Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Dropbox
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Dropbox is a cloud storage solution, equipped with features that help users to save time, improve productivity, and collaborate with others. Users can edit PDFs, share videos, sign documents, and collaborate with stakeholders without leaving Dropbox.
$9.99
per month
Google App Engine
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Google App Engine is Google Cloud's platform-as-a-service offering. It features pay-per-use pricing and support for a broad array of programming languages.
$0.05
Per Hour Per Instance
Microsoft Azure
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft Azure is a cloud computing platform and infrastructure for building, deploying, and managing applications and services through a global network of Microsoft-managed datacenters.
$29
per month
Pricing
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Editions & Modules
Plus
$9.99
per month
Essentials
$18
per month
Business
$20
per month per user
Business Plus
$26
per month per user
Basic
Free
Starting Price
$0.05
Per Hour Per Instance
Max Price
$0.30
Per Hour Per Instance
Developer
$29
per month
Standard
$100
per month
Professional Direct
$1000
per month
Basic
Free
per month
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Free Trial
NoNoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYesYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsThe free tier lets users have access to a variety of services free for 12 months with limited usage after making an Azure account.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Considered Multiple Products
Dropbox
Chose Dropbox
The above products have good features but have some functionality missing in each of them. In comparison, Dropbox has all of them included in it which is very helpful.
Chose Dropbox
Dropbox is easy to use and integrate.
Manages documents effectively.
Digital Signatures are easy to use.
Chose Dropbox
It is a different solution, perfect for our requirements of security, ease of deployment and billing.
Chose Dropbox
Dropbox is somewhat operating system agnostic. That, in and of itself, removes obstacles that potentially occur in corporate settings.

Additionally, the functionality meets the typical request from users all in one solution. Not having to move from one application to another is …
Chose Dropbox
User-friendly features, better sync rates and the ability to work across different operating systems make it a compatible and convenient platform to use. You don't need to have a very fast internet connection. Files get synced automatically rather than put in a folder hence …
Google App Engine
Chose Google App Engine
Compared with Microsoft Azure, Google App Engine requires a more complicated development environment setup. It's not as simple as using Visual Studio 2015 with Azure SDK. There are multiple IDE on the market to choose from for developing apps for Google App Engine. JetBrains …
Chose Google App Engine
If you have a small team which is also responsible for development of the product then surely go for it. And if you have a larger team with dedicated person to take care of deployments. Go for cheaper options such as compute engine or AWS (be sure to do your research on pricing …
Chose Google App Engine
We were on another much smaller cloud provider and decided to make the switch for several reasons - stability, breadth of services, and security. In reviewing options, GCP provided the best mixtures of meeting our needs while also balancing the overall cost of the service as …
Chose Google App Engine
AWS and Heroku are both great, and I use them both extensively for different projects. Google App Engine was chosen because it is much more innovative than AWS, and because Heroku specializes in Ruby on Rails. Even though Heroku supports Java and other services, we feel Google …
Chose Google App Engine
I think that Microsoft and Amazon are simply investing more in their offerings, and there are a bunch of cool PaaS solutions out there as well. Google App Engine is solid, and is probably the right choice for some projects. But ultimately one should evaluate each platform …
Chose Google App Engine
Google Apps is great for environments where the need for a more robust platform is not necessary if you are looking to have email and cloud collaboration enablement of your working staff. From the stand point of using both, I can see the value of both but it really depends on …
Chose Google App Engine
  • No management of operating system
  • Cheaper
Microsoft Azure
Chose Microsoft Azure
Microsoft Azure seems to be the most cost-effective and the ability to buy credits for projects instead of a license makes it attractive.
Chose Microsoft Azure
We have settled with Microsoft Azure considered its effective administration and the ability to data visualization and analysis, together with the top-notch security/stability.
Features
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
File Sharing & Management
Comparison of File Sharing & Management features of Product A and Product B
Dropbox
8.0
1336 Ratings
4% below category average
Google App Engine
-
Ratings
Microsoft Azure
-
Ratings
Versioning8.11110 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Video files7.91092 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Audio files8.2988 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Document collaboration7.81162 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Access control8.41234 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
File search7.61280 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Device sync8.31230 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Cloud Storage Security & Administration
Comparison of Cloud Storage Security & Administration features of Product A and Product B
Dropbox
8.5
1265 Ratings
1% below category average
Google App Engine
-
Ratings
Microsoft Azure
-
Ratings
User and role management8.41130 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
File organization8.41246 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Device management8.61110 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Cloud Storage Platform
Comparison of Cloud Storage Platform features of Product A and Product B
Dropbox
8.3
1255 Ratings
4% below category average
Google App Engine
-
Ratings
Microsoft Azure
-
Ratings
Performance7.81244 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Reliability8.91251 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Storage Reports8.2954 Ratings00 Ratings00 Ratings
Platform-as-a-Service
Comparison of Platform-as-a-Service features of Product A and Product B
Dropbox
-
Ratings
Google App Engine
9.5
32 Ratings
20% above category average
Microsoft Azure
-
Ratings
Ease of building user interfaces00 Ratings9.018 Ratings00 Ratings
Scalability00 Ratings10.032 Ratings00 Ratings
Platform management overhead00 Ratings9.032 Ratings00 Ratings
Workflow engine capability00 Ratings8.024 Ratings00 Ratings
Platform access control00 Ratings10.031 Ratings00 Ratings
Services-enabled integration00 Ratings10.028 Ratings00 Ratings
Development environment creation00 Ratings10.029 Ratings00 Ratings
Development environment replication00 Ratings10.028 Ratings00 Ratings
Issue monitoring and notification00 Ratings9.028 Ratings00 Ratings
Issue recovery00 Ratings9.026 Ratings00 Ratings
Upgrades and platform fixes00 Ratings10.029 Ratings00 Ratings
Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)
Comparison of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) features of Product A and Product B
Dropbox
-
Ratings
Google App Engine
-
Ratings
Microsoft Azure
8.5
27 Ratings
3% above category average
Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime00 Ratings00 Ratings8.126 Ratings
Dynamic scaling00 Ratings00 Ratings8.725 Ratings
Elastic load balancing00 Ratings00 Ratings8.624 Ratings
Pre-configured templates00 Ratings00 Ratings8.225 Ratings
Monitoring tools00 Ratings00 Ratings8.326 Ratings
Pre-defined machine images00 Ratings00 Ratings8.424 Ratings
Operating system support00 Ratings00 Ratings9.026 Ratings
Security controls00 Ratings00 Ratings8.626 Ratings
Automation00 Ratings00 Ratings8.224 Ratings
Best Alternatives
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Small Businesses
SugarSync
SugarSync
Score 4.1 out of 10
AWS Lambda
AWS Lambda
Score 8.3 out of 10
DigitalOcean Droplets
DigitalOcean Droplets
Score 9.4 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Druva Security Cloud
Druva Security Cloud
Score 9.4 out of 10
Red Hat OpenShift
Red Hat OpenShift
Score 9.2 out of 10
SAP on IBM Cloud
SAP on IBM Cloud
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Druva Security Cloud
Druva Security Cloud
Score 9.4 out of 10
Red Hat OpenShift
Red Hat OpenShift
Score 9.2 out of 10
SAP on IBM Cloud
SAP on IBM Cloud
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Likelihood to Recommend
8.6
(1348 ratings)
8.0
(35 ratings)
8.8
(96 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.1
(41 ratings)
8.3
(8 ratings)
10.0
(17 ratings)
Usability
8.1
(496 ratings)
7.7
(7 ratings)
8.3
(36 ratings)
Availability
6.8
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
6.8
(2 ratings)
Performance
6.0
(8 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
6.6
(38 ratings)
8.4
(12 ratings)
9.0
(27 ratings)
Online Training
8.2
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
7.5
(4 ratings)
8.0
(1 ratings)
8.0
(2 ratings)
Configurability
6.4
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
6.6
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
DropboxGoogle App EngineMicrosoft Azure
Likelihood to Recommend
Dropbox
Let me describe a scenario that happened recently in our organization's marketing team storing thousands of images videos and pdfs and Dropbox is done a great perfomer in this situation by the product features which is very helpful for the team, such as smart sync reduces disc usage, preview support for many media formats & Integrate with Adobe Creative Cloud.
Read full review
Google
App Engine is such a good resource for our team both internally and externally. You have complete control over your app, how it runs, when it runs, and more while Google handles the back-end, scaling, orchestration, and so on. If you are serving a tool, system, or web page, it's perfect. If you are serving something back-end, like an automation or ETL workflow, you should be a little considerate or careful with how you are structuring that job. For instance, the Standard environment in Google App Engine will present you with a resource limit for your server calls. If your operations are known to take longer than, say, 10 minutes or so, you may be better off moving to the Flexible environment (which may be a little more expensive but certainly a little more powerful and a little less limited) or even moving that workflow to something like Google Compute Engine or another managed service.
Read full review
Microsoft
Azure is particularly well suited for enterprise environments with existing Microsoft investments, those that require robust compliance features, and organizations that need hybrid cloud capabilities that bridge on-premises and cloud infrastructure. In my opinion, Azure is less appropriate for cost-sensitive startups or small businesses without dedicated cloud expertise and scenarios requiring edge computing use cases with limited connectivity. Azure offers comprehensive solutions for most business needs but can feel like there is a higher learning curve than other cloud-based providers, depending on the product and use case.
Read full review
Pros
Dropbox
  • I can share projects I need feedback on.
  • I can make projects available to editors so that they can do their work.
  • Dropbox is a place where I can store files that I can access from anywhere, even if I don't have my laptop with me at the time.
  • I have an old friend who is an acting professor in Tokyo. He loves the dialogue that I write in my novels. He converts chapters into scenework for his acting students. They get very excited when there's new material!
Read full review
Google
  • Quick to develop, quick to deploy. You can be up and running on Google App Engine in no time.
  • Flexible. We use Java for some services and Node.js for others.
  • Great security features. We have been consistently impressed with the security and authentication features of Google App Engine.
Read full review
Microsoft
  • Microsoft Azure is highly scalable and flexible. You can quickly scale up or down additional resources and computing power.
  • You have no longer upfront investments for hardware. You only pay for the use of your computing power, storage space, or services.
  • The uptime that can be achieved and guaranteed is very important for our company. This includes the rapid maintenance for security updates that are mostly carried out by Microsoft.
  • The wide range of capabilities of services that are possible in Microsoft Azure. You can practically put or create anything in Microsoft Azure.
Read full review
Cons
Dropbox
  • I’d like to be able to hover over an image/document and have it expand/enlarge without actually opening it
  • I’d love to see a carousel that lets me thumb through more quickly
  • I’m almost always in thumbnail view. I’d like to see them re-organize automatically when something is moved or deleted instead of leaving an empty space.
  • AI options for photo editing.
  • Easier pdf markups
Read full review
Google
  • There is a slight learning curve to getting used to code on Google App Engine.
  • Google Cloud Datastore is Google's NoSQL database in the cloud that your applications can use. NoSQL databases, by design, cannot give handle complex queries on the data. This means that sometimes you need to think carefully about your data structures - so that you can get the results you need in your code.
  • Setting up billing is a little annoying. It does not seem to save billing information to your account so you can re-use the same information across different Cloud projects. Each project requires you to re-enter all your billing information (if required)
Read full review
Microsoft
  • The cost of resources is difficult to determine, technical documentation is frequently out of date, and documentation and mapping capabilities are lacking.
  • The documentation needs to be improved, and some advanced configuration options require research and experimentation.
  • Microsoft's licensing scheme is too complex for the average user, and Azure SQL syntax is too different from traditional SQL.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
Dropbox
Dropbox is a user-friendly, easy tool which requires little to no skill and they offer a free version with a good amount of storage available. There are other file sharing tools available however at a cost. Dropbox free version I have used for years and it serves every purpose I need.
Read full review
Google
App Engine is a solid choice for deployments to Google Cloud Platform that do not want to move entirely to a Kubernetes-based container architecture using a different Google product. For rapid prototyping of new applications and fairly straightforward web application deployments, we'll continue to leverage the capabilities that App Engine affords us.
Read full review
Microsoft
Moving to Azure was and still is an organizational strategy and not simply changing vendors. Our product roadmap revolved around Azure as we are in the business of humanitarian relief and Azure and Microsoft play an important part in quickly and efficiently serving all of the world. Migration and investment in Azure should be considered as an overall strategy of an organization and communicated companywide.
Read full review
Usability
Dropbox
It works extremely well, and we have never had any issues with connecting or sharing files. It's very easy to use, and any team member can share, add, and delete files to a virtual drive. This is extremely helpful, and it's an amazing tool to use, ensuring everyone can connect and work together effectively.
Read full review
Google
I had to revisit the UI after a year of just setting up and forgetting. The UI got some improvements but the amount of navigation we have to go through to setup a new app has increased but also got easier to setup. Gemini now is integrated and make getting answers faster
Read full review
Microsoft
As Microsoft Azure is [doing a] really good with PaaS. The need of a market is to have [a] combo of PaaS and IaaS. While AWS is making [an] exceptionally well blend of both of them, Azure needs to work more on DevOps and Automation stuff. Apart from that, I would recommend Azure as a great platform for cloud services as scale.
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Dropbox
I really recommend the product for the Dropbox availability is a great having very very less downtimes, they errors are less I have been faced yet, due to connectivity sometimes we are getting errors. Only sometimes the limitations of some features show some errors.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
It has proven to be unreliable in our production environment and services become unavailable without proper notification to system administrators
Read full review
Performance
Dropbox
Dropbox is really useful, you can access any file from anywhere and you can upload and even edit files online, but, sometimes it can be slow. Downloading, uploading, and syncing is a bit slow, it can take several minutes. Furthermore, the search engine for large amounts of data can be slow too and it is not powerful.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Dropbox
They immediately responded like in an example that I gave where one of our staff members accidentally deleted the whole Special Hope Network Dropbox, we immediately contacted Dropbox they walked us through the steps of how to retrieve the information and luckily enough we were able to retrieve the entire Dropbox and we have had back and forth with Dropbox on what to do when an employee leaves how to remove them how to add another employee.
Read full review
Google
Good amount of documentation available for Google App Engine and in general there is large developer community around Google App Engine and other products it interacts with. Lastly, Google support is great in general. No issues so far with them.
Read full review
Microsoft
We were running Windows Server and Active Directory, so [Microsoft] Azure was a seamless transition. We ran into a few, if any support issues, however, the availability of Microsoft Azure's support team was more than willing and able to guide us through the process. They even proposed solutions to issues we had not even thought of!
Read full review
In-Person Training
Dropbox
The person for corporate product dealing and knowledge of the product explore and better and secure use are properly handover to us. Also provide full software and tool training from the basic to the pro level with each and every possible explanation. Provide many sessions regarding every doubt. Also Guide better suitable options for our business to migrate and integrate for the expansion in all places employee smoothly.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Online Training
Dropbox
I did not personally take any training for Dropbox so I am self taught but I know when our Vice President selected Dropbox, he personally did do some training modules on it and I'm assuming it was very easy and simple to understand since he now acts like he is a pro at it!
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Dropbox
I needed to stay current in improving my daily operations. Dropbox
was suggested to me by a former colleague two-years ago and I've been using it just fine ever since.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
As I have mentioned before the issue with my Oracle Mismatch Version issues that have put a delay on moving one of my platforms will justify my 7 rating.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Dropbox
I prefer the layout and visual aspect of Dropbox as it mirrors my files on my computer. I feel that I am more organized, and it's easier to find my files in Dropbox than it was with Google Drive.
Read full review
Google
We were on another much smaller cloud provider and decided to make the switch for several reasons - stability, breadth of services, and security. In reviewing options, GCP provided the best mixtures of meeting our needs while also balancing the overall cost of the service as compared to the other major players in Azure and AWS.
Read full review
Microsoft
As I continue to evaluate the "big three" cloud providers for our clients, I make the following distinctions, though this gap continues to close. AWS is more granular, and inherently powerful in the configuration options compared to [Microsoft] Azure. It is a "developer" platform for cloud. However, Azure PowerShell is helping close this gap. Google Cloud is the leading containerization platform, largely thanks to it building kubernetes from the ground up. Azure containerization is getting better at having the same storage/deployment options.
Read full review
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Dropbox
I would recommend to this product directly to the sales team of Dropbox for the best deal provide to my referred person and provide the best service to them.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Scalability
Dropbox
It's easy to integrate with the systems of Windows and Linux, easy to have web versions accessible, which provide the web login credentials. Also, it can be installed for individuals for the best autosync features.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Professional Services
Dropbox
Their services are highly rated for moving massive, complex data sets from legacy on-premise servers to the cloud with minimal downtime.
Read full review
Google
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
Dropbox
  • When it works (usually if a client already has Dropbox, so they don't get the solicitation to sign up), it works flawlessly.
  • I've had multiple clients not see the "continue with download only" at the bottom and email me to resend the media another way because they don't have a Dropbox account.
Read full review
Google
  • Effective employee adoption through ease of use.
  • Effective integration to other java based frameworks.
  • Time to market is very quick. Build, test, deploy and use.
  • The GAE Whitelist for java is an important resource to know what works and what does not. So use it. It would also be nice for Google to expand on items that are allowed on GAE platform.
Read full review
Microsoft
  • For about 2 years we didn't have to do anything with our production VMs, the system ran without a hitch, which meant our engineers could focus on features rather than infrastructure.
  • DNS management was very easy in Azure, which made it easy to upgrade our cluster with zero downtime.
  • Azure Web UI was easy to work with and navigate, which meant our senior engineers and DevOps team could work with Azure without formal training.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Dropbox Screenshots

Screenshot of the action bar, that sits across the browser page can be used to record the screen, edit PDFs, upload files, create folders, get signatures, or send and track documents.Screenshot of Dropbox Replay, that lets collaborators leave frame-accurate feedback and markups directly on project files.Screenshot of Dropbox Capture, which can be used to take screen recordings, screenshots, and GIFs with one click and share them with a link.Screenshot of the interface where Dropbox lets users upload, edit, send, and sign PDFs in one place.