What Is Cloud Computing?
Cloud computing is the on-demand delivery of IT resources over the Internet with pay-as-you-go pricing. Instead of buying, owning, and maintaining physical data centers and servers, you can access technology services, such as computing power, storage and databases on an as-needed basis from a cloud provider like Amazon Web Services (AWS).
How does cloud computing work?
Rather than owning their own computing infrastructure or data centers, companies can rent access to anything from applications to storage from a cloud service provider.
One benefit of using cloud computing services is that firms can avoid the upfront cost and complexity of owning and maintaining their own IT infrastructure, and instead simply pay for what they use, when they use it.
In turn, providers of cloud computing services can benefit from significant economies of scale by delivering the same services to a wide range of customers.
Types of cloud computing
- Public cloud
- Private cloud
- Community cloud
- Hybrid cloud
Types of cloud services
- Infrastructure as a service (IaaS)
- Platform as a service (PaaS)
- Software as a service (SaaS)
Benefits of cloud computing
- Cost
- Speed
- Productivity
- Reliability
- Performance
- Global scale
- Security