AWS vs Azure: A Decision Framework for Production Workloads

Your team just got approval for a new microservices platform. The CTO asks whether to go with AWS or Azure. You've used both—maybe AWS for a previous startup, Azure through an enterprise gig with Microsoft EA discounts. Both worked fine. Both had their quirks. But now you need to make a defensible recommendation that accounts for your specific workload patterns, team expertise, and long-term costs. "It depends" won't fly in the architecture review. This is where most cloud comparisons fail you. They'll tell you AWS has more services (true), Azure integrates better with Microsoft tooling (also true), and both have Kubernetes offerings (obviously). What they won't tell you is how to weigh these factors against your actual constraints: a team that knows Terraform but not ARM templates, a data pipeline that needs sub-100ms latency to on-prem systems, a compliance requirement that narrows your region choices. I've sat through dozens of these decisions—some I got right, some I'd make differe