Cloud Vs On-Premise: IT Infrastructure Model of Your Choice?
IT infrastructure has been undergoing transition over decades. The IT industry has matured to a stage where infrastructure maintenance is easily manageable from the level of traditional hardware with heavy maintenance.
Cloud infrastructure is one solution in that journey that simplifies IT maintenance concerns by taking care of core infrastructure aspects over the network. However, Cloud solutions are not a complete answer because of the strong preferences for on-premise solutions on the other side.
The Cloud vs on-premise installations differences is various. While Cloud infrastructure is enabled over the network, on-premise servers (as the name suggests) deal with infrastructure at organizational premises or on-site. However, both solutions aim to reduce organizational costs and maintenance burdens through the implementation of agile IT infrastructure. Cloud infrastructure has already proved to be cost-effective and easier for small businesses, majorly for its agile and flexible integrations at affordable costs.
But how about infrastructure management at the enterprise level that maintains strict data policies? To what extent will Cloud computing infrastructure be successful here? Will they have to look for a managed on-premises model?
Planning Migration to Cloud
Stuck at this point?
Answers to these questions lie in understanding key differentiators between the Cloud Vs On-premise models.
1) Hosting
Hosting is the first factor that shows us a big difference between on-premise and Cloud infrastructure models.
As we see the on-premise servers, the infrastructure is maintained at the premises of the organization. This directly means the requirement of additional maintenance personnel for server management.
Whereas Cloud solutions work otherwise, and the Cloud infrastructure is maintained over the network.
The Cloud Service Providers (CSP) in place will (by default) take care of the Cloud computing environment. Be it upgrading software, addressing downtimes, repair, and maintenance, and more pertaining to the accommodated public Cloud computing servers.
Coming to sudden scenarios like server blackouts, Cloud solutions work their way with high scalability offerings.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Server Location | Third-party Cloud | Physical, On-premises |
| Maintenance | Off-site | On-site |
| Server Blackouts | Possible but Scalable | Possible |
| On-Demand | Easily Scalable | Consumes Time and Effort |
2) Deployment
Having an on-premise server model means maintaining infrastructure on your own, which directly reflects in investment for servers, software, and technical personnel.
In that case, the entire risk at times of failure lies with the organization!
Whereas, Cloud computing infrastructure presents a safer perspective to your business. In Cloud solutions, any loss incurs you only the subscription charges needed for utilizing its virtual environment.
Cloud virtual infrastructure also offers you high flexibility in the implementation of broader infrastructure.
Cloud integration also facilitates faster installation and support services, while it might take days together to get an on-premise server on board. A system administrator with Cloud support can perform at a rate ten times faster than in an on-premise infrastructure.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Installation | Easy and fast | Time-consuming |
| Availability | On-demand | When bought and deployed |
| Investment | Less | High |
| Business Risks | Low | High |
3) Workflow and Delivery
Straight answer to this Cloud!
Cloud is known for its ability to:
- Offer unlimited memory space
- Timely backup
- On-demand Cloud solutions availability
- Faster rate of application launch and release
- Timely software upgrades without the need for additional hardware in case of own datacenter
- Ability to handle workloads
This might not be the case with an on-premise server. But testing and running workloads on the Cloud computing environment can be a temporary solution for those with on-premise infrastructure.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Unlimited Memory | Yes | No |
| Back-up | Timely | Effort-intensive |
| Rate of Application Launch and Deployment | High | Low |
| Ability to handling workloads | High | Low |
| Process Delivery | Smooth | Chances of interruption |
4) Energy Savings
Considering the number of energy servers consume, having on-premise server deployment involves more energy expenditure.
While the servers consumes 100 percent of its required power, managed on-premise servers demand 10-20 percent of the server’s power.
This naturally turns into a maintenance burden for organizations as they own the infrastructure and end up dreaming about energy savings.
Whereas, Cloud integration platform deals away with this challenge as maintenance responsibility lies with service providers.
While energy consumption comes as part of a package in a Cloud service model, the on-premise model throws that burden on to the organization.
Techniques like airflow management are being used to address the issue of heavy power consumption.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Energy Savings | Comes part of a package | To be managed individually |
| Cost-Savings | High | Low |
| Scope for SMEs | High | Low |
| Scope for Corporates | High | Low |
| Maintenance Burden | Taken care of by CSP | Enterprise’s responsibility |
5) Bandwidth Enhancement
Cloud solutions give enterprises the flexibility to upgrade their requirements, be it memory, software, server space, etc.
One can make the best use of virtual servers, virtual routers and additional networks in Cloud to enhance the size, and capacities of existing storage.
All you have to do is upgrade your Cloud computing service models!
This is not the case with on-premises infrastructure, where enhancement of bandwidth and capacity means physically deploying new servers.
However, one advantage that on-premises users can enjoy is ‘security’. Since you manage things physically with on-premises servers, you will have to make custom configurations in line with your organizational needs.
Cloud infrastructure fails here as the organizations will only have to choose from the available options Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) provide.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Bandwidth Enhancement | On-demand | Demands new deployments |
| Hardware | CSP’s responsibility | Organization’s responsibility |
| Configurations | Standard | Customizable |
6) Access Control
Unexpected blackouts, malware, critical system failure and technical are common with any system.
But how you overcome the disaster is the real challenge.
Cloud infrastructure stands a step ahead in this aspect compared to the on-premises model.
Cloud solutions provide organizations instant access to its virtual resources in case of any disaster. With these features of Cloud computing, you can backup, restore and reboot software as well as data in a virtual environment.
Whereas in on-premises, the responsibility of security and privacy needs lies with the organization.
| Key Factors | Cloud | On-Premise |
| Malware Removal | Easy | Difficult |
| Vulnerability to Attacks | Yes | Yes |
| Responsibility of failure | CSP | Organization |
The Result
On an end note, we put before you the following significant differences between Cloud Vs On-premise models:
- CAPEX and OPEX: On-premise adds to capital expenditure; Cloud means operational cost offering higher flexibility to pay for what you use.
- Disaster Recovery: Major advantage that Cloud enjoys over on-premises because of its application and data storage options
- Security: Both solutions are equally vulnerable to security. The decision here depends on the situation!
Not able to make a decision?
Stevie Award Winner Veritis can help you!
Our decade-old experience in offering Cloud solutions & services to different firms (including Fortune 500 firms) can get your issue resolved.
Explore Cloud Services Got Questions? Schedule A Call
FAQ’s about Cloud and On-Premise
Cloud computing is the on demand delivery of IT services over the internet to host resources like servers, emails, storage, networking, analytics, and data.
These services are divided into three categories and they are Platform as a Service (PaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (SaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS).
The major advantage of on-premise software is data protection. The data is stored on local environment, and the user will have complete control over its security.
Apart from security, there are two significant advantages of on-premise - cost, and connectivity.
According to a survey by Cisco, Cloud computing will virtually replace traditional data centers in the coming years.
Cloud data center traffic witnessed 95 percent of the total data traffic center in 2021.
Cloud computing is relatively cheaper than on-premise for setup, maintenance, running, and overall support costs.
However, based on the requirements of a business, there are some cases in which on-premise software is cheaper.
Additional Resources: