Advantages and Disadvantages of Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing is shaping how we live and work today. Whether we like it or not, it has become an integral part of our lives. Companies and businesses of all shapes and sizes are now turning to Cloud Computing. But nothing is perfect and Cloud Computing is no exception. While it is vastly beneficial, it also has some risks and concerns that should not be overlooked. Therefore, in this tutorial section, let’s discuss the advantages and disadvantages of Cloud Computing in detail.

Advantages of Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing is an emerging technology that almost every company is being switched to from its on-premise technologies. Whether it is public, private, or hybrid, Cloud Computing has become an essential factor for companies to rise up to the competition. Let us find out why the cloud is so much preferred over the on-premise technologies.

• Cost efficiency: The biggest reason behind companies shifting to Cloud Computing is that it takes considerably lesser cost than any on-premise technology. Now, companies need not store data in disks anymore as the cloud offers enormous storage space, saving money and resources.
• High speed: Cloud Computing lets us deploy the service quickly in fewer clicks. This quick deployment lets us get the resources required for our system within minutes.
• Excellent accessibility: Storing information in the cloud allows us to access it anywhere and anytime regardless of the machine making it a highly accessible and flexible technology of the present times.

• Back-up and restore data: Once data is stored in the cloud, it is easier to get its back-up and recovery, which is quite a time-consuming process in on-premise technology.
• Manageability: Cloud Computing eliminates the need for IT infrastructure updates and maintenance since the service provider ensures timely, guaranteed, and seamless delivery of our services and also takes care of all the maintenance and management of our IT services according to the service-level agreement (SLA).
• Sporadic batch processing: Cloud Computing lets us add or subtract resources and services according to our needs. So, if the workload is not 24/7, we need not worry about the resources and services getting wasted and we won’t end up stuck with unused services.
• Strategic edge: Cloud Computing provides a company with a competitive edge over its competitors when it comes to accessing the latest and mission-critical applications that it needs without having to invest its time and money on their installations. It lets the company focus on keeping up with the business competition by offering access to the most trending and in-demand applications and doing all the manual work of installing and maintaining the applications for the comapny.

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Disadvantages of Cloud Computing

Every technology has both positive and negative aspects that are highly important to be discussed before implementing it. The aforementioned points highlight the benefits of using cloud technology and the following discussion will outline the potential cons of Cloud Computing.

• Vulnerability to attacks: Storing data in the cloud may pose serious challenges of information theft since in the cloud every data of a company is online. Security breach is something that even the best organizations have suffered from and it’s a potential risk in the cloud as well. Although advanced security measures are deployed on the cloud, still storing confidential data in the cloud can be a risky affair.
• Network connectivity dependency: Cloud Computing is entirely dependent on the Internet. This direct tie-up with the Internet means that a company needs to have reliable and consistent Internet service as well as a fast connection and bandwidth to reap the benefits of Cloud Computing.
• Downtime: Downtime is considered as one of the biggest potential downsides of using Cloud Computing. The cloud providers may sometimes face technical outages that can happen due to various reasons, such as loss of power, low Internet connectivity, data centers going out of service for maintenance, etc. This can lead to a temporary downtime in the cloud service.

• Vendor lock-in: When in need to migrate from one cloud platform to another, a company might face some serious challenges because of the differences between vendor platforms. Hosting and running the applications of the current cloud platform on some other platform may cause support issues, configuration complexities, and additional expenses. The company data might also be left vulnerable to security attacks due to compromises that might have been made during migrations.
• Limited control: Cloud customers may face limited control over their deployments. Cloud services run on remote servers that are completely owned and managed by service providers, which makes it hard for the companies to have the level of control that they would want over their back-end infrastructure. 

When weighing the cloud computing advantages and disadvantages, it’s important to keep the sources of those pros and cons in mind. Cloud service providers are responsible for just about every advantage. The same isn’t true for the disadvantages.

Cloud providers can’t control when your Internet access goes down. They can only exert limited control over your personal digital security habits. As for the providers closing shop, it’s always best to choose companies that have an established track record.