Amazon EKS vs Google GKE: pricing
On the control plane, Amazon EKS and Google GKE charge the same control-plane fee. Amazon EKS charges $0.10/hr (~$73/mo) and Google GKE charges $0.10/hr (~$73/mo). Their cheapest worker nodes are about $30/mo and $24/mo. For an illustrative 3-node cluster with one load balancer, Google GKE is the cheaper of the two (~$157/mo vs ~$175/mo). Snapshot captured June 2026 — verify before buying.
Data as of June 2026.
Amazon EKS vs Google GKE side by side
| Cost factor | Amazon EKS | Google GKE |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Amazon Web Services | Google Cloud |
| Control plane | $0.10/hr | $0.10/hr |
| Est. control-plane / month | ~$73/mo | ~$73/mo |
| Free control plane? | No | No |
| Cheapest node / month | $30 | $24 |
| Load balancer | AWS Network/Application Load Balancer billed separately (from ~$16–$22/month plus LCU usage). | Google Cloud Load Balancing billed separately (forwarding rules + data processed). |
| Egress | Standard AWS data-transfer egress applies (first 100 GB/month free, then ~$0.09/GB). | Standard Google Cloud egress applies; tiered by destination. |
| Free tier | No free control plane. AWS Free Tier covers some EC2/EBS for 12 months but not the EKS control-plane fee. | One free zonal or Autopilot cluster per billing account per month via a ~$74.40 monthly credit that offsets the management fee. |
| Regions | 30+ AWS regions worldwide. | 40+ Google Cloud regions worldwide. |
Sources: Amazon Web Services pricing · Google Cloud pricing.
Sample monthly cost
A rough monthly total for a small cluster (3 nodes at each provider's cheapest node price + one $12/mo load balancer + the control-plane fee). This ignores egress, storage, support and node-size differences, so treat it as a starting point only:
| Component | Amazon EKS | Google GKE |
|---|---|---|
| Control plane | ~$73/mo | ~$73/mo |
| 3 × cheapest node | $90 | $72 |
| 1 × load balancer | $12 | $12 |
| Estimated total / month | $175 | $157 |
Verdict
On cost alone, Google GKE is the cheaper pick for this small-cluster example. But the right choice depends on more than price: Amazon EKS (deep aws integration (iam, vpc, alb, fargate)) versus Google GKE (one cluster's management fee is effectively free via the monthly credit). Read each provider's full breakdown — Amazon EKS and Google GKE — and model your own node plan in the calculator.
Frequently asked questions
Is Amazon EKS or Google GKE cheaper?
On the control plane, Amazon EKS and Google GKE charge the same control-plane fee. For a sample 3-node cluster with one load balancer (using each provider's cheapest node and a $12/mo load balancer), Google GKE comes out lower — about $157/mo vs $175/mo. This is illustrative; your real cost depends on node size, count, egress and region. snapshot captured June 2026.
What is the control-plane fee for Amazon EKS vs Google GKE?
Amazon EKS: $0.10 per cluster/hour for standard Kubernetes support (~$73/month). Extended support for older versions is $0.60/cluster/hour. Google GKE: $0.10 per cluster/hour cluster-management fee (~$73/month) on both Autopilot and Standard. A monthly free-tier credit (~$74.40) effectively covers one zonal/Autopilot cluster. snapshot captured June 2026 — verify on each vendor's pricing page.
Which has the cheaper worker nodes, Amazon EKS or Google GKE?
Google GKE has the cheaper representative node: $24/mo vs $30/mo. Amazon EKS: EC2 t3.medium on-demand ~ $0.0416/hour (~$30/month) per node; you pay normal EC2 rates, or use EKS Auto Mode (adds a $0.02–$0.07/hr management fee per instance) or Fargate. Google GKE: Standard mode: you pay normal Compute Engine rates (e.g. e2-medium ~ $0.0335/hour, ~$24/month). Autopilot bills per pod vCPU/memory you request instead of per node.
Amazon EKS or Google GKE — which should a small team pick?
If a free control plane and predictable pricing matter most, lean to whichever of Amazon EKS/Google GKE is free and simpler. If you need deep cloud integration or the widest region coverage, the larger vendor usually wins despite higher fees. Run your real node plan through the calculator before deciding.
More comparisons
Last updated: 2026-06-20