No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Amazon S3 Glacier vs Zadara comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 1, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
4.0
Organizations benefit from Amazon S3 Glacier with cost savings and high ROI, despite needing better support and cost management.
Sentiment score
8.2
Zadara offers cost-effective scalability, eliminating upfront investments with flexible, nearly limitless capacity, potentially saving 50% in time and money.
If AWS improves support and cost management, there would be fewer reasons for users to consider other cloud platforms.
Technical Owner at Harman International
As it is Amazon S3 Glacier, it is used only for archival purposes, so it is comparatively okay to use it, and we can save money compared to the standard which is high.
Server Administrator at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
The cost is not cheaper compared to AWS, and we have not seen the expected return on investment.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.4
Amazon S3 Glacier support receives mixed reviews, with some praising assistance and others noting delays and occasional unresponsiveness.
Sentiment score
8.2
Zadara's exceptional, 24/7 global customer service and technical expertise reduce user workload, earning high satisfaction ratings.
Amazon S3 Glacier is a good solution for us, and I am very happy with it.
Project Engineer at Astellas Pharma US
There is room for improvement in providing more skilled and comprehensive solutions.
Technical Owner at Harman International
They provide documentation and resolve issues.
Sr Data Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
We lack adequate response times and a 24/7 service level agreement.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
I rate the technical support from Zadara as nine out of ten.
IT Technical Architect at AVALIS
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
5.1
Amazon S3 Glacier excels in scalability and integration, handling large data volumes effortlessly with high user ratings and reliability.
Sentiment score
7.6
Zadara provides scalable, flexible workload management, supporting business growth with adjustable tiers and high performance for various needs.
Amazon S3 Glacier auto-scales according to the data.
Sr DevOps Engineer at HTC Global
Amazon S3 Glacier is infinitely scalable, with no issues on our end.
Technical Owner at Harman International
Glacier has excellent scalability, with elasticity and security that meet industry standards.
Sr Data Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Zadara is a fully-fledged platform, and our customers are happy with its use.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.7
Amazon S3 Glacier is highly stable, with minimal outages and enhanced performance from AWS tools, ensuring reliable data access.
Sentiment score
7.5
Users appreciate Zadara for its stability, high-availability, and reliability, noting minimal downtime and dependable performance in demanding environments.
It is specifically designed for cold storage.
Technical Owner at Harman International
I do not experience any stability issues.
Server Administrator at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
Amazon S3 Glacier is quite stable, nine out of ten.
Sr DevOps Engineer at HTC Global
 

Room For Improvement

Amazon S3 Glacier needs improvements in retrieval speed, integration, pricing, support, security, compliance, billing, and storage efficiency.
Zadara needs better communication, advanced features, broader support, improved infrastructure, and user-friendly upgrades to enhance market competitiveness.
I would like to see improvements in the transfer rate as it takes quite a long time to retrieve data from Glacier compared to standard S3 storage.
Sr DevOps Engineer at HTC Global
Support could be more robust, with a focus on providing comprehensive solutions even for novel issues.
Technical Owner at Harman International
Another improvement is making Glacier available in all regions.
Sr Data Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Adding AI capabilities could enhance the offering as well.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
Maintenance can also be complicated, especially when deeper troubleshooting requires navigating the CLI and searching for logs.
IT Technical Architect at AVALIS
 

Setup Cost

Amazon S3 Glacier's pricing is affordable but confusing, with no licensing fees and potential long-term costs for large data volumes.
Zadara offers predictable pay-per-use pricing, with all-inclusive features and support, appealing to cost-conscious enterprise buyers.
Compared to competitors like GCP, AWS can work on reducing hidden costs and overall pricing to retain startups and medium-sized businesses.
Technical Owner at Harman International
The storage cost is minimal, which is beneficial for archival purposes.
Sr Data Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Amazon S3 Glacier is beneficial due to its lower cost.
Sr. Data Engineer at a real estate/law firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
The pricing is considered expensive.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
 

Valuable Features

Amazon S3 Glacier provides affordable, secure archiving with easy integration, strong encryption, user-friendly features, and reliable data management.
Zadara offers flexible cloud integration, scalable storage solutions, and predictable costs with high performance, reliability, and user-friendly support.
Glacier greatly helps in managing storage costs by moving historical data to a lower-cost storage option.
Sr Data Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
The security features include object lock encryption and immutability options, so we can use this for backups.
Server Administrator at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
The most valuable features of Amazon S3 Glacier are its cost-effectiveness for data archiving and its durability.
Sr DevOps Engineer at HTC Global
The most valuable feature is its storage management capability.
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
Zadara's troubleshooting feature is very valuable for me.
IT Technical Architect at AVALIS
 

Categories and Ranking

Amazon S3 Glacier
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Zadara
Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services
15th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (32nd), Software Defined Storage (SDS) (16th), Compute Service (10th), File and Object Storage (22nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Public Cloud Storage Services category, the mindshare of Amazon S3 Glacier is 10.9%, down from 17.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zadara is 2.2%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Public Cloud Storage Services Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Amazon S3 Glacier10.9%
Zadara2.2%
Other86.9%
Public Cloud Storage Services
 

Featured Reviews

PF
Project Engineer at Astellas Pharma US
Archiving data has reduced storage costs and provides reliable long‑term retention
We have not really come across any downsides for us. It is possible that the retrieval of data may be expensive, which could be an issue, but we have not experienced that in fairness. Integration with our policies would be beneficial. We have policies for our systems where we delete data after a certain number of years, and having integration with Amazon S3 Glacier would be good. Having a guarantee that Amazon S3 Glacier would persist for the amount of time that we require in our archives would be valuable. In other words, Amazon would need to commit to support for the period we need. We could be talking about 20 years or longer. We cannot always move to the next version because we need to maintain old systems and legacy systems in order to maintain archives. A guarantee around support would be a good thing to have.
Kirubel Behailu - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud System Engineer at cloud251
Enhancing storage management efficiency with user-friendly experience
Our customers are using Zadara for their research and development environments. We provide infrastructure for government projects, but we are often not fully aware of their specific usage.  I typically use it for our infrastructure and offer both Zadara and Microsoft Azure to our customers Zadara…
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Public Cloud Storage Services solutions are best for your needs.
885,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise15
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Amazon's S3 Glacier or EBS (Elastic Block Store)?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon's S3 Glacier or Elastic Block Store data storage software was the better fit for us. We decided to go with Amazon's S3 Glacier, whi...
What do you like most about Amazon S3 Glacier?
I like creating buckets where data can be segregated at a high level and then routing the appropriate data to each designated bucket. In terms of value, I would say that the tool gets the job done ...
What needs improvement with Amazon S3 Glacier?
We have not really come across any downsides for us. It is possible that the retrieval of data may be expensive, which could be an issue, but we have not experienced that in fairness. Integration w...
What needs improvement with Zadara?
The initial installation was difficult because many steps required the command line interface (CLI). Maintenance can also be complicated, especially when deeper troubleshooting requires navigating ...
What is your primary use case for Zadara?
I use this product as storage. Specifically, I use it as big storage. That's the main use case for Zadara ( /products/zadara-reviews ).
What advice do you have for others considering Zadara?
As for the pros and cons, the main concerns are the complexity of the initial installation and the complicated maintenance due to the CLI usage. Overall, I do not have other complaints. My overall ...
 

Also Known As

Amazon Glacier
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

King Cpunty, Illumina, Backupify, Nearmap.com, Scribd, Baylor College of Medicine, SoundCloud
Time, Inc. A&E Network, The Washington Post, News UK, McGraw Hill, Gilt, Toshiba, Deloitte, VMware
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon S3 Glacier vs. Zadara and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
885,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.