Google Cloud

Google Cloud is often cheaper than AWS for comparable workloads — GCP offers automatic sustained-use discounts (up to 30% off for running VMs all month) and committed-use discounts (up to 57% off for 1-year commitment) without requiring upfront payment. Egress costs are also lower. However, pricing depends heavily on the specific services used. BigQuery's query-based pricing ($5/TB queried) can be either cheaper or more expensive than equivalent data warehouse solutions depending on query patterns. Use the GCP Pricing Calculator for specific comparisons.

Google Cloud excels in three areas: (1) Data analytics — BigQuery is the fastest, most scalable serverless data warehouse available; (2) Machine learning — Vertex AI, TPU access, and first-party Gemini model APIs give GCP an edge for AI/ML workloads; (3) Kubernetes — GKE was the original managed Kubernetes service and remains the most feature-rich. GCP is also excellent for high-performance networking applications due to its private global fiber backbone.

Both offer generous free tiers and startup credit programs. AWS has the larger ecosystem, more third-party integrations, and a larger talent pool (more engineers with AWS certifications). Google Cloud's free tier is more generous on some services (300 free BigQuery queries/month, always-free GKE Autopilot for small clusters). For AI/ML-heavy startups, GCP's Vertex AI and TPU access provide real advantages. For general web applications, AWS is the safer default due to broader ecosystem support.