Vision & documents
Amazon Rekognition vs Azure Vision – Image Analysis / Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) / Azure Content Understanding
Amazon Rekognition's image features map partly to Azure Vision Image Analysis, but that API is deprecated and retires on September 25, 2028.
Microsoft now recommends Foundry multimodal models and Content Understanding instead.
Side-by-side comparison
| Aspect | Amazon Web Services | Microsoft Azure |
|---|---|---|
| Service | Amazon Rekognition | Azure Vision – Image Analysis Deprecated Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) Azure Content Understanding |
| Lifecycle | Streaming Events and Batch Image Content Moderation are in maintenance (Mar 31, 2026). Person Pathing was fully shut down Oct 31, 2025. | The Image Analysis API (v3.2 and v4.0, cloud and containers) retires Sep 25, 2028. Microsoft recommends Document Intelligence (OCR), Face API, Foundry multimodal/embedding models, and Content Understanding. Generally available Generally available |
| What it is | Prebuilt image and video analysis. Labels, text, moderation, face detection, comparison and search, celebrity recognition, and Face Liveness. | Prebuilt image tagging, captioning, object detection, OCR (Read), smart crops, and image embeddings. Catalog of 10,000+ models. "Sold by Azure" (Azure OpenAI GPT family, Microsoft MAI/Phi, xAI Grok, DeepSeek, Meta, Mistral, Cohere, Black Forest Labs, Moonshot) plus partner/community models (Anthropic Claude, Hugging Face, and more). Deploy serverless (per-token) or on managed compute. GenAI-based extraction of user-defined schemas from documents, images, audio, and video, with confidence scores, grounding, classification, and prebuilt industry analyzers. |
| Pricing model | Per image processed, tiered by monthly volume, plus per face-metadata stored. | Per transaction for Image Analysis (until retirement). Model alternatives are billed per token. |
| Docs | Amazon Rekognition docs | Azure Vision – Image Analysis docs Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) docs Azure Content Understanding docs |
| Pricing page | Amazon Rekognition pricing | Azure Vision – Image Analysis pricing Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) pricing Azure Content Understanding pricing |
| Exams | AIF-C01 | AI-901 AI-103 |
Key differences
- Microsoft's own AWS comparison now maps Rekognition to Foundry models plus Azure ML AutoML for vision. It says no single current Azure service covers every Rekognition capability.
- Microsoft's Image Analysis migration guide sends OCR to Document Intelligence, faces to the Face API, embeddings to Cohere Embed (Foundry), and everything else to GPT models or Content Understanding.
- Rekognition offers celebrity recognition and Face Liveness, which Azure's guidance doesn't cover the same way (Azure Face has liveness under Limited Access).
Pricing summary
Pricing models only. No prices are quoted because they change by region and over time.
- AWS
- Per image processed, tiered by monthly volume, plus per face-metadata stored. Amazon Rekognition pricing →
- Azure
- Per transaction for Image Analysis (until retirement). Model alternatives are billed per token. Azure Vision – Image Analysis pricing → Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) pricing → Azure Content Understanding pricing →
Certification exam mapping
| Exam | Provider | Level | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| AWS Certified AI Practitioner AIF-C01 | AWS | Foundational | current Italian and German versions retire after Oct 15, 2026 (per AWS cert page). |
| Microsoft Certified – Azure AI Fundamentals AI-901 | Azure | Fundamentals | current AI-901 replaces AI-900 for this certification (English version updated Apr 15, 2026). Covers Microsoft Foundry. |
| Microsoft Certified – Azure AI Apps and Agents Developer Associate AI-103 | Azure | Associate | current Generative AI and agentic solutions with Microsoft Foundry using Python. Successor in scope to the retired AI-102. |
Relevance is based on each exam's published scope, not a line-by-line objective match. Check the official study guide.
FAQ
What is the Azure equivalent of Amazon Rekognition?
Amazon Rekognition's image features map partly to Azure Vision Image Analysis, but that API is deprecated and retires on September 25, 2028. Microsoft now recommends Foundry multimodal models and Content Understanding instead.
How does pricing compare between Amazon Rekognition and Azure Vision – Image Analysis, Microsoft Foundry Models (incl. Azure OpenAI) and Azure Content Understanding?
AWS: Per image processed, tiered by monthly volume, plus per face-metadata stored. Azure: Per transaction for Image Analysis (until retirement). Model alternatives are billed per token. Check the official pricing pages for current rates.
Which certification exams cover this topic?
AWS Certified AI Practitioner (AIF-C01); Microsoft Certified – Azure AI Fundamentals (AI-901); Microsoft Certified – Azure AI Apps and Agents Developer Associate (AI-103).