Estimate cloud VPN gateway costs for AWS, Azure, or GCP. Calculate hourly gateway fees, connection charges, and data transfer for site-to-site tunnels.
Cloud VPN gateways provide encrypted site-to-site connectivity between your on-premise network and cloud VPCs. They are the most common and cost-effective way to establish hybrid connectivity, though pricing varies by provider and configuration.
AWS charges $0.05/hr ($36.50/mo) per VPN connection plus standard data transfer rates. Azure VPN Gateway pricing depends on the SKU: Basic ($0.04/hr), VpnGw1 ($0.19/hr), VpnGw2 ($0.49/hr), up to VpnGw5 ($4.97/hr). GCP Cloud VPN costs $0.075/hr ($54.75/mo) per tunnel.
This calculator estimates the total monthly cost of VPN gateways including hourly gateway fees, per-connection charges, and data transfer. Use it to compare VPN costs across providers and determine when upgrading to Direct Connect or ExpressRoute makes financial sense.
Tracking this metric consistently enables technology teams to identify system performance trends and address potential issues before they impact end users or business operations. This measurement provides a critical foundation for capacity planning and performance budgeting, helping teams align infrastructure resources with application requirements and growth projections.
VPN gateways are often the first step in hybrid cloud and the ongoing cost affects every connected workload. Understanding the pricing model (gateway + connections + transfer) helps you optimize tunnel configurations and predict costs as inter-site traffic grows. This quantitative approach replaces reactive troubleshooting with proactive monitoring, enabling engineering teams to maintain service level objectives and minimize unplanned system downtime.
Gateway Cost = gateways × gateway_hourly × 730 Connection Cost = connections × connection_hourly × 730 Transfer Cost = data_GB × transfer_rate Total Monthly = Gateway + Connection + Transfer
Result: $118.00/month
One VPN gateway at $0.05/hr: $36.50/month. Two connections at $0.05/hr each: $73.00/month. Wait—AWS charges per-connection, not per-gateway separately. Two tunnels at $0.05/hr: 2 × $36.50 = $73. 500 GB transfer at $0.09/GB: $45. Total: $118.00/month.
AWS Site-to-Site: $0.05/hr per connection + data transfer. Azure VPN Gateway: $0.04–$4.97/hr depending on SKU (Basic to VpnGw5). GCP Cloud VPN: $0.075/hr per tunnel + data transfer. For basic connectivity, AWS is cheapest. For high-bandwidth needs, Azure VpnGw2 offers 1.25 Gbps at $0.49/hr. GCP is mid-range.
At $0.09/GB AWS data transfer over VPN versus $0.02/GB over Direct Connect, the break-even point depends on monthly transfer volume. With a 1 Gbps Direct Connect at $420/mo (port + partner), the transfer savings offset the cost at roughly 6 TB/month. Below 5 TB/month, VPN is usually cheaper.
AWS Transit Gateway charges $0.05/hr ($36.50/mo) plus $0.02/GB processed. For 10 branch offices, Transit Gateway consolidates connectivity at one hub versus maintaining 45 individual VPN connections (n×(n-1)/2). The cost savings and operational simplicity are substantial at scale.
AWS Site-to-Site VPN costs $0.05/hr per connection ($36.50/month). Each connection includes two IPSec tunnels for redundancy. Data transfer is charged at standard rates ($0.09/GB for the first 10 TB out). AWS Client VPN (remote access) charges $0.05/hr per association + $0.05/hr per connection.
VPN is cheaper ($36–100/mo) and faster to set up (minutes). Direct Connect is more expensive ($220–1,650+/mo) but provides dedicated bandwidth, consistent latency, and lower data transfer rates. Choose VPN for under 500 GB/month transfer or as a backup for Direct Connect.
AWS VPN supports up to 1.25 Gbps per tunnel with equal-cost multi-path routing across two tunnels. Azure VPN gateways range from 100 Mbps (Basic) to 10 Gbps (VpnGw5). GCP supports up to 3 Gbps per tunnel. Real throughput depends on encryption overhead and internet path quality.
Yes. All cloud VPN connections use IPSec encryption (AES-256 or AES-128) for data in transit. This provides the same encryption level as Direct Connect with MACsec. The encryption is automatic and transparent to your applications.
Yes. AWS Transit Gateway supports hundreds of VPN connections in a hub-and-spoke topology. Azure Virtual WAN similarly connects multiple branches. This is more scalable than point-to-point VPN connections between each site pair.
Each AWS VPN connection includes two tunnels across different availability zones. If one tunnel fails, traffic automatically routes through the other. For higher availability, configure VPN connections from two customer gateways with BGP for automatic failover.