In April 2008, Google announced App Engine, a platform for developing and hosting web applications in Google-managed data centers, which was the first cloud computing service from the company. The service became generally available in November 2011. Since the announcement of App Engine, Google added multiple cloud services to the platform.
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) or GKE on-prem offered as part of Anthos platform[6][7] – Containers as a Service based on Kubernetes.
Cloud Functions – Functions as a Service to run event-driven code written in Node.js, Java, Python, or Go.
Cloud Run – Compute execution environment based on Knative.[8] Offered as Cloud Run (fully managed)[9] or as Cloud Run for Anthos.[9] Currently supports GCP, AWS and VMware management.[10]
Cloud Composer – Managed workflow orchestration service built on Apache Airflow.[22]
Cloud Datalab – Tool for data exploration, analysis, visualization and machine learning. This is a fully managed Jupyter Notebook service.[23]
Cloud Dataprep – Data service based on Trifacta to visually explore, clean, and prepare data for analysis.[24]
Cloud Pub/Sub – Scalable event ingestion service based on message queues.[25]
Cloud Data Studio – Business intelligence tool to visualize data through dashboards and reports.[26]
Looker – Business intelligence platform used to deliver value through real-time dashboards, integrated insights, and custom applications.[27][28]
Cloud AI
Cloud AutoML – Service to train and deploy custom machine learning models. As of September 2018, the service is in Beta.[29]
Cloud TPU – Accelerators used by Google to train machine learning models.[30]
Cloud Machine Learning Engine – Managed service for training and building machine learning models based on mainstream frameworks.[31]
Cloud Talent Solution (formerly Cloud Job Discovery) – Service based on Google's search and machine learning capabilities for the recruiting ecosystem.[32]
Dialogflow Enterprise – Development environment based on Google's machine learning for building conversational interfaces.[33]
Cloud Natural Language – Text analysis service based on Google Deep Learning models.[34]
Cloud Speech-to-Text – Speech to text conversion service based on machine learning.[35]
Cloud Text-to-Speech – Text to speech conversion service based on machine learning.[36]
Cloud Translation API – Service to dynamically translate between thousands of available language pairs.
Cloud Vision API – Image analysis service based on machine learning.[37]
Cloud Video Intelligence – Video analysis service based on machine learning.[38]
Management tools
Operations suite (formerly Stackdriver ) – Monitoring, logging, and diagnostics for applications on Google Cloud Platform and AWS.[39]
Cloud Deployment Manager - Tool to deploy Google Cloud Platform resources defined in templates created in YAML, Python or Jinja2.[40]
Cloud Console – Web interface to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
Cloud Shell – Browser-based shell command-line access to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
Cloud Console Mobile App – Android and iOS application to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
Cloud APIs – APIs to programmatically access Google Cloud Platform resources
Maps Platform – APIs for maps, routes, and places based on Google Maps.
Apigee API Platform – Lifecycle management platform to design, secure, deploy, monitor, and scale APIs.
API Monetization – Tool for API providers to create revenue models, reports, payment gateways, and developer portal integrations.
Developer Portal – Self-service platform for developers to publish and manage APIs.
API Analytics – Service to analyze API-driven programs through monitoring, measuring, and managing APIs.
Apigee Sense – Enables API security by identifying and alerting administrators to suspicious API behaviors.
Cloud Endpoints – An NGINX-based proxy to deploy and manage APIs.
Service Infrastructure – A set of foundational services for building Google Cloud products.
Regions and zones
As of Q3 2022, Google Cloud Platform is available in 37 regions and 112 zones. A region is a specific geographical location where users can deploy cloud resources.
Each region is an independent geographic area that consists of zones.
A zone is a deployment area for Google Cloud Platform resources within a region. Zones should be considered a single failure domain within a region.
Most of the regions have three or more zones. As of Q3 2022, Google Cloud Platform is available in the following regions and zones:
GCP Regions & Zones
Region Name
Launch Date
Location
Zones
us-west1
Q3, 2016
The Dalles, Oregon, US
us-west1-a
us-west1-b
us-west1-c
us-west2
Q3, 2018
Los Angeles, California, US
us-west2-a
us-west2-b
us-west2-c
us-west3
Q1, 2020
Salt Lake City, Utah, US
us-west3-a
us-west3-b
us-west3-c
us-west4
Q2, 2020
Las Vegas, Nevada, US
us-west4-a
us-west4-b
us-west4-c
us-central1
Council Bluffs, Iowa, US
us-central1-a
us-central1-b
us-central1-c
us-central1-f
us-east1
Q4, 2015
Moncks Corner, South Carolina, US
us-east1-b
us-east1-c
us-east1-d
us-east4
Q2, 2017
Ashburn, Virginia, US
us-east4-a
us-east4-b
us-east4-c
northamerica-northeast1
Q1, 2018
Montréal, Canada
northamerica-northeast1-a
northamerica-northeast1-b
northamerica-northeast1-c
southamerica-east1
Q3, 2017
São Paulo, Brazil
southamerica-east1-a
southamerica-east1-b
southamerica-east1-c
southamerica-west1
Q3, 2021
Santiago, Chile
southamerica-west1-a
southamerica-west1-b
southamerica-west1-c
europe-west1
St. Ghislain, Belgium
europe-west1-b
europe-west1-c
europe-west1-d
europe-west2
Q2, 2017
London, UK
europe-west2-a
europe-west2-b
europe-west2-c
europe-west3
Q3, 2017
Frankfurt, Germany
europe-west3-a
europe-west3-b
europe-west3-c
europe-west4
Q1, 2018
Eemshaven, Netherlands
europe-west4-a
europe-west4-b
europe-west4-c
europe-west6
Q1, 2019
Zurich, Switzerland
europe-west6-a
europe-west6-b
europe-west6-c
europe-west8
Q2, 2022
Milan, Italy
europe-west8-a
europe-west8-b
europe-west8-c
europe-west9
Q2, 2022
Paris, France
europe-west9-a
europe-west9-b
europe-west9-c
europe-central2
Q2, 2021
Warsaw, Poland
europe-central2-a
europe-central2-b
europe-central2-c
europe-north1
Q2, 2018
Hamina, Finland
europe-north1-a
europe-north1-b
europe-north1-c
europe-southwest1
Q2, 2022
Madrid, Spain
europe-southwest1-a
europe-southwest1-b
europe-southwest1-c
me-west1
Q4, 2022
Tel Aviv, Israel
me-west1-a
me-west1-b
me-west1-c
me-central1
Q2, 2023
Doha, Qatar
me-central1-a
me-central1-b
me-central1-c
asia-south1
Q4, 2017
Mumbai, India
asia-south1-a
asia-south1-b
asia-south1-c
asia-southeast1
Q2, 2017
Jurong West, Singapore
asia-southeast1-a
asia-southeast1-b
asia-southeast1-c
asia-southeast2
Q2, 2020
Jakarta, Indonesia
asia-southeast2-a
asia-southeast2-b
asia-southeast2-c
asia-east2
Q3, 2018
Hong Kong
asia-east2-a
asia-east2-b
asia-east2-c
asia-east1
Changhua County, Taiwan
asia-east1-a
asia-east1-b
asia-east1-c
asia-northeast1
Q4, 2016
Tokyo, Japan
asia-northeast1-a
asia-northeast1-b
asia-northeast1-c
asia-northeast2
Q2, 2019
Osaka, Japan
asia-northeast2-a
asia-northeast2-b
asia-northeast2-c
asia-northeast3
Q1, 2020
Seoul, Korea
asia-northeast3-a
asia-northeast3-b
asia-northeast3-c
australia-southeast1
Q3, 2017
Sydney, Australia
australia-southeast1-a
australia-southeast1-b
australia-southeast1-c
Similarity to services by other cloud service providers
For those familiar with other notable cloud service providers, a comparison of similar services may be helpful in understanding Google Cloud Platform's offerings.
May 2010 – Google BigQuery and Prediction API announced in preview[46]
October 2011 – Google Cloud SQL is announced in preview[46]
June 2012 – Google Compute Engine is launched in preview[47]
May 2013 – Google Compute Engine is released to GA[48]
August 2013 - Cloud Storage begins automatically encrypting each Storage object's data and metadata under the 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES-128), and each encryption key is itself encrypted with a regularly rotated set of master keys[49]
November 2019 – Google Cloud Run (fully managed) General availability release[78]
March 2020 – Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Google Cloud postponed the online streaming version of its Google Cloud Next mega-conference, two weeks after it canceled the in-person version.[79]
October 2020 – Google Cloud announced that it will become a block producer candidate for the EOS network and EOS.IO protocol. Currently the top block producers are cryptocurrency exchanges like OKEx and Binance.[80][81]
February 2021 – Google Kubernetes Engine Autopilot introduced. [82][83]
April 2022 – MobiledgeX acquired and joins Google Cloud.[85]
March 2023 – Google brings generative AI capabilities to Google Cloud.[86]
Public Customers
Customers announced in 2023 include: Kingfisher,[87] The Government of Kuwait,[88] Deutsche Börse Group,[89] Unity,[90] Uber,[91] FanCode,[92] and Mercedes-Benz.[93]