Análise comparativa de serviços básicos de infraestrutura como serviço (IaaS) nos planos gratuitos da AWS, do Azure e da GCP

Abstract

This study compares basic infrastructure-as-a-service resources available in the free tiers of Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform. The research was applied, experimental, and comparative, with a predominantly quantitative approach. The same backend application was deployed on entry-level virtual machines across the three platforms and subjected to three standardized rounds consisting of warm-up, controlled load, and recovery phases. The analysis considered average response time, processor utilization, error rate, network traffic, availability of native metrics, monitoring granularity, and the operational effort required for deployment, update, and rollback. All platforms processed the light workload without request errors. In the evaluated scenario, Amazon Web Services achieved the lowest average response time; Microsoft Azure provided the most comprehensive set of native metrics and the shortest rollback time; and Google Cloud Platform achieved the shortest initial deployment time. The results indicate that no platform outperformed the others across all criteria, as each presented contextual advantages that may guide students, developers, and instructors according to the priorities of a project or practical activity.