Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Amazon FSx comparison

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) and Amazon FSx are both solutions in the Cloud Storage category. Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) is ranked #11 with an average rating of 7.9, while Amazon FSx is ranked #14 with an average rating of 8.3. Additionally, 100% of Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Amazon FSx users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

Amazon EFS and Amazon FSx are cloud storage solutions competing in the AWS ecosystem. FSx seems to have the upper hand due to its flexibility and support for specialized file systems.

Features: Amazon EFS offers a fully managed NFS file system with easy scalability and minimal management. FSx supports Windows File Server, integrates seamlessly with Windows-based environments, and is optimized for high-performance computing tasks with FSx for Lustre. FSx offers tailored functionalities for specific workloads.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Amazon EFS provides straightforward deployment with reliable customer support, emphasizing ease of use. FSx deployment varies by file system, including detailed configuration options that may require more setup. FSx's customer service is recognized for specialized support in complex integrations.

Pricing and ROI: EFS has a pay-as-you-go pricing model with automatic scaling to balance costs and resource consumption. It is favored for low upfront costs and predictable expenses. FSx pricing depends on the selected file system and may be higher due to its specialized nature but offers robust performance for demanding applications.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon FSx Report (Updated: August 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon FSx

August 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

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

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MuhammadAzhar Khan

Senior DevOps Engineer at Alibaba Group

Auto-scaling capabilities enhance file management while reducing downtime

The most valuable feature of Amazon EFS is its auto-scaling capability. It's really easy to configure EFS by just creating it and running a command to directly configure it with my servers. It supports unlimited use, and charges are applied based on the file usage at the end of the month. The solution offers reduced downtime and increased durability through its auto-scaling features.

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MuhammadAzhar Khan

Senior DevOps Engineer at Alibaba Group

Shared storage capabilities provide enterprise value with good reliability

Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS. The auto-scaling feature should be improved, as it currently includes downtime. I need to manually increase the storage, which is not ideal. Integrating FSx with Windows Server is challenging; it's a long process involving Active Directory (AD) setup and synchronization.

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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

"The most valuable features of FlashBlade include its replication capabilities, reports, and easy allocation. Everything is user-friendly."

"What I like best about Pure Storage FlashBlade is its object storage functionality, plus it has fast underlying hardware. Pure Storage FlashBlade is also very stable. I find its stability one of its valuable features."

"The snapshots, replication, and the ability to have immutable blades are the most valuable features. You're putting data snapshots out in those blades, and they cannot be touched. Its performance is great."

"The most valuable feature is Safe Mode."

"The solution provides many controllers."

"It uses the same platform for connectivity so integration is seamless."

"The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power outages when we need to quickly move data between different data centers. It ensures efficient replication and helps maintain our data centers' uptime."

"It is very easy to use, and it is very fast."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"Amazon EFS offers the flexibility of scaling as needed without requiring pre-provisioned storage."

"We are not that big of a cloud user. We just use it for the storage of our bytes. The most valuable aspect is the storage."

"There are huge money savings, as we can save more than half of our costs."

"The most beneficial feature of the product for data storage stems from the fact that it serves as a shared file storage."

"Amazon EFS is extremely stable, as it is managed by AWS."

"Elastic File Systems allow me to share data, provision, and manage capacity and performance in AWS."

"Its elasticity and flexible pricing are the most valuable. For Amazon EFS, you are charged based on the storage. It is also very fast and stable with a very simple and intuitive interface."

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) pros

"The shared storage capability is highly valuable."

"On a scale of one to ten, I would rate Amazon FSx a ten."

"We used it for disaster recovery perspective behind a number of resources, like batch services and RDS."

"I rate the stability of Amazon FSx ten out of ten."

"FSx operates as an independent service, not tied to any server, which eliminates dependencies between applications for storage."

Cons

"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."

"I would like to see more monitoring capability included in the next release of this solution."

"Its configuration should be easier."

"I would like to see the licensing fees improved as well as the price per terabytes."

"It's on the expensive side, as expected for a niche product."

"In terms of technical support, the experience has been mixed. The support is done through email and is not that great, making it a very problematic area I've been dealing with for over four years."

"The technical support needs to improve. When we open a case, it is auto assigned to a support tech person. Nine out of ten times, we get an email right back saying that person is off until tomorrow. I cannot handle that. They just did this over the weekend to us, too. I had to call our rep and have them do something about it."

"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"EFS could be improved by including a one-click setup."

"The initial setup requires prior experience and technical skills."

"It should be simplified. There are people who don't have cloud experience. It should be storage that we are able to just connect to."

"There are challenges related to AWS, such as ensuring proper security measures with IMS code and encryption."

"Elastic File Systems can be expensive due to the nature of data transfer costs, using services like SSTP, and potentially being costly in a rate-shift context."

"The product's stability has some shortcomings where improvements are required."

"Specifically, when it comes to the file system for the learning system, we encountered performance issues with both Azure and AWS."

"The user activity needs to be more connected."

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) cons

"Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS."

"A direct FTP feature would be beneficial instead of relying on transmission services."

"Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS."

"I've been facing a challenge when doing a failover from FSx side. AWS console does not refresh within a half hour."

"From my experience, there are areas in Amazon FSx where more performance is needed, as they will be looking for higher IOPS."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"I feel that the price could always be lowered."

"Licensing fees are paid yearly."

"Our licensing is renewed annually."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) offers a pay-as-you-go model, so whenever you use its services, you need to pay."

"The main challenge with EFS is its cost, which is slightly higher compared to EBS or S3. For one GB or ten GB of data, S3 is much cheaper. EFS could cost around $30 to $50 per month for similar usage."

"The product charges are based on the amount of data stored."

"The solution's price is mid-ranged."

"The product's price depends on the services and the size and capacity at which it is used in a business environment."

"I would rate the pricing 7 out of 10."

"It has flexible pricing. You are charged based on your storage."

"The lowest price I have paid is $370 or $380 per month, while the highest can exceed $3,000 per month."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Healthcare Company

Manufacturing Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

10%

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	20

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	7

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the pas...

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What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bi...

See all answers

Which file storage system is better - Amazon EFS (elastic file storage) or Azure File Storage?

Amazon EFS is easy to set up: you can use the AWS management console, API, or command-line. Amazon EFS can grow to pe...

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What do you like most about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?

The product's initial setup phase is easy, as per the configurations.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)?

We don't need to purchase it; we are just using it and paying Amazon as per the utilization. We make direct payments ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon FSx?

From my experience, there are areas in Amazon FSx where more performance is needed, as they will be looking for highe...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Amazon FSx?

Our customers mainly use Amazon FSx for high-performance computing. Our customers are mainly in the Life Science and ...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Amazon FSx?

There is an ongoing project where my customers are exploring the FSx solution, but not yet for AI-driven projects; th...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 20% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

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Microsoft Azure File Storage vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 70% of the time

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 6% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 5% of the time

Google Cloud Storage vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 5% of the time

Azure NetApp Files vs Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

Compared 4% of the time

More Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) Competitors

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Amazon FSx

Compared 24% of the time

Azure NetApp Files vs Amazon FSx

Compared 13% of the time

Amazon EBS (Elastic Block Store) vs Amazon FSx

Compared 12% of the time

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Amazon FSx

Compared 10% of the time

VAST Data vs Amazon FSx

Compared 5% of the time

More Amazon FSx Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

August 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System)

September 2025

Download Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) product report

Buyer's Guide

Cloud Storage

August 2025

Download Amazon FSx product report

Also Known As

No data available

Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, Amazon FSx for Lustre

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) provides simple, scalable file storage for use with Amazon EC2 instances in the AWS Cloud. Amazon EFS is easy to use and offers a simple interface that allows you to create and configure file systems quickly and easily. With Amazon EFS, storage capacity is elastic, growing and shrinking automatically as you add and remove files, so your applications have the storage they need, when they need it.

When mounted to Amazon EC2 instances, an Amazon EFS file system provides a standard file system interface and file system access semantics, allowing you to seamlessly integrate Amazon EFS with your existing applications and tools. Multiple Amazon EC2 instances can access an Amazon EFS file system at the same time, allowing Amazon EFS to provide a common data source for workloads and applications running on more than one Amazon EC2 instance.

It’s designed for high availability and durability, and provides performance for a broad spectrum of workloads and applications, including Big Data and analytics, media processing workflows, content management, web serving, and home directories.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Amazon FSx makes it easy and cost effective to launch and run popular file systems. With Amazon FSx, you can leverage the rich feature sets and fast performance of widely-used open source and commercially-licensed file systems, while avoiding time-consuming administrative tasks like hardware provisioning, software configuration, patching, and backups. It provides cost-efficient capacity and high levels of reliability, and it integrates with other AWS services so that you can manage and use the file systems in cloud-native ways.

Amazon FSx provides you with two file systems to choose from: Amazon FSx for Windows File Server for enterprise workloads and Amazon FSx for Lustre for high-performance workloads.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Arcesium, Atlassian, Seeking Alpha, Zend

Neiman Marcus, T Mobile, Docxellent, Matrix, Lyell

Buyer's Guide

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon FSx

August 2025

Free Report: Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon FSx

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs. Amazon FSx and other solutions. Updated: August 2025.

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