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Alibaba Cloud vs Azure

Jump to: What's good Pricing GPUs Services Company details Alternatives

What's good about...

Alibaba Cloud logo Alibaba Cloud

  • Strong presence in Asia and over 3,000 points of presence (POPs) around the world
  • Extensive range of managed services and server configurations
  • Offers a solid range of GPU servers

Microsoft Azure logo Azure

  • Integrations with the rest of Microsoft's products
  • Extensive range of managed services, from serverless to databases to queues to AI
  • Generous free tier, and compute savings plans available
  • 60+ datacenter locations around the world

Price comparison

How do Alibaba Cloud's prices compare against Azure?

VM Small

Closest config to 1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$15.21 / mo 1 vCPU, 1 GiB RAM (ecs.xn4.small)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$6.13 / mo 2 vCPU, 1 GB RAM (B2pts v2)

VM Medium

Closest config to 4 vCPU, 8 GB RAM.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$89.79 / mo 4 vCPU, 8 GiB RAM (ecs.c7.xlarge)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$86.87 / mo 4 vCPU, 8 GB RAM (B4pls v2)

VM Large

Closest config to 8 vCPU, 16 GB RAM (dedicated preferred).
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$170.49 / mo 8 vCPU, 16 GiB RAM (ecs.c7.2xlarge)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$173.74 / mo 8 vCPU, 16 GB RAM (B8pls v2)

Block Storage

Closest config to 100+ GB SSD, 3,000+ IOPS, 100+ MB/s throughput, no snapshots.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$11.20 / mo 100 GB (Enhanced SSD PL0)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$8.10 / mo 100 GB

Object Storage

Closest config to 1 TB stored, 100 GB in / 250 GB out, 1M GET, 100k PUT/POST.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$43.84 / mo 1 TB, 250 GB reads, 100 GB writes
Microsoft Azure Azure
$21.50 / mo 1 TB

Load Balancer

Closest config to TCP, 1 node (1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM), 200+ Mbps, 1,000 conn/sec, 1 TB processed/mo.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$16.56 / mo Small I (slb.s1.small)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$23.25 / mo Standard

Managed PostgreSQL

Closest config to 1 node, 2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM, 50+ GB storage, 10 GB read / 5 GB write per month.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$114.92 / mo 2 vCPU, 8 GB RAM (general-purpose)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$131.89 / mo 2 vCPU, 4 GiB RAM, 50 GB storage (Gen 5)

Managed Redis®*

Closest config to 1 node, 1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM, 10 req/s, 1 KB avg request size.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$43.09 / mo 1 GB Performance-enhanced (HA)
Microsoft Azure Azure
$39.60 / mo 1 vCPU, 1 GiB RAM (Basic C1)

Serverless 25M Executions

Closest config to 25M invocations, 150ms execution time, 512 MB memory.
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
--
Microsoft Azure Azure
$29.80 / mo 25M invocations, 512 MB RAM, 150 ms duration

Free egress allowance

Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
10 GB / mo
Microsoft Azure Azure
100 GB / mo

1 TB of egress beyond allowance

Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
$74.00 $0.074 / GB
Microsoft Azure Azure
$87.00 $0.087 / GB (Premium network North America)
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Runpod
Our sponsor
Spin Up a GPU in Seconds - No Setup Required
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GPU Fleet Overview

Same GPU, Both Providers

Cheapest rate per GPU per hour for the cards both providers sell, compared on a billing mode they both publish.

On-demand price per GPU-hour.

Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
Microsoft Azure Azure
V100 $2.70 $1.53 T4 $1.12 $0.53 A10 $1.27 $3.20

Billing Options

Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
On-DemandReserved (12mo)
Microsoft Azure Azure
On-DemandSpotReserved (12mo)Reserved (36mo)Custom

Available Models

Ranked by how many providers list each card. The number beside a GPU is how many instance configurations this provider sells it in, not how many are in stock.

Alibaba Cloud offers 4 GPU models, while Azure offers 10.

Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
V100(14) A10(26) T4(12) P100(12)
Microsoft Azure Azure
H100(16) A100(20) H200(2) RTX PRO 6000(40) V100(6) A10(12) MI300X(2) T4(16) GB200(2) MI455X(1)

Heads up: We do our best to keep these specs & prices accurate. However, cloud costs may fluctuate based on region, usage, and other factors not listed here. These are estimates based on common setups and are for informational purposes only. Always verify current rates & exact specs with the provider before provisioning.

Which services do they offer

Here are some managed services that Alibaba Cloud and Azure offer:

Service Alibaba Cloud Azure
Analytics
App Testing
Block Storage
Content Delivery Network (CDN)
Container Registry
Crash Reporting
GPU-powered Servers
Load Balancer
Managed Containers
Managed Kubernetes
Managed MySQL
Managed PostgreSQL
Managed Redis®*
NoSQL Databases
Object Storage
Performance Monitoring
Push Notifications
Realtime Databases
Remote Config
Serverless Cron Jobs
Serverless Functions
Static Sites
User Authentication
Vector Databases
Virtual Private Server (VPS)

Company details

Website
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
www.alibabacloud.com
Microsoft Azure Azure
azure.microsoft.com
Headquarters
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
Singapore
Microsoft Azure Azure
United States of America
Founded
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
2009
Microsoft Azure Azure
2008
Data Center Locations
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
30
Microsoft Azure Azure
66
Example Customers
Alibaba Cloud Alibaba Cloud
Taobao, Henkel, Hang Seng Bank, Tiger Brokers
Microsoft Azure Azure
General Motors, NHS, Fujitsu, NBA

Alternatives to consider

Compare Alibaba Cloud and Azure against other cloud providers.

View all comparisons

Our data for Alibaba Cloud was last updated on Aug. 22, 2026, and for Azure on Aug. 22, 2026.

Runpod Logo
Runpod
Our sponsor
Spin Up a GPU in Seconds - No Setup Required
Deploy AI Models Globally in 30+ Regions
Scale from 0 to 1000 GPUs on Demand
PyTorch, Tensorflow & Docker Ready
Learn more