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Edge runtimes compared: Azure IoT Edge vs AWS IoT Greengrass

Updated 27 Oct 2026

An edge runtime runs containers or functions on a computer in the factory (an industrial PC or gateway) and lets you deploy and update that software from the cloud. It’s how you filter, aggregate and act on data locally, before it costs anything to send.

Why edge processing saves money

Every message that leaves the factory is billed several times: by the IoT gateway, the event stream, stream processing and storage. Reducing data at the edge reduces all of those at once.

  • Aggregate: send one-minute summaries instead of every raw reading.
  • Filter: send only readings that changed, or that cross a threshold.
  • Act locally: stop a machine on a vibration spike within milliseconds, without a round trip to the cloud.
  • Keep working offline: buffer data during an internet outage and send it when the connection returns.

Azure IoT Edge: free runtime, pay for messages

The IoT Edge runtime itself is free. Each edge device registers with Azure IoT Hub, and the messages it sends to the cloud count against your IoT Hub units like any other device.

So the cost of IoT Edge is really the cost of IoT Hub, plus the hardware you run it on. Azure also offers ready-made modules (such as Stream Analytics on the edge) that are priced separately.

AWS IoT Greengrass: pay per active core device

Greengrass charges per active core device per month: a device counts if it connects to AWS during the month. Messages it sends to the cloud are then billed by AWS IoT Core as usual.

The per-device fee is small next to industrial hardware costs, but it scales with the number of gateways, so a design with one gateway per machine costs more than one gateway per line.

Google Cloud: no managed edge runtime

Google has no managed IoT edge runtime since Cloud IoT Core was retired in 2023. Options are:

  • Running your own container platform on edge hardware (for example a lightweight Kubernetes distribution), managed with your own tools;
  • Google Distributed Cloud, a hardware-plus-software offering aimed at larger sites, priced very differently from a per-device runtime.

Our estimates show Google Cloud’s edge runtime as a gap, not a free item. See what replaced IoT Core.

Choosing

If you… Consider
Already use Azure IoT Hub IoT Edge: no extra runtime fee
Already use AWS IoT Core Greengrass: small per-device fee, deep AWS integration
Want to stay cloud-neutral Your own containers on the edge, sending over MQTT to whichever cloud
Have only a few devices Edge may not pay off yet; batching on the device gets much of the saving

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