Azure: 60 regions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 41 regions
Microsoft Azure: 90+ (HIPAA, FedRAMP, SOC 2, ISO 27001) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 60+
Oracle Database Performance Optimization
Microsoft Azure: Third-party optimization | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 20% faster on OCI
Microsoft Azure: Native (Office 365, Teams, Dynamics, AD) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): Third-party connectors only
Microsoft Azure: Not applicable | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 70-75% savings on Oracle licenses
Microsoft Azure: 60 regions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 45+ services | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $15-30 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Available (separate purchase) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Native, optimized licensing | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 99.99% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 12+ databases | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: ~95% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 60 regions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 47+ regions
Compute Instance Starting Price (hourly)
Microsoft Azure: $0.0120/hour (B1s) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: up to 72% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure SQL Database (native) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure ML (launched 2014) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $0.0106/hour | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $7.60/month | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 200+ services | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 11,904 GB | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 15 minutes | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 8/10 (steep) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $15/month (1-core VM) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 30 days ($200 credit) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 15-20 minutes (average) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 50+ pre-built AI models, full ML platform | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: HIPAA, FedRAMP, PCI-DSS, SOC2, ISO 27001 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Complex: 100+ pricing tiers, reserved instances, spot pricing | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 1-3x (HDInsight standard) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: $0.055-$0.116 (Standard_D4s_v3) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Azure only | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: No (requires external solutions) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 200+ (all cloud categories) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Native, no additional setup | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: Shared resources via RBAC | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: AES-256, customer-managed keys | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 180+ services | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 65+ services
Database Autonomous Administration Coverage
Microsoft Azure: 40% | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 80%
Starting Compute Instance Cost (monthly)
Microsoft Azure: $25-35 | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): $20-30
Database Optimization for Oracle Workloads
Microsoft Azure: Baseline (100%) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): +25% faster
Microsoft Azure: Limited tier | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 1 GB free
Microsoft Azure: 600ms avg | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 400ms avg
Microsoft Azure: $0 (limited free tier) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Managed Kubernetes Pricing (Per Cluster)
Microsoft Azure: $73 (AKS standard) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 75+ (OpenAI, Vision, Language, Anomaly Detector) | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: 500,000+ questions | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): N/A
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): $0.20/GB
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): No equivalent service
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): $70-$85
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): Up to 90%
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 99.995%
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): 2.1 million
Microsoft Azure: N/A | Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): Limited AI services
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) — Wikipedia
How to choose between Microsoft Azure and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)
Compare Microsoft Azure vs Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)
Azure vs Oracle Cloud — Structured Comparison Data
Machine-readable comparison dataset for Azure vs Oracle Cloud. Contains 113 attribute comparisons, 3 FAQ pairs.
Azure vs Oracle Cloud — Attribute Category Vocabulary
Taxonomy of attribute categories used to classify comparison data for Azure vs Oracle Cloud.
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) is generally 30-50% cheaper than equivalent Azure compute instances, and OCI egress (data transfer out) pricing is significantly lower — a major cost driver for data-intensive workloads. OCI also offers the industry's most generous free tier (2 OCPUs VMs and 24GB RAM VMs free forever). However, Azure's total cost of ownership may be lower for Microsoft-ecosystem organizations due to Azure Hybrid Benefit (reusing existing Windows/SQL licenses, saving 40-85%).
Oracle Autonomous Database is Oracle's flagship cloud database service that uses machine learning to automate all routine database tasks — patching, tuning, backups, security updates — without requiring a DBA. It's available as Autonomous Data Warehouse (optimized for analytics) and Autonomous Transaction Processing (optimized for OLTP). It's unique in the market; no AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud service offers the same level of self-management automation for Oracle Database workloads.
Can I use Azure and Oracle Cloud together?
Yes — Oracle@Azure allows enterprises to run Oracle Cloud Infrastructure services, including Exadata Database Service, directly within Azure datacenters with a high-speed private interconnect (<2ms latency). This lets businesses keep their Microsoft 365/Teams/Dynamics on Azure while running Oracle databases on OCI hardware optimized for Oracle workloads — without data leaving a single datacenter.
How to Choose Between Microsoft Azure and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)
Global Market Share: Microsoft Azure has 23%, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has 3%.
Consider: Monthly Cost (4-vCPU VM, 16GB RAM, US East)
Monthly Cost (4-vCPU VM, 16GB RAM, US East): Microsoft Azure has $290, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has $185.
Consider: Microsoft Enterprise Integration
Microsoft Enterprise Integration: Microsoft Azure has Native (Office 365, Teams, Dynamics 365), while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has Limited third-party connectors.
Consider: Database Performance (Oracle Database)
Database Performance (Oracle Database): Microsoft Azure has Good via third-party, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has Optimized (20% faster).
AI/ML Service Portfolio: Microsoft Azure has 70+ services, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has 35+ services.
Compliance Certifications: Microsoft Azure has 90+, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has 60+.
Available Regions Globally: Microsoft Azure has 60 regions, while Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) has 41 regions.
Microsoft Azure is better than Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)
Azure dominates enterprise cloud infrastructure with 23% global market share and superior integration with Microsoft enterprise tools, while Oracle Cloud excels in database workloads and offers aggressive pricing for existing Oracle licensees. Azure is the safer choice for most enterprises; Oracle C