AWS Key Management Service vs Azure Key Vault

AWS Key Management Service creates and controls cryptographic keys for data encryption and digital signatures. It centralizes key lifecycles and permissions, including separate control over administrators and key users. KMS supports symmetric encryption, asymmetric signing or encryption pairs, and HMAC generation and verification. The AWS Encryption SDK can use KMS as a key provider for local application encryption and decryption. Integrations include Amazon S3, EBS, RDS, DynamoDB, Lambda, and CloudTrail. With CloudTrail enabled, requests can record the user, time, API action, and key. AWS says hardware security modules validated to FIPS 140-3 Security Level 3 protect key material and operations, with plaintext keys kept only in volatile HSM memory. Multi-Region keys support cross-Region workflows; external key stores keep material in a customer-managed external manager. KMS scales with demand but has default key and request limits. The listed plan is $1 a month per KMS key, prorated hourly.

Azure Key Vault is a cloud service accessed through the web for managing keys, secrets, and certificates. Its Standard plan lists software-protected keys, secrets operations, and certificate operations. Premium lists HSM-protected keys with the same secrets and certificate operations. The service includes key audit logs, audit logs, and secret rotation. It can inject secrets into CI/CD workflows and integrates with Kubernetes. The main stated distinction between plans is key protection: software protection in Standard versus HSM protection in Premium. Its cloud deployment model suits teams that need web-based management of credentials and cryptographic material, including delivery into deployment pipelines. The listed capabilities also provide operational visibility through logging and support recurring secret rotation.