Cloud vs Colocation Calculator
Independent Cost Comparison Tool
The complete independent tool for modeling your current cloud spend against dedicated colocation infrastructure across NYC and national markets. Run the numbers below, then see how to interpret your results.
Bottom Line: Cloud GPU and cloud compute economics shift meaningfully when your workloads stabilize. For most companies running stable workloads at $20,000+ monthly cloud spend, dedicated colocation reduces total infrastructure cost by 40 to 65 percent over a 3-year horizon. For workloads under that threshold or with genuinely variable utilization patterns, cloud usually remains the right answer. The calculator below gives you a directionally accurate first look at the comparison for your specific situation. Metro Colo Advisory provides specific facility recommendations and current market rate benchmarks at no cost.
See what NYC colocation could cost compared to what you are paying on AWS or Azure today.
How This Calculator Works
The calculator above models your total infrastructure cost across two scenarios — staying on cloud (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud) versus moving to dedicated colocation in a professional facility.
We built it to give buyers a directionally accurate first look at the economics before engaging Metro Colo Advisory for specific facility recommendations and current market pricing.
Estimated Monthly Colo: $0
Year 1 Savings: $0
Year 3 Savings: $0
Year 5 Savings: $0
What the calculator includes
- Cloud side: Monthly compute spend, storage costs, networking and egress fees, and the multi-year compound of paying these costs without ever owning hardware. Reserved instance and savings plan discounts can be modeled if you have them.
- Colocation side: Power and space in a professional facility, cross-connect costs for hybrid architectures, and hardware amortization over a typical 3-5 year refresh cycle. The calculator uses current market rate benchmarks for the NYC metro and national markets where Metro Colo Advisory has active channel relationships.
What the calculator doesn't include
Honest about the limits of any calculator.
The tool does not model your team’s operational time on either side, one-time migration costs if you’re moving workloads off cloud, training and skill-building costs for managing dedicated infrastructure, or the financial value of cloud flexibility for workloads with genuinely unpredictable demand patterns.
These factors matter and we discuss them with every client during the assessment process.
What "directional accuracy" means
The calculator gives you a defensible first look at the cost comparison — accurate enough to know whether dedicated infrastructure is worth investigating further for your specific situation, not accurate enough to commit to a deployment.
Final pricing for dedicated colocation depends on facility selection, deployment density, contract length, and the negotiation leverage you bring to the conversation.
Metro Colo Advisory provides specific current market rate benchmarks for your actual deployment requirements at no cost.
Understanding Your Results
The numbers above tell you something. What they tell you depends on the gap between the two scenarios.
Results favor colocation strongly
(40 percent or more savings)
Dedicated infrastructure is almost certainly the right answer for your stable workloads. The gap is too large to attribute to calculator imprecision — even with conservative adjustments for migration costs and operational complexity, the colocation economics dominate. Companies in this category should be actively evaluating facility options. We recommend starting with our colocation pricing guide for the broader market framework, then reaching out for facility-specific analysis across the NYC metro colocation market and national alternatives.
Results favor colocation moderately
(15-40 percent savings)
Worth deeper evaluation. The economics favor colocation but not so dramatically that the answer is automatic. The right call depends on workload characteristics, growth trajectory, compliance requirements, and your team’s appetite for operational ownership. A hybrid cloud colocation architecture often makes the most sense in this range — dedicated for stable production workloads, cloud for everything genuinely variable. For analysis of how this works in practice, see our cloud repatriation guide.
Results favor cloud or are close to even
Stay on cloud or design a careful hybrid architecture. When the calculator output is close, the operational simplicity advantages of cloud typically outweigh small dollar savings. This is the right answer for most companies under $20,000 in monthly cloud spend, most companies with genuinely variable workloads, and most early-stage companies where flexibility matters more than cost optimization.
A note on stable workloads versus burst workloads
The calculator assumes the workload you’re modeling runs at consistent utilization. If your actual cloud spend mixes stable production workloads with burst development and experimentation, the right architecture is almost always hybrid — move the stable workloads off cloud while keeping cloud capacity for the variable workloads. We help clients model this split for free.
Common Mistakes Companies Make Using Cloud vs Colocation Calculators
1. Forgetting cloud egress fees entirely.
AWS egress charges can run 15-25 percent of total cloud cost for data-heavy workloads. Companies modeling cloud costs from their AWS invoice often miss this line item or underweight it. The calculator above includes egress when you specify data transfer volumes.
2. Using published colocation rates instead of negotiated rates.
Provider websites publish list pricing that serious clients almost never pay. Negotiated rates for colocation pricing in the NYC metro market typically run 15-30 percent below published rates with the right competitive evaluation. Modeling against published rates makes colocation look worse than it actually is.
3. Not modeling cross-connect costs for hybrid architectures.
Companies that will run dedicated infrastructure plus cloud services need to factor private connectivity costs into the financial model. Cross-connects to AWS, Azure, and GCP add meaningful recurring cost but typically save far more in egress fee elimination. The calculator handles this if you indicate cloud connectivity requirements. Modern carrier neutral data center facilities offer cross-connect access to dozens of cloud and network providers, making hybrid architectures economically efficient when properly modeled.
4. Ignoring hardware refresh economics.
Cloud commitments end with nothing owned at expiration. Colocation deployments end with hardware that has meaningful residual value or can be refreshed on your timeline rather than the cloud provider’s product roadmap. The calculator amortizes hardware over a typical 3-5 year cycle, which most companies underweight when running their own calculations.
5. Comparing today's cloud bill to today's colocation rate without modeling growth.
Cloud costs scale linearly with usage. Colocation costs scale step-function as you add capacity. For growing workloads, the colocation advantage compounds significantly over 3-5 year horizons in ways static comparisons miss. This matters especially for companies planning data center migration from cloud to dedicated infrastructure on growing workloads.
Why Independent Advisory Matters After Running the Numbers
The calculator gives you the comparison. Provider sales teams will give you their version of the comparison. Both are useful inputs. Neither is the complete picture.
Think of Metro Colo Advisory like a buyer’s agent in real estate. We work exclusively for our clients, not for the colocation providers. Commission comes from the provider you ultimately choose, paid only when a deal closes, so there’s no cost to your organization at any stage. Our independence comes from representing the buyer through every step of the evaluation, negotiation, and contracting process, never the seller.
Metro Colo Advisory has no financial stake in which provider you ultimately choose. We have formal partner relationships and earn comparable commissions from Equinix, Digital Realty, DataBank, CoreSite, and Cologix. When the calculator results favor cloud or are close to even, we tell clients that honestly. When colocation clearly wins, we model specific facility options. Either way, the recommendation reflects your actual situation rather than a provider’s quota.
For specific NYC colocation contracts provisions that affect total cost over a 5-year deployment, our contract guide covers what matters most. For evaluations involving disaster recovery colocation requirements alongside primary infrastructure, see our disaster recovery colocation guide.”
When to Move From Calculator to Conversation
The calculator is a first look. The conversation is where the real work happens. Most companies reach out for an assessment when one or more of these signal that the cost question is becoming a decision:
Your monthly cloud spend has crossed $20,000 and the trajectory is up and to the right. Your CFO has started asking specific questions about infrastructure costs in quarterly reviews. Your inference workloads are stable enough that you’re paying for cloud flexibility you’re not actually using.
Your compliance team is asking questions about cloud data residency that don’t have clean answers. Your cloud commitment is coming up on renewal and you want real alternatives in the conversation before signing again.
Metro Colo Advisory provides specific facility recommendations and current market rate benchmarks at no cost. The conversation typically takes 20 minutes and gives you concrete numbers for your actual deployment requirements.
Frequently Asked Questions About Cloud vs Colocation Pricing
How much cheaper is colocation than AWS?
For stable workloads running at consistent utilization, dedicated colocation typically reduces total infrastructure cost by 40 to 65 percent compared to equivalent AWS deployments over a 3-year horizon. The cost reduction comes from eliminating cloud provider margins on compute, eliminating egress fees, and converting variable consumption pricing to fixed infrastructure pricing. For variable workloads or workloads under $20,000 monthly cloud spend, the comparison narrows considerably and cloud often remains the better economic answer. Metro Colo Advisory models specific cloud versus colocation economics for your workload at no cost.
What is the break-even point between cloud and colocation?
The typical break-even point for cloud versus colocation sits around $15,000 to $20,000 in monthly cloud spend for stable workloads. Below that threshold, the operational complexity of managing dedicated infrastructure usually outweighs the cost savings. Above $20,000 monthly with stable utilization, dedicated infrastructure economics start to favor colocation noticeably. For high-density GPU workloads, the break-even point can be significantly lower due to the cloud GPU premium. Metro Colo Advisory provides specific break-even analysis for your workload profile at no cost.
How much does colocation actually cost per kW per month?
NYC metro colocation pricing ranges from approximately $350 per kW per month for fringe market secondary sites to $1,400 per kW per month for Manhattan carrier hotels. The Secaucus financial ecosystem (Equinix NY4) prices at premium tier for direct exchange connectivity. Northern New Jersey enterprise campuses including DataBank LGA3 at 165 halsey st newark nj deliver the strongest economics at $400-$850 per kW per month. Outside NYC, markets like Northern Virginia, Dallas, and Phoenix typically run 15-25 percent lower than NYC metro pricing. Specific pricing depends on deployment density, contract length, and negotiation leverage. Metro Colo Advisory provides current market rate benchmarks for your specific situation at no cost.
Is colocation worth it for AI and GPU workloads?
For stable AI inference workloads at scale, dedicated GPU colocation typically reduces total infrastructure cost by 40 to 65 percent compared to cloud GPU services. The cost advantage is more dramatic for GPU workloads than for general compute because the cloud GPU premium is significantly higher than the cloud compute premium. The break-even point for AI workloads can be as low as $10,000-$15,000 in monthly cloud GPU spend for stable utilization patterns. Metro Colo Advisory evaluates the high density colocation decision for AI workloads at no cost.
What's included in my AWS bill that colocation eliminates?
Moving to dedicated colocation eliminates AWS margin on compute, AWS egress fees (which can run 15-25 percent of total cloud cost for data-heavy workloads), reserved instance lock-in (you own the hardware rather than committing to multi-year cloud spending), and the indefinite renting model where you never own anything. Colocation does not eliminate the underlying hardware costs, power costs, and facility costs — but it lets you pay those costs directly rather than paying a cloud provider to pay them plus margin.
When does it not make sense to move from cloud to colocation?
Cloud remains the right answer when monthly cloud spend is under $20,000, when workloads have genuinely variable utilization patterns rather than stable demand, when global geographic distribution requirements span many regions, when models are still in active development with frequently changing requirements, and when your team lacks operational capacity to manage dedicated infrastructure. Metro Colo Advisory honestly tells clients when cloud remains the better answer for their specific situation at no cost.
Does the calculator account for AWS reserved instance pricing?
Yes, the calculator can model reserved instance and savings plan discounts when you input your effective rate after discounts rather than published on-demand pricing. The dedicated colocation side does not require equivalent commitments — you own the hardware regardless of how you use it. The comparison is most accurate when you input the actual rates you’re paying after any cloud discounts you’ve already negotiated. Note that reserved instance commitments lock you into multi-year cloud spending that limits future flexibility.
How does colocation pricing compare in different US markets?
Colocation pricing varies significantly by market. NYC metro carries the highest pricing tier in the US due to financial ecosystem connectivity and Manhattan real estate costs. Northern Virginia and Ashburn run 15-25 percent below NYC pricing despite hosting the largest concentration of hyperscaler infrastructure. Dallas, Phoenix, and Atlanta typically deliver another 10-20 percent below Northern Virginia pricing. Chicago runs comparable to Dallas. West Coast markets (Los Angeles, San Francisco) price similar to NYC metro reflecting tech ecosystem proximity. The right market for your deployment depends on workload requirements, latency tolerances, and geographic distribution needs.
What hidden costs does colocation have that cloud doesn't?
Colocation has several costs that cloud bundles into the monthly bill — cross-connect installation and recurring fees ($50-$300 setup, $50-$250 monthly per connection), remote hands labor for occasional onsite work, hardware procurement and refresh cycles every 3-5 years, and one-time setup fees at contract initiation. These costs are real but typically smaller than the egress fees, cloud margin, and lack of hardware ownership that colocation eliminates. The calculator models typical cross-connect and amortized hardware costs based on deployment specifications you provide.
How long does it take to migrate from cloud to colocation?
Cloud-to-colocation migration typically takes 60 to 120 days from decision to operational deployment. Hardware procurement (especially for current-generation GPUs with constrained supply chains) is frequently the longest critical path element. Facility cross-connects and power provisioning typically run 30-60 days from contract execution. Application migration and cutover varies dramatically by workload complexity. Companies planning data center migration or data center relocation from cloud should plan minimum 90-day timelines for production-grade deployments. Metro Colo Advisory provides realistic migration timeline estimates for your specific situation at no cost.
National Coverage
Metro Colo Advisory provides independent colocation advisory services across all major US markets. Our channel relationships span the major data center providers including Equinix, Digital Realty, DataBank, CoreSite, Cologix, TierPoint, Flexential, and 365 DataCenters, with active coverage in NYC metro (the Equinix data center at NY4 in Secaucus, Digital Realty at 60 Hudson Street and 111 8th Avenue, DataBank LGA3 in Orangeburg, CoreSite NY3 at 2 Emerson Lane), Chicago, Dallas, Atlanta, Phoenix, Northern Virginia/Ashburn, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Miami, Boston, and Philadelphia. National coverage means we can support your colocation deployment wherever your infrastructure needs to land — and our calculator reflects market pricing across all of these markets. For comparative analysis across all NYC providers, see our full NYC colocation provider comparison.
Ready to Move From Calculator to Real Numbers?
The calculator gives you a first look. Metro Colo Advisory provides specific facility recommendations and current market rate benchmarks for your actual deployment at no cost.
We have no financial stake in which provider you ultimately choose. We work with mid-market companies evaluating colocation across all major US markets, with channel relationships spanning Equinix, Digital Realty, DataBank, CoreSite, Cologix, and other major providers.
Reach out at contact@metrocoloadvisory.com to start the conversation.
For broader colocation pricing analysis across the NYC metro and national markets, see our colocation pricing guide. For deep analysis of when cloud repatriation makes economic sense for stable workloads, see our cloud repatriation guide. For high-density AI and GPU infrastructure decisions specifically, see our AI and GPU infrastructure guide.
