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AWS Lake Formation vs Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

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

AWS Lake Formation
Ranking in Cloud Data Warehouse
13th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Azure Synapse Ana...
Ranking in Cloud Data Warehouse
5th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
93
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Cloud Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of AWS Lake Formation is 5.8%, up from 5.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics is 6.2%, down from 8.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Ramesh Raghavan - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized repository, offers various cataloging mechanisms for quick data retrieval but data governance capabilities could be better
There are a couple of areas for improvement with Lake Formation. One of the main challenges, especially when dealing with rich media content, like in MarTech (Marketing Technology) or ad agencies, is its versatility. Some clients feel that Lake Formation doesn’t meet their needs and they tend to prefer competitor products for those specific use cases. The second area for improvement is in data governance. Specifically, Lake Formation could enhance its capabilities in audit logs, real-time monitoring, and advanced data governance. This includes managing the entire data lineage—where the data originated, how it moves, and where it’s currently stored. The visibility of the data as it evolves is crucial, and that’s where more advanced governance capabilities would be beneficial.
Renee Hoon - PeerSpot reviewer
Scalable performance tuning and optimization for finance and supply chain jobs
We run our finance and supply chain jobs using SQL BW, and we visualize our data loads on Power BI. We are using SQL Data Warehouse for data warehousing In terms of cost savings, we don't need specialization in skills as advanced as Teradata. We used to pay extensive licensing fees for Teradata,…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We use AWS Lake Formation typically for the data warehouse."
"It is seamlessly integrated within the AWS ecosystem, making it straightforward to manage access patterns for AWS-native services."
"AWS Lake Formation works hand in hand with other products."
"AWS Lake Formation lets you see all your data and tables on one screen."
"The most important advantage in using AWS Lake Formation is its ability to connect the data lake to the other technologies in AWS. This is what I advise my clients."
"The solution has many features that are applicable to events such as audits."
"I can easily move data from cold storage to regular storage."
"The solution is quite good at handling analytics. It's done a good job at helping us centralize them."
"The product works well with other Azure products."
"It's quite quick for querying, even with large datasets, and it's scalable. It's also flexible to use, so it's easy to update and get data quickly without wasting time."
"The main advantage of using this solution is its ability to scale and handle very large amounts of data, in the petabyte range."
"The product provides a seamless and adaptable approach to data processing and analytics."
"Technical support is okay in terms of the help they provide."
"The most valuable features of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics are its serverless flexibility and complete power have allowed me to explore various different use cases. While I am not an expert in the product, my experience in programming in Databricks has shown me that Microsoft's investments in Synapse could potentially lead to it becoming a complete replacement for Databricks in the future."
"The most valuable features of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics are how easy and quick it is to set up the linked services."
"The solution's best feature is its predictive analytics."
 

Cons

"For the end-users, it's not as user-friendly as it could be."
"The solution could make improvements around orchestration and doing some automation stuff on AWS front automation. It would be useful if we could use automation to build images and use hardened images which are CIS compliant."
"If I could improve AWS Lake Formation, I would add more integrations with SageMaker."
"In our experience what could be improved are not the support, performance or monitoring, but at a managerial level, the very expensive professional services of AWS. This could be an area of improvement for them. It's too expensive to acquire their support."
"It falls short when it comes to more granular access control, such as cell-level or row-level entitlements which is a significant drawback for organizations that require precise control over who can access specific rows of data."
"Lake Formation could enhance its capabilities in audit logs, real-time monitoring, and advanced data governance."
"AWS Lake Formation's pricing could be cheaper."
"You need to have data experience to use the product."
"Integration with other vendors has limitations and could be improved."
"Real-time integration is hard to do in Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics."
"The initial setup process needs improvement. When you're moving to the cloud it takes a bit of time. It would be great if they could implement something that would make it faster."
"In our company, we always want to improve our data management, including how to manage structured and unstructured data."
"The need to improve a little bit in terms of user-friendliness."
"In the future, Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics has the potential to enhance its capabilities by expanding its connectors, specifically with regard to Oracle solutions, such as operating systems. This would involve a comprehensive approach to adding more connectors for both data input and consumption purposes. By doing so, Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics would be better equipped to meet the diverse needs of its users and achieve greater efficiency in its performance. The provision of more connectors is definitely a crucial area that needs improvement."
"The cost of the solution has room for improvement."
"I am very sure that there are areas in need of improvement, but I can't recall what they are off the top of my head."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"AWS Lake Formation is a bit expensive."
"You have to be very careful with one specific service inside Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics which is called the Sequel Data Warehouse Dedicated. It is very reliable and performs well, but it's expensive. You need to define the tier well because you can choose between several tiers and you have to define which suits your needs and not overperform the tier because it's quite expensive."
"The price of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics can vary. Other solutions are typically fixed prices and a fixed cost regardless of usage, but this solution is based on usage or consumption."
"I don't know about the price, but I'm trying to get a sense of the cost."
"The pricing is competitive, but only when you pay upfront. If you pay as you go, it's not as competitive. I'd give pricing a rating of seven out of ten."
"Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics is an expensive solution and there is a license needed to use it. My company has an enterprise license."
"We are on a monthly payment plan for the use of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics."
"The solution is subscription-based. You can also pay to use the product as you go."
"Very costly solution and other products are available for less."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
5%
Educational Organization
26%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS Lake Formation?
It is seamlessly integrated within the AWS ecosystem, making it straightforward to manage access patterns for AWS-native services.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS Lake Formation?
The pricing is expensive compared to OpenStack, but cheaper than other cloud environments. It's middle-of-the-road for regular storage yet very cost-effective when using Amazon Glacier for data.
What needs improvement with AWS Lake Formation?
If I could improve AWS Lake Formation, I would add more integrations with SageMaker. I would have built-in functions that provide statistics for the data when using the GUI, such as SageMaker Insig...
How does Amazon Redshift compare with Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics?
Amazon Redshift is very fast, has a very good response time, and is very user-friendly. The initial setup is very straightforward. This solution can merge and integrate well with many different dat...
What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics?
The product is easy to use, and anybody can easily migrate to advanced DB.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics?
I think the price of Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics is very expensive, but that's not only for Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics—it's for the cloud in general. The cloud is not cost-effective. I...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Azure Synapse Analytics, Microsoft Azure SQL Data Warehouse, Microsoft Azure SQL DW, Azure SQL Data Warehouse, MS Azure Synapse Analytics
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

bp, Cerner, Expedia, Finra, HESS, intuit, Kellog's, Philips, TIME, workday
Toshiba, Carnival, LG Electronics, Jet.com, Adobe, 
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Lake Formation vs. Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.