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Cloud Foundry vs Google App Engine comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 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

Cloud Foundry
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
22nd
Average Rating
5.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Google App Engine
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
13th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the PaaS Clouds category, the mindshare of Cloud Foundry is 1.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google App Engine is 2.2%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
PaaS Clouds
 

Featured Reviews

Carlos Bittrich - PeerSpot reviewer
Quick to deploy but being deprecated by IBM and should be merged with Kubernetes
We enjoy the fast deployment. Cloud Foundry builds the runtime environment directly without requiring dependency management from the developer or administrator. The autoscaling is great. It is just a switch that needs to be turned on, and autoscaling starts working. At this moment, you begin to see different meters about usage that helps you in updating the scaling limits, which help you tune the running instances. Besides this, autoscaling can be scheduled, so in times of low activity, you can have lower limits or increase in advance for special dates. It has good logging. CF has logging events that help identify when a transaction runs and its response time which helps in monitoring execution.
OmkarPatil - PeerSpot reviewer
Simplifies app development process for businesses
The product simplifies app development processes since once the local development is completed, my company has a common configuration in place where we can specify the requirements to run an application, after which we need to do a one-click GCP deployment for the entire application. In general, the two offer managed deployment options, so we don't have to worry about deployment. In my company, we just configure the servers and check if anything needs to be containerized, after which GCP handles everything for us. A project where Google App Engine scalability was essential was when, recently, my company was involved with Golang to build a web application, after which deploying that application on Google App Engine was really easy. In my company, we also had a Django application in Python, and it was easy to deploy. As my company deals with small-scale projects, the automated scaling feature of Google App Engine is not something we thought about. I wouldn't recommend the product to others unless the potential end users use GCP and have a word with their vendors about their plans. One specific recommendation from me would be that the product's potential uses should stick with a particular vendor. If someone wants a product that is easy to deploy and scalable, then multiple options are available in the market. The product integrates very well with other Google solutions. I rate the overall solution a ten out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"My favorite component of IBM's solution is Node-RED, which greatly shortens the amount of time required to develop, test, and deploy new applications."
"IBM is the only vendor to offer integration with blockchain for smart contract development."
"Cloud Foundry builds the runtime environment directly without requiring dependency management from the user."
"What I find most valuable about Google App Engine is its support for open-source development."
"Google App Engine's most valuable feature is self-management. You do not have to manage the infrastructure underneath where all the functions are happening, such as load balancing deployment and version management, they are managed by the system itself."
"I've found that all of the features are valuable, especially the shared drive and the ability for multiple people to use their documents at the same time."
"The initial setup is okay. It's not too complex. Deployment took about one day."
"It is simple to use. It is much simpler than AWS. It is also very powerful."
"Its ability to integrate with most devices helps users who have different or old devices."
"The product's initial setup phase was straightforward, considering that there is good documentation explaining the implementation part of it."
"The WhatApp feature is the most valuable."
 

Cons

"In IBM Cloud, the product has been deprecated in favor of Kubernetes, which is a more complicated infrastructure to manage."
"After the initial excitement period with Node-RED is over, you crave the need of additional integrations to third-party services."
"The product's price is an area of concern where improvements are required."
"The whitelist and blacklist of APIs can be a deal-breaker due to security concerns, and the deployment process is chaotic."
"The only concern is that there is a number of the offerings which are built on their own proprietary technologies. With some of the offerings in Google Cloud, it's difficult to have a path to migrate to other cloud providers."
"I would like a simpler deployment tool on laptops. It is a bit complicated at the moment. We know how to do it, but it could be easier to deploy it on laptops."
"Difficult to assess how pricing is managed."
"The support for the Indian region is not as good as compared to the support that is offered to the regions in Europe."
"There is limited customization because the sandbox environment restricts it."
"I am limited to sending a photo to five people. I want to be able to send a photo to many people, not just five."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"You are allocated a minimum amount of resources in the free tier. This seems fair and highly scalable, as you pay per usage as per cloud pricing schemes."
"IBM has a free tier and payment option depending on the products selected."
"The pricing models should be reworked to the needs of a wider range of companies. Some customers will not be able to afford it until quite a few years into production, even after good PoC results and a successful launch."
"If we don't know how to work with the tool, we might have some spikes in price."
"I would like to have more free application with it. Some of the applications, I am paying more for them. I think that they must be free."
"We pay the license yearly. It's about $6 a month, which is $72 a year per person, so it's about $500."
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Comparison Review

it_user8586 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 14, 2013
Amazon vs Rackspace vs Microsoft vs Google: Cloud Hosting Services Comparison
Amazon Web Services, Rackspace OpenStack, Microsoft Windows Azure and Google are the major cloud hosting and storage service providers. Athough Amazon is top of them and is oldest in cloud market, Rackspace, Microsoft and Google are giving tough competition to each other and to Amazon also for…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
26%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Healthcare Company
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Educational Organization
16%
Financial Services Firm
12%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What do you like most about Google App Engine?
The product's setup and deployment phases are easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google App Engine?
The pricing is a pay-as-you-go model. For F1 usage with 256 MB, it is free. F2 with 512 MB costs approximately 0.05 USD. F4 with 1 GB varies from 0.10 to 0.15 USD. It is billed per instance and hou...
What needs improvement with Google App Engine?
There is limited customization because the sandbox environment restricts it. There are issues with cold starting; apps may take time to wake up if idle for a few minutes. The pricing is higher comp...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Grape Up, c-Com, KONE, TITAN, CSAA, Bosch, Allstate, Verizon, West Corp., Telstra
Khan Academy, Best Buy, Gigya, MetOffice, Getaround, Mimiboard, NewsLimited, WebFilings, and CloudLock.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloud Foundry vs. Google App Engine and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
850,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.