This post covers the difference between Oracle OCI (Oracle Cloud Infrastructure) Vs OCI-C (Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Classic), one of the most common questions asked in our Cloud Trainings (Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, DBA to Cloud DBA & EBS (R12) on Cloud (OCI)).

As you probably know, Cloud has three Service Models: IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS  (If you are new to Cloud and would like to know more about these Service Models then I highly recommend you to watch my previous live, to watch it click here).

Note: Oracle has offerings in all three Service Models and both Oracle OCI and OCI-C are from IaaS offerings, where OCI stands for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and OCI-C stand for Classic Version of IaaS Offering.  

(OCI-C) Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Classic (Gen 1) :

• OCI-C is based on Nimbula Director, Xen based Hypervisor which provides Compute & Network (Shared & IP Networks)
• It provides only Virtual Machines (whereas OCI can also provide Bare Metal)
• OCI-C formerly OPC announced at Oracle Open World (OOW) 2014, was renamed to OCI -C at OOW 2017
• It can be deployed as a) Elastic Compute b) Dedicated Compute c) Sparc Model 300
• As of March 2018, OCI-C is available in NAC, EMEA, APAC.

Also Read: Our blog post on EBS Cloud Manager. Click here

What’s not Available in OCI -C

• Availability Domain (AD)  
• Compartment
• Virtual Cloud Network (VCN)  
• Oracle Bare Metal (BM)

Note: Oracle has deprecated OCI -C and it is available only for old customers now.

What is Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Gen 2:

• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) like OCI-C is also IaaS offering that provides Compute, Network but as Virtual Cloud Network, Availability Domain and additionally Edge Services like Email, DNS, Load Balancer etc (more on Edge Services little later)
• OCI announced in OOW 2017  is re-branding of Bare Metal Cloud Service (BMCS)
• Oracle OCI provides both Bare Metal & Virtual Machines (whereas OCI-C provides only Virtual Machine) [Updated on 15th Mar, Thanks Manjunath for pointing out typo]
• The hypervisor in VM option of OCI is based on KVM (whereas on OCI-C this is Xen based Hypervisor)
• Bring Your Own Hypervisor (BYOH) only available in OCI.

Click Here to get the FREE Guide: Oracle Compute Cloud Services Interview Questions

When to Use What

• Cloud@Cusotmer is a subscription-based service where both Hardware & Cloud Software is on Customer Premises, this option as of March 2018 is only available on OCI-C. (Know more about Cloud at Customer (C@C))
• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) now has more regions currently compared to OCI -C. (Know more on Region in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI))
• High-Performance Compute (HPC), Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) is available only on OCI (as of Mar 2018)
• EBS (R12) & Database both are supported on both OCI & OCI Classic so you can use either

Note: As Oracle has depreciated OCI -C and its only available for old Cloud Customer, I would recommend you to go with Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (Oracle OCI).

Join my FREE Masterclass Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Architect [1Z0-932] WHAT, WHY & HOW TO LEARN.

Related/Further Readings

• Follow Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI): Region, AD, FD, Tenancy, Compartment, VCN, IAM, Storage Service etc.
• Cloud Service Models (SaaS, PaaS, IaaS)
• 12 Point Checklist for DBA for Beginner to Expert Cloud DBA (Facebook Live)
• If you are confused to pick Amazon AWS or Oracle Cloud then check this
• To check tasks performed by Apps DBAs in Cloud here
• [Video 3 of 5] Oracle Cloud: Create VCN, Subnet, Firewall (Security List), IGW, DRG: Step By Step

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