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AWS runs Mumbai (ap-south-1) and Hyderabad (ap-south-2), each with 3 availability zones; Hyderabad must be switched on per account. Google Cloud runs Mumbai (asia-south1) and Delhi (asia-south2), each with 3 zones. Azure runs Pune (Central India) and Hyderabad (India South Central) with 3 zones each, plus Chennai (South India) and Mumbai (West India) without zones.
Eight regions across the three largest clouds are physically in India. Four of them have three availability zones, which is what you need to run one app across separate data centres in the same city. The other four are single-site regions that the providers use mainly as a second location for backups and disaster recovery.
| Provider and region | City | Availability zones | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| AWS ap-south-1, Asia Pacific (Mumbai) | Mumbai | 3 | On by default |
| AWS ap-south-2, Asia Pacific (Hyderabad) | Hyderabad | 3 | Opt-in: enable it per account |
| Google Cloud asia-south1 | Mumbai | 3 (asia-south1-a, -b, -c) | — |
| Google Cloud asia-south2 | Delhi | 3 (asia-south2-a, -b, -c) | — |
| Azure Central India | Pune | 3 | Paired with South India |
| Azure India South Central | Hyderabad | 3 | Paired with Central India |
| Azure South India | Chennai | None | Paired with Central India |
| Azure West India | Mumbai | None | Paired with South India |
AWS lists 34 regions worldwide. Two are in India, both with 3 availability zones: Asia Pacific (Mumbai), code ap-south-1, and Asia Pacific (Hyderabad), code ap-south-2.
The difference that trips teams up is opt-in. AWS turns on every region launched before 20 March 2019 by default; regions launched after that must be enabled in the account first. Mumbai is enabled by default. Hyderabad is not, so a Terraform plan or a CLI call that names ap-south-2 fails on a new account until someone enables the region in the AWS Global View or Billing console.
Google Cloud runs 43 regions and 130 zones worldwide. In India it has asia-south1 in Mumbai and asia-south2 in Delhi, each with three zones. Both are standard regions with no opt-in step.
Having one region in the west and one in the north is useful when you want two Indian locations that are far apart, for example a primary in Mumbai and a backup in Delhi, while keeping all data in the country.
Azure has the most India regions: Central India in Pune and India South Central in Hyderabad, both with 3 availability zones, and South India in Chennai and West India in Mumbai, which have none. Microsoft launched availability zones in the Pune region in December 2021 and said they bring uptime of up to 99.99%.
Each Azure region has a paired region for disaster recovery: Central India pairs with South India, India South Central pairs with Central India, and West India pairs with South India. If you need zone redundancy, build in Pune or Hyderabad; use Chennai or Mumbai as the second site.
The RBI's circular on Storage of Payment System Data, dated 6 April 2018, requires payment system providers to keep that data in a system only in India, and gave them six months to comply. Banks, payment aggregators and the apps that hold payment data for them therefore need their primary store in one of the regions above, not in Singapore.
For most Indian apps the choice is simpler than the table suggests. Pick the region closest to the bulk of your users, keep a second Indian region for backups, and check that every managed service you plan to use is offered in both, because newer regions often get services later.
Two: Asia Pacific (Mumbai), ap-south-1, and Asia Pacific (Hyderabad), ap-south-2, each with 3 availability zones. Hyderabad has to be enabled in your account before use.
asia-south1 in Mumbai and asia-south2 in Delhi, each with three zones.
Central India (Pune) and India South Central (Hyderabad), with 3 zones each. South India (Chennai) and West India (Mumbai) have none.
Yes for payment system data: the RBI's 6 April 2018 circular requires it to be stored in a system only in India.
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