AWS and Azure services, side by side
AWS and Azure sell the same building blocks under different names, and the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02), AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate (SAA-C03), Microsoft Azure Fundamentals (AZ-900), and Microsoft Azure Administrator (AZ-104) exams each expect their own vendor's names cold. This sheet pairs the services those exams actually test, using names current as of 2026 (Microsoft Entra ID, not Azure AD; Azure Front Door, not the retiring classic CDN). The pairs are functional equivalents, not identical products; the notes flag where the analogy breaks.
Compute
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virtual machines | Amazon EC2 | Azure Virtual Machines | Full virtual servers; you pick the size and OS and patch them yourself |
| Serverless functions | AWS Lambda | Azure Functions | Event-driven code billed per execution; Lambda caps at 15 minutes per run |
| Containers | Amazon ECS / Amazon EKS | Azure Container Apps / AKS | Managed container orchestration; EKS to AKS is the Kubernetes pair |
| Web app PaaS | AWS Elastic Beanstalk | Azure App Service | Push code and the platform provisions, scales, and patches for you |
For serverless containers, pair AWS Fargate with Azure Container Apps; ECS itself is AWS-proprietary and has no exact Azure twin. Elastic Beanstalk keeps its EC2 instances and load balancers visible in your account, while App Service hides the servers entirely.
Storage
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Object storage | Amazon S3 | Azure Blob Storage | Durable object storage over HTTPS; an S3 bucket maps to a blob container inside a storage account |
| Block storage | Amazon EBS | Azure Managed Disks | Persistent block volumes attached to VMs, with snapshot backups |
| File shares | Amazon EFS | Azure Files | Managed network file shares; EFS is NFS-only, Azure Files serves SMB and NFS |
| Archive tier | S3 Glacier (Instant / Flexible / Deep Archive) | Blob Storage Archive tier | Lowest-cost storage for rarely read, long-retention data |
Blob access tiers run Hot, Cool, Cold, then Archive; Archive is offline and must be rehydrated (up to hours) before reads, while S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval returns data in milliseconds. Because Azure Files speaks SMB, the closer AWS match for Windows shares is Amazon FSx for Windows File Server.
Networking
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Private network | Amazon VPC | Azure Virtual Network (VNet) | Your isolated network: address space, subnets, route tables, peering |
| DNS | Amazon Route 53 | Azure DNS | Managed DNS zone hosting; Route 53 also registers domains and adds routing policies |
| CDN and edge | Amazon CloudFront | Azure Front Door (Standard/Premium) | Global edge delivery: caching, TLS offload, optional WAF |
| Load balancing | Elastic Load Balancing (ALB / NLB / GWLB) | Azure Load Balancer + Application Gateway | Traffic distribution; ALB maps to Application Gateway (L7), NLB to Load Balancer (L4) |
| Private connectivity | AWS Direct Connect | Azure ExpressRoute | Dedicated private circuit into the cloud that bypasses the public internet |
Neither Direct Connect nor ExpressRoute encrypts traffic by default, a favorite trick question on both sides. Azure CDN (classic) retires September 30, 2027, so Front Door Standard/Premium is the current Azure answer for edge delivery.
Databases
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Relational | Amazon RDS | Azure SQL Database | Managed relational databases: automated backups, patching, HA options |
| NoSQL | Amazon DynamoDB | Azure Cosmos DB | Managed NoSQL with single-digit-millisecond latency at any scale |
| In-memory cache | Amazon ElastiCache | Azure Cache for Redis | Managed in-memory store for caching, sessions, and leaderboards |
RDS is one umbrella for MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQL Server, and more, while Azure splits engines across Azure SQL Database, Azure Database for MySQL, and Azure Database for PostgreSQL. Azure Managed Redis is the announced successor to Azure Cache for Redis (Basic/Standard/Premium tiers retire September 30, 2028), though 2026 exams still use the older name.
Identity and security
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identity and access | AWS IAM | Microsoft Entra ID + Azure RBAC | Who can do what; Azure splits identity (Entra ID) from resource permissions (RBAC) |
| Key management | AWS KMS | Azure Key Vault | Managed encryption keys; Key Vault also stores secrets and certificates |
| Audit logging | AWS CloudTrail | Azure Activity Log | Control-plane audit trail of who did what and when; 90-day default retention in both |
| Threat detection | Amazon GuardDuty | Microsoft Defender for Cloud | Built-in threat detection; Defender for Cloud also bundles posture management (CSPM) |
Microsoft Entra ID is the 2023 rename of Azure Active Directory, and current exams use the new name. What Key Vault does in one service, AWS spreads across KMS, Secrets Manager, and AWS Certificate Manager.
Cost and governance
| Category | AWS | Azure | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spend analysis | AWS Cost Explorer | Microsoft Cost Management | Visualize, analyze, and forecast cloud spend over time |
| Org hierarchy | AWS Organizations | Azure management groups | Govern many accounts or subscriptions from one hierarchy; policies inherit down |
| Recommendations | AWS Trusted Advisor | Azure Advisor | Automated best-practice checks across cost, security, reliability, and performance |
An AWS account maps to an Azure subscription, and SCPs in Organizations do the job Azure Policy does at management-group scope. Full Trusted Advisor checks require an upgraded support plan (Business Support+ or higher as of 2026), while Azure Advisor is free.
Reading a sheet is recognition; the exam tests recall. The fastest way to make this stick is answering questions that use it.
Common questions
Is Microsoft Entra ID the same thing as Azure Active Directory?
Yes. Microsoft renamed Azure Active Directory to Microsoft Entra ID in 2023; it is the same service with the same sign-in and directory features. Current AZ-900 and AZ-104 material uses the Entra ID name, so expect it on the exam even where older study guides still say Azure AD.
Do AWS and Azure services map one-to-one?
No, several mappings are one-to-many. AWS IAM alone covers what Azure splits between Microsoft Entra ID (who you are) and Azure RBAC (what you can touch), while Azure Key Vault covers what AWS splits across KMS, Secrets Manager, and Certificate Manager. Learn what job each service does rather than memorizing name pairs.
What is the AWS equivalent of an Azure subscription?
An AWS account is the closest match: both are the billing and isolation boundary your resources live in. AWS Organizations then groups accounts the way Azure management groups group subscriptions. Azure adds resource groups one level further down; AWS resource groups exist but are only tag-based views, not a management boundary.
Is Azure Cache for Redis being retired?
Yes. Microsoft has named Azure Managed Redis as the successor; the Basic, Standard, and Premium tiers of Azure Cache for Redis retire on September 30, 2028, and the Enterprise tiers on March 31, 2027. The 2026 exams still reference Azure Cache for Redis, so know both names.
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