Dedicated Interconnect

Cloud Interconnect – Dedicated vs Partner, Setup & Pricing

~ Last updated on : ~ jayendrapatil

Google Cloud Interconnect

  • Google Cloud Interconnect provides low-latency, high-availability connections that enable reliable data transfer between networks.
  • Cloud Interconnect offers the following options for extending the network:
    • Dedicated Interconnect – provides a direct physical connection between the on-premises network and Google’s network.
    • Partner Interconnect – provides connectivity between the on-premises and VPC networks through a supported service provider.
    • Cross-Cloud Interconnect – provides dedicated connectivity between Google Cloud and another cloud service provider (AWS, Azure, OCI, Alibaba Cloud).
    • Cross-Site Interconnect – provides Layer 2 connectivity between on-premises network sites using Google’s global network.
  • Cloud Interconnect provides access to all Google Cloud products and services from the on-premises network except Google Workspace.
  • Cloud Interconnect also allows access to supported APIs and services by using Private Google Access from on-premises hosts.
  • Traffic between networks doesn’t traverse the public internet, reducing points of failure and improving latency.
  • VPC network’s internal IP addresses are directly accessible from on-premises without NAT or VPN tunnels.

Dedicated Interconnect

  • Dedicated Interconnect provides direct physical connections between the on-premises network and Google’s network.
  • Dedicated Interconnect enables the transfer of large amounts of data between networks, which can be more cost-effective than purchasing additional bandwidth over the public internet.
  • Dedicated Interconnect requires your network to physically meet Google’s network in a colocation facility with your own routing equipment.
  • Dedicated Interconnect supports only dynamic routing.
  • Dedicated Interconnect supports the following link types:
    • 10 Gbps circuits (single mode fiber, 10GBASE-LR)
    • 100 Gbps circuits (single mode fiber, 100GBASE-LR4)
    • 400 Gbps circuits (single mode fiber, 400GBASE-LR4) – GA March 2026
  • VLAN attachments support maximum bandwidths up to 400 Gbps (GA March 2026).
  • VLAN attachment should be associated with a Cloud Router.
  • Cloud Router creates a BGP session for the VLAN attachment and its corresponding on-premises peer router.
  • Cloud Router receives the routes that the on-premises router advertises. These routes are added as custom dynamic routes in the VPC network.
  • Cloud Router also advertises routes for Google Cloud resources to the on-premises peer router.
  • Supports IPv6 traffic exchange between IPv6-enabled VPC network and on-premises network.

Google Cloud Dedicated Interconnect

Dedicated Interconnect Provisioning

  • Find a collocation facility with GCP Point of Presence (PoP) which offers Direct Interconnect connections.
  • Order an Interconnect connection so that Google can allocate the necessary resources and send a Letter of Authorization and Connecting Facility Assignment (LOA-CFA).
  • LOA-CFA is sent via email to NOC (technical contact) or can be downloaded from the Google Cloud console.
  • Submit the LOA-CFA to the vendor so that they can provision the Interconnect connections between Google’s network and your network.
  • Configure and test the connections with Google before you can use them.
  • Create VLAN attachments to allocate a VLAN on the connection.
  • Configure the on-premises router to establish a BGP session with the Cloud Router.

Dedicated Interconnect Redundancy

  • Single Dedicated Interconnect connection does not offer redundancy or high availability.
  • Google recommends redundancy using 2 (99.9%) or 4 (99.99%) interconnect connections so that if one connection fails, the other connection can continue to serve traffic.
  • Redundant Interconnect connection with 2 connections must be created in the same metropolitan area (city) as the existing one, but in a different edge availability domain (metro availability zone).
  • Redundant Interconnect connection with 4 connections must be created with 2 connections in two different metropolitan areas (city), and each connection in a different edge availability domain (metro availability zone).
  • Dynamic routing mode for the VPC network must be global so that Cloud Router can advertise all subnets and propagate learned routes to all subnets regardless of the subnet’s region.
  • A single-region Critical production SLA (99.99%) topology is now available (GA June 2026), allowing 99.99% availability within a single region.

Google Cloud Dedicated Interconnect Redundancy

Partner Interconnect

  • Partner Interconnect provides connectivity between the on-premises network and the VPC network through a supported service provider.
  • A Partner Interconnect connection is useful if the data center is in a physical location that can’t reach a Dedicated Interconnect colocation facility, or the data needs don’t warrant an entire 10-Gbps connection.
  • Partner Interconnect supports bandwidth from 50 Mbps minimum to 50 Gbps maximum per VLAN attachment.
  • Service providers have existing physical connections to Google’s network that they make available for their customers to use.
  • After the connectivity with a service provider is established, a Partner Interconnect connection from the service provider can be requested.
  • After the service provider provisions the connection, you can start passing traffic between your networks by using the service provider’s network.
  • Partner Interconnect provides Layer 2 and Layer 3 connectivity:
    • For Layer 2 connections:
      • You must configure and establish a BGP session between the Cloud Routers and on-premises routers for each created VLAN attachment.
      • BGP configuration information is provided by the VLAN attachment after your service provider has configured it.
    • For Layer 3 connections:
      • The service provider establishes a BGP session between the Cloud Routers and their edge routers for each VLAN attachment.
      • You don’t need to configure BGP on the on-premises router. Google and the service provider automatically set the correct configuration.
  • Supports IPv6 traffic exchange between IPv6-enabled VPC network and on-premises network.

Google Cloud Partner Interconnect

Partner Interconnect Provisioning

  • Connect the on-premises network to a supported service provider.
  • Create a VLAN attachment for a Partner Interconnect connection in the Google Cloud project, which generates a unique pairing key that must be used to request a connection from the service provider.
  • Activate the connection.
  • Depending on the connection, either you or your service provider then establishes a Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) session.
  • Partner Interconnect provisioning does not require LOA-CFA.

Partner Interconnect Redundancy

  • Single Partner Interconnect connection does not offer redundancy or high availability.
  • 99.9% availability requires:
    • At least two VLAN attachments in a single Google Cloud region, in separate edge availability domains (metro availability zones).
    • At least one Cloud Router, connected to both VLAN attachments.
  • 99.99% availability requires:
    • At least four VLAN attachments across two metros, one in each edge availability domain (metro availability zone).
    • Two Cloud Routers (one in each Google Cloud region of a VPC network).
    • Associate one Cloud Router with each pair of VLAN attachments.
  • Dynamic routing mode for the VPC network must be global so that Cloud Router can advertise all subnets and propagate learned routes to all subnets regardless of the subnet’s region.

Google Cloud Dedicated Interconnect Redundancy - Layer 2

Cross-Cloud Interconnect

  • Cross-Cloud Interconnect provides high-bandwidth dedicated connectivity between Google Cloud and another cloud service provider.
  • Supported cloud providers include Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), and Alibaba Cloud.
  • Provides private, SLA-backed connectivity without traversing the public internet.
  • Available connection capacities: 10 Gbps, 100 Gbps, and 400 Gbps (GA March 2026).
  • Google provisions and manages the physical connections from Google to the remote cloud provider.
  • Supports traffic differentiation through application awareness (GA September 2025).
  • Use cases:
    • Multicloud deployments requiring private connectivity between clouds.
    • Data replication and disaster recovery across cloud providers.
    • Distributed applications spanning multiple clouds.

Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect

  • Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect for AWS (GA April 2026) provides an on-demand, reliable method for establishing cross-cloud transport without manually setting up networking components.
  • Provides region-to-region transport with SLA-protected, coordinated underlay built with AWS.
  • Can be set up on-demand and sized up or down based on needs.
  • Supports both VPC Network Peering and Network Connectivity Center (NCC) connectivity models.
  • Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect for OCI provides on-demand connections with variable speed options (1 Gbps to 50 Gbps).

Cross-Site Interconnect

  • Cross-Site Interconnect (Preview, April 2025) provides reliable, high-bandwidth Layer 2 connectivity between on-premises network sites using Google’s global network.
  • A transparent, on-demand, Layer 2 connectivity solution that leverages Google’s global infrastructure.
  • Supports 10 Gbps and 100 Gbps connections.
  • Supports an MTU size of 9,000 bytes for cross-site networks.
  • Use cases:
    • Site-to-site connectivity between on-premises locations.
    • Simplifying WAN infrastructure for high-performance and high-bandwidth connectivity.
    • Improving reliability posture across the WAN.
  • Provisioning requires LOA-CFA similar to Dedicated Interconnect.
  • Available in multiple colocation facilities globally (Singapore, Dallas, Miami, Melbourne, Taipei, Stockholm, etc.).

Cloud Interconnect Security

  • Cloud Interconnect does not encrypt the connection between your network and Google’s network by default.
  • Multiple encryption options are now available:
    • HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect – Deploys IPsec-encrypted HA VPN tunnels over VLAN attachments. Supported for both Dedicated Interconnect and Partner Interconnect. Each HA VPN tunnel provides up to 3 Gbps bandwidth.
    • MACsec for Cloud Interconnect – Uses IEEE 802.1AE MACsec standard to encrypt traffic between your on-premises router and Google’s edge routers. Available for 100 Gbps and 400 Gbps links regardless of location; for 10 Gbps links, availability varies by location.
    • Application-level encryption or your own VPN for additional security.
  • HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect helps maintain compliance with industry regulations requiring encryption of outgoing traffic or data in transit.

MACsec for Cloud Interconnect

  • MACsec encrypts traffic at the Layer 2 (data link) level between your on-premises router and Google’s edge routers.
  • MACsec doesn’t provide encryption in transit within Google’s network. For stronger security, combine with IPsec or TLS.
  • Supports two security modes:
    • Fail open (must-secure) – If MACsec session can’t be established, link operates without encryption.
    • Fail closed – If MACsec session can’t be established, the link fails (drops all traffic).
  • Available for 100 Gbps and 400 Gbps links regardless of location.
  • Uses pre-shared keys to encrypt traffic transiting between routers.

HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect

  • Establishes encrypted HA VPN tunnels over Cloud Interconnect VLAN attachments.
  • Supported for both Dedicated Interconnect and Partner Interconnect.
  • Each HA VPN tunnel provides up to 3 Gbps bandwidth.
  • Provides IPsec encryption at the IP layer (Layer 3).
  • Requires a Cloud Router with encrypted_interconnect_router = true.
  • Can reserve regional internal IP ranges for HA VPN gateway interfaces.

Traffic Differentiation (Application Awareness)

  • Dedicated Interconnect and Cross-Cloud Interconnect support network traffic differentiation through application awareness (GA September 2025).
  • Lets you map outbound traffic to different traffic classes.
  • Supports bandwidth percentage policy or strict priority policy for traffic prioritization.
  • Uses Differentiated Services Field Codepoint (DSCP) in IP headers for traffic differentiation.
  • Managed traffic classification (Preview April 2026) automates DSCP bit assignment in outgoing packets.
  • Contact your account team to enable application awareness.

Dedicated Interconnect vs Partner Interconnect

  • Choosing between Dedicated Interconnect vs Partner Interconnect, consider the connection requirements, such as the connection location and capacity:
    • If you can’t physically meet Google’s network in a colocation facility to reach your VPC networks, use Partner Interconnect to connect through service providers.
    • If you have high bandwidth needs (up to 400 Gbps per link), Dedicated Interconnect can be a cost-effective solution.
    • If you require lower bandwidth (50 Mbps to 50 Gbps), Partner Interconnect provides flexible options through service providers.
    • If you need connectivity to another cloud provider, use Cross-Cloud Interconnect or Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect.

Cloud Interconnect MTU

  • Cloud Interconnect VLAN attachments support the following MTU sizes:
    • 1,440 bytes
    • 1,460 bytes
    • 1,500 bytes
    • 8,896 bytes
  • Cross-site networks support an MTU size of 9,000 bytes.

Connection Groups and SLA

  • Interconnect connection groups and VLAN attachment groups (GA June 2025) help communicate intended reliability levels.
  • Reliability options:
    • Critical production – 99.99% uptime SLA for maximum resiliency.
    • Non-critical production – 99.9% uptime SLA for non-critical workloads.
    • No SLA – No uptime guarantee (not recommended for production).
  • Resource groups provide feedback on how Cloud Interconnect resources meet the intended level of reliability.

GCP Certification Exam Practice Questions

  • Questions are collected from Internet and the answers are marked as per my knowledge and understanding (which might differ with yours).
  • GCP services are updated everyday and both the answers and questions might be outdated soon, so research accordingly.
  • GCP exam questions are not updated to keep up the pace with GCP updates, so even if the underlying feature has changed the question might not be updated
  • Open to further feedback, discussion and correction.
  1. Your company has decided to build a backup replica of their on-premises user authentication PostgreSQL database on Google
    Cloud Platform. The database is 4 TB, and large updates are frequent. Replication requires private address space communication.
    Which networking approach should you use?

    1. Google Cloud Dedicated Interconnect
    2. Google Cloud VPN connected to the data center network
    3. A NAT and TLS translation gateway installed on-premises
    4. A Google Compute Engine instance with a VPN server installed connected to the data center network
  2. A company wants to connect cloud applications to an Oracle database in its data center. Requirements are a maximum of 20 Gbps
    of data and a Service Level Agreement (SLA) of 99%. Which option best suits the requirements?

    1. Implement a high-throughput Cloud VPN connection
    2. Cloud Router with VPN
    3. Dedicated Interconnect
    4. Partner Interconnect
  3. A company wants to connect cloud applications to an Oracle database in its data center. Requirements are a maximum of 9 Gbps
    of data and a Service Level Agreement (SLA) of 99%. Which option best suits the requirements?

    1. Implement a high-throughput Cloud VPN connection
    2. Cloud Router with VPN
    3. Dedicated Interconnect
    4. Partner Interconnect
  4. A company needs to establish private connectivity between their Google Cloud environment and their AWS environment for a multicloud application. They require high bandwidth and an SLA. Which connectivity option should they use?
    1. Cloud VPN with AWS Site-to-Site VPN
    2. Partner Interconnect through a shared service provider
    3. Cross-Cloud Interconnect
    4. Dedicated Interconnect with VPN tunnels to AWS
  5. An organization requires encrypted traffic over their Dedicated Interconnect connection to meet regulatory compliance requirements. What is the recommended approach?
    1. Use a third-party VPN appliance on a Compute Engine instance
    2. Deploy HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect
    3. Enable Cloud Armor on the Interconnect
    4. Use application-level TLS only
  6. A company wants to connect two of their on-premises data centers using Google’s global network for high-bandwidth, low-latency Layer 2 connectivity. Which Google Cloud service should they use?
    1. Cloud VPN
    2. Dedicated Interconnect
    3. Network Connectivity Center
    4. Cross-Site Interconnect
  7. Which encryption options are available for Cloud Interconnect traffic? (Choose TWO)
    1. MACsec for Cloud Interconnect
    2. Cloud Armor DDoS protection
    3. HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect
    4. Cloud KMS envelope encryption
    5. Identity-Aware Proxy
  8. A company needs an on-demand, managed connection between Google Cloud and AWS without setting up physical infrastructure or colocation facilities. Which service should they use?
    1. Cross-Cloud Interconnect
    2. Dedicated Interconnect with AWS Direct Connect
    3. Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect for AWS
    4. Cloud VPN with AWS Site-to-Site VPN

Google Cloud Data Transfer Services Overview

~ Last updated on : ~ jayendrapatil

Google Cloud Data Transfer Services

Google Cloud Data Transfer services provide various options in terms of network and transfer tools to help transfer data from on-premises to Google Cloud network.

📋 Last Updated: June 2026 — Updated with gcloud storage CLI (gsutil replacement), Storage Transfer Service event-driven transfers, Cross-Cloud Interconnect, Transfer Appliance data export, BigQuery Data Transfer Service new sources, Classic VPN dynamic routing deprecation, and Network Connectivity Center.

Network Services

Cloud VPN

  • Provides network connectivity with Google Cloud between on-premises network and Google Cloud, or from Google Cloud to another cloud provider.
  • Cloud VPN still routes the traffic through the Internet.
  • Cloud VPN is quick to set up (as compared to Interconnect)
  • Each Cloud VPN tunnel can support up to 3 Gbps total for ingress and egress, but available bandwidth depends on the connectivity. Bandwidth can be increased by adding more tunnels.
  • Choose Cloud VPN to encrypt traffic to Google Cloud, or with lower throughput solution, or experimenting with migrating the workloads to Google Cloud
  • HA VPN is the recommended VPN configuration offering a 99.99% SLA when configured with tunnels on both interfaces per Google best practices.
  • Classic VPN provides a 99.9% SLA. Note: Classic VPN dynamic routing (BGP) was deprecated on August 1, 2025. HA VPN must be used for BGP-based VPN connectivity.
  • HA VPN over Cloud Interconnect allows encrypting traffic traversing Dedicated or Partner Interconnect connections for additional security and compliance.
  • Cloud VPN supports customizable cipher options (Public Preview as of June 2025) allowing configuration of ciphers per security requirements.
  • Cloud Interconnect offers a direct connection to Google Cloud through Google or one of the Cloud Interconnect service providers.
  • Cloud Interconnect service prevents data from going on the public internet and can provide a more consistent throughput for large data transfers
  • For enterprise-grade connection to Google Cloud that has higher throughput requirements, choose Dedicated Interconnect (10 Gbps to 100 Gbps) or Partner Interconnect (50 Mbps to 50 Gbps)
  • Cloud Interconnect provides access to all Google Cloud products and services from your on-premises network except Google Workspace.
  • Cloud Interconnect also allows access to supported APIs and services by using Private Google Access from on-premises hosts.
  • Cross-Cloud Interconnect enables dedicated, private connectivity between Google Cloud and another cloud service provider (AWS, Azure, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, Alibaba Cloud). This eliminates the need for traffic to traverse the public internet for multicloud architectures.
  • Partner Cross-Cloud Interconnect (available for AWS) provides an on-demand method for cross-cloud transport without manually setting up networking components.
  • Cross-Site Interconnect (GA 2025) is a transparent, on-demand Layer 2 connectivity solution leveraging Google’s global infrastructure for high-bandwidth connectivity between on-premises sites.
  • Direct Peering provides access to the Google network with fewer network hops than with a public internet connection
  • By using Direct Peering, internet traffic is exchanged between the customer network and Google’s Edge Points of Presence (PoPs), which means the data does not use the public internet.
  • Google does not offer a Service Level Agreement (SLA) with Direct Peering.
  • For SLA-backed connectivity, Cloud Interconnect (Dedicated or Partner) is recommended over Direct Peering.

Network Connectivity Center

  • Network Connectivity Center (NCC) is an orchestration framework that simplifies network connectivity using a hub-and-spoke model.
  • Supports three types of spokes: VPC spokes, Producer VPC spokes, and Hybrid spokes (HA VPN tunnels, Cloud Interconnect VLAN attachments, Router appliance VMs).
  • Enables site-to-cloud connectivity (external networks to Google Cloud) and site-to-site connectivity (using Google Cloud as enterprise WAN).
  • Supports up to 250 VPC spokes per hub and provides transitivity between workload VPCs.
  • Useful for managing complex multicloud and hybrid network topologies centrally.

Google Cloud Networking Services Decision Tree

Google Cloud Hybrid Connectivity

Transfer Services

gcloud storage (formerly gsutil)

⚠️ gsutil Deprecation Notice: gsutil is no longer the recommended CLI for Cloud Storage. Google recommends using gcloud storage commands in the Google Cloud CLI instead. gsutil does not support newer Cloud Storage features such as soft delete and managed folders. gcloud storage commands require less manual optimization and provide faster transfer rates.
  • gcloud storage (replacement for gsutil) is the standard tool for small- to medium-sized transfers (less than 1 TB) over a typical enterprise-scale network, from a private data center to Google Cloud.
  • gcloud storage provides all the basic features needed to manage Cloud Storage instances, including copying data to and from the local file system and Cloud Storage.
  • gcloud storage can also move, rename, and remove objects and perform real-time incremental syncs (similar to rsync) to a Cloud Storage bucket.
  • gcloud storage is especially useful in the following scenarios:
    • As-needed transfers or during command-line sessions by your users.
    • Transferring only a few files or very large files, or both.
    • Consuming the output of a program (streaming output to Cloud Storage).
    • Watching a directory with a moderate number of files and syncing any updates with very low latencies.
  • gcloud storage provides the following features:
    • Parallel multi-threaded transfers for increased transfer speeds.
    • Composite transfers for a single large file, breaking them into smaller chunks to increase transfer speed. Chunks are transferred and validated in parallel. Once the chunks arrive at Google, they are combined (composited) to form a single object.
    • Uses faster CRC32C hashing algorithm for data integrity checking (improved over gsutil’s crcmod).
  • Migration: Replace gsutil commands with equivalent gcloud storage commands. For example: gsutil cp → gcloud storage cp, gsutil rsync → gcloud storage rsync.
  • Storage Transfer Service is a fully managed, highly scalable service to automate transfers into Cloud Storage from multiple sources.
  • Supported Sources:
    • Amazon S3
    • S3-compatible storage (requires agents)
    • Microsoft Azure Blob Storage and Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2
    • Cloud Storage (bucket-to-bucket)
    • Publicly accessible HTTP/HTTPS URLs
    • On-premises file systems (POSIX-compliant, requires agents)
    • Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS, requires agents)
  • Storage Transfer Service for Cloud-to-Cloud transfers:
    • Supports transfers from S3, Azure Blob Storage, and Cloud Storage without agents.
    • Supports daily copies of any modified objects.
  • Storage Transfer Service for on-premises data:
    • Is designed for large-scale transfers (up to petabytes of data, billions of files).
    • Supports full copies or incremental copies.
    • Can be set up by installing on-premises software (known as agents) onto computers in the data center.
  • Has a simple, managed graphical user interface; even non-technically savvy users (after setup) can use it to move data.
  • Provides robust error-reporting and a record of all files and objects that are moved.
  • Supports executing recurring transfers on a schedule.
  • Event-Driven Transfers (2025-2026):
    • Listens to event notifications to automatically transfer new or updated objects.
    • Supported for AWS S3 (via S3 Event Notifications to Amazon SQS).
    • Supported for Azure Blob Storage and Data Lake Storage Gen2 (via Azure Event Grid to Azure Storage Queues) — available since January 2026.
    • Supported for Cloud Storage (via Pub/Sub notifications).
  • Private Network Transfers (December 2025): Transfer data from AWS S3 or Azure Blob Storage to Cloud Storage over a private network connection using Cross-Cloud Interconnect or Partner Interconnect, optimizing costs and compliance.
  • Google-Managed Private Network for S3: Transfer from S3 over a Google-managed private network, eliminating AWS egress fees with a flat per-GiB rate.
  • AWS GovCloud Support (2026): Supports transfers from S3 buckets in us-gov-east-1 and us-gov-west-1 regions.
  • Organization Policy Constraints (February 2026): Custom organization policy constraints to control Storage Transfer Service usage (e.g., restrict sources or destinations).
  • Encrypts data in transit, supports VPC Service Controls, and uses checksums for data integrity.

Transfer Appliance

  • Transfer Appliance is an excellent option for performing large-scale transfers, especially when a fast network connection is unavailable, it’s too costly to acquire more bandwidth, or it’s a one-time transfer.
  • Expected turnaround time for a network appliance to be shipped, loaded with the data, shipped back, and rehydrated on Google Cloud is approximately 50 days.
  • Consider Transfer Appliance if the online transfer timeframe is calculated to be substantially more than this timeframe.
  • Transfer Appliance requires the ability to receive and ship back the Google-owned hardware.
  • Transfer Appliance is available only in certain countries.
  • Data Export (GA in US): Transfer Appliance now supports exporting data from Cloud Storage to the appliance, which is then shipped to you. This enables large-scale data egress from Google Cloud when network transfer is impractical.
  • gcloud CLI Support (Alpha): gcloud alpha transfer appliances commands allow viewing in-progress results, working with draft orders, and cloning existing orders.
  • Data is encrypted during upload, transit, after upload to Cloud Storage, and during download for data export.

BigQuery Data Transfer Service

  • BigQuery Data Transfer Service automates data movement into BigQuery on a scheduled, managed basis.
  • After a data transfer is configured, the BigQuery Data Transfer Service automatically loads data into BigQuery on a regular basis.
  • BigQuery Data Transfer Service can also initiate data backfills to recover from any outages or gaps.
  • BigQuery Data Transfer Service can only sink data to BigQuery and cannot be used to transfer data out of BigQuery.
  • Also supports dataset copies and scheduled queries within BigQuery.
  • BigQuery Data Transfer Service supports loading data from the following data sources:
    • Google SaaS Applications:
      • Google Ads
      • Google Ad Manager
      • Campaign Manager
      • Search Ads 360
      • Google Merchant Center
      • Google Play
      • YouTube Channel reports
      • YouTube Content Owner reports
      • Google Analytics 4 (GA4) — provides 12 daily partitioned tables reflecting UI reports
    • Cloud Storage — supports incremental and truncated write preferences
    • External cloud storage providers:
      • Amazon S3 (supports cross-cloud transfer)
    • Data warehouses:
      • Teradata
      • Amazon Redshift
    • Third-party connectors (2025):
      • Salesforce Sales Cloud
      • Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC)
      • Facebook Ads
      • Adobe Analytics

Transfer Data vs Speed Comparison

Data Migration Speeds

Choosing the Right Transfer Method

Method Best For Data Size Network Requirement
gcloud storage Ad-hoc, small transfers < 1 TB Standard internet
Storage Transfer Service Recurring, large cloud-to-cloud or on-premises transfers TB to PB scale Available network (supports private network)
Transfer Appliance One-time massive transfers, limited bandwidth Hundreds of TB to PB Minimal (physical shipping)
BigQuery Data Transfer Service SaaS data ingestion into BigQuery Varies Standard internet

GCP Certification Exam Practice Questions

  • Questions are collected from Internet and the answers are marked as per my knowledge and understanding (which might differ with yours).
  • GCP services are updated everyday and both the answers and questions might be outdated soon, so research accordingly.
  • GCP exam questions are not updated to keep up the pace with GCP updates, so even if the underlying feature has changed the question might not be updated
  • Open to further feedback, discussion and correction.
  1. A company wants to connect cloud applications to an Oracle database in its data center. Requirements are a maximum of 9 Gbps of data and a Service Level Agreement (SLA) of 99%. Which option best suits the requirements?
    1. Implement a high-throughput Cloud VPN connection
    2. Cloud Router with VPN
    3. Dedicated Interconnect
    4. Partner Interconnect
  2. An organization wishes to automate data movement from Software as a Service (SaaS) applications such as Google Ads and Google Ad Manager on a scheduled, managed basis. This data is further needed for analytics and generate reports. How can the process be automated?
    1. Use Storage Transfer Service to move the data to Cloud Storage
    2. Use Storage Transfer Service to move the data to BigQuery
    3. Use BigQuery Data Transfer Service to move the data to BigQuery
    4. Use Transfer Appliance to move the data to Cloud Storage
  3. Your company’s migration team needs to transfer 1PB of data to Google Cloud. The network speed between the on-premises data center and Google Cloud is 100Mbps. The migration activity has a timeframe of 6 months. What is the efficient way to transfer the data?
    1. Use BigQuery Data Transfer Service to transfer the data to Cloud Storage
    2. Expose the data as a public URL and Storage Transfer Service to transfer it
    3. Use Transfer Appliance to transfer the data to Cloud Storage
    4. Use gcloud storage command to transfer the data to Cloud Storage
  4. Your company uses Google Analytics for tracking. You need to export the session and hit data from a Google Analytics 360 reporting view on a scheduled basis into BigQuery for analysis. How can the data be exported?
    1. Configure a scheduler in Google Analytics to convert the Google Analytics data to JSON format, then import directly into BigQuery using bq command line.
    2. Use gcloud storage to export the Google Analytics data to Cloud Storage, then import into BigQuery and schedule it using Cron.
    3. Import data to BigQuery directly from Google Analytics using Cron
    4. Use BigQuery Data Transfer Service to import the data from Google Analytics
  5. A company needs to automatically transfer new files from an AWS S3 bucket to Cloud Storage as soon as they are created, with minimal latency. What is the most efficient approach?
    1. Schedule Storage Transfer Service to run every 15 minutes
    2. Use a Lambda function to call the Cloud Storage API on each new object
    3. Configure Storage Transfer Service event-driven transfers using S3 Event Notifications and Amazon SQS
    4. Use gsutil rsync with a cron job
  6. An organization wants to establish private, high-bandwidth connectivity between their Google Cloud environment and their AWS infrastructure for a multicloud application. Which service should they use?
    1. Cloud VPN with HA configuration
    2. Partner Interconnect
    3. Cross-Cloud Interconnect
    4. Direct Peering
  7. A company needs to transfer 500 TB of data from Azure Blob Storage to Cloud Storage while keeping all traffic off the public internet and maintaining dedicated bandwidth. What combination should they use?
    1. Storage Transfer Service over public internet
    2. Storage Transfer Service with private network transfer over Cross-Cloud Interconnect
    3. Transfer Appliance
    4. gcloud storage cp command
  8. Your organization wants to centrally manage connectivity between multiple VPC networks, on-premises sites, and other cloud providers using a hub-and-spoke model. Which Google Cloud service should you use?
    1. Cloud Router
    2. VPC Network Peering
    3. Shared VPC
    4. Network Connectivity Center

References