So, you've decided to move to a sovereign cloud. Now comes the important question: which provider should you choose?

There are plenty of options. Scalingo, OVHcloud, OUTSCALE, Scaleway, Cloud Temple, Clever Cloud… these names regularly come up in discussions about sovereign cloud hosting in France. Other providers, such as S3NS and Bleu, offer a different take on cloud sovereignty, with an approach built around partnerships with major US cloud providers.

The challenge is that these offerings aren't directly comparable. Some providers focus primarily on infrastructure, while others handle much of the operational work involved in running your applications. Their security guarantees, underlying technologies, and the level of infrastructure management required from your team can also vary considerably.

In this guide, we'll explore what the main French sovereign cloud providers actually offer, how they differ, and, most importantly, which ones might be the best fit for your project.

The Main Sovereign Cloud Providers in France

Several French providers stand out in today's sovereign cloud market. Here's a quick overview of the main options worth considering.

Last reviewed: September 2026. SecNumCloud qualification statuses are based on information published by ANSSI and apply to specific cloud offerings, not necessarily to all services provided by a company.

Now, let's take a closer look at each provider.

OVHcloud

At a glance

OVHcloud is arguably the most general-purpose cloud provider in this comparison. Its portfolio ranges from dedicated servers and private cloud to public cloud services, including virtual machines, storage, Kubernetes, managed databases, and many other services.

OVHcloud also has several SecNumCloud-qualified offerings, including SNC Cloud Platform, which obtained qualification in September 2026.

Strengths

• Extensive range of cloud services

• Numerous options for building customized infrastructure

• Strong presence in France and across Europe

• Several SecNumCloud-qualified offerings

• HDS certification covering all six healthcare data hosting activities

Things to consider

This breadth of services also means more technical decisions to make. Depending on the services you choose, your team may remain responsible for a significant part of the architecture and day-to-day operations.

Some private cloud offerings also rely on VMware, a proprietary US technology. This dependency is worth considering from a technological sovereignty perspective, particularly when it comes to licensing terms, pricing changes, and vendor lock-in.

Best suited for

Organizations looking for a French cloud provider that can accommodate a wide range of infrastructure requirements while giving them extensive control over their environments.

Scalingo

At a glance

Scalingo is a French Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Database as a Service (DBaaS) provider. The platform manages the infrastructure and operations required to run your applications and databases.

This approach reduces operational complexity, saves time on system administration, and helps limit infrastructure maintenance costs. It's particularly useful for teams with limited DevOps resources or those that prefer not to manage infrastructure in-house.

Scalingo's cloud regions are located in France, and the platform holds ISO 27001 and HDS certifications. One of its regions runs on the SecNumCloud-qualified IaaS infrastructure operated by OUTSCALE.

This makes Scalingo particularly relevant for projects with strict security and compliance requirements, including healthcare and public sector applications.

Strengths

• No infrastructure to administer yourself

• Application deployment and day-to-day operations handled by the platform

• Managed databases, including availability management, maintenance, automated backups, and security; capabilities that remain relatively uncommon in SecNumCloud environments

• Hosting in France

• HDS certification covering all six healthcare data hosting activities and ISO 27001 certification

• Access to a SecNumCloud-qualified IaaS region, with SecNumCloud qualification underway (J0) for its DBaaS offering

• Technologies and open standards that facilitate portability and reversibility

• Straightforward, per-minute pricing

Things to consider

Scalingo isn't designed to replace a general-purpose IaaS provider.

If you need to manage your virtual machines and network directly, or build every layer of your infrastructure yourself, a PaaS may not be the right approach.

Best suited for

Teams building SaaS products, APIs, or backend applications that want to focus on their product rather than server administration, while retaining the flexibility to scale resources as demand grows.

Scaleway

At a glance

Scaleway is a French cloud provider with a broad portfolio of services, including compute instances, storage, Kubernetes, managed databases, bare metal servers, serverless computing, GPUs, and AI services.

Its offering is therefore closer to that of a European hyperscaler than a traditional hosting provider.

Scaleway's SecNumCloud qualification process is currently underway with ANSSI.

Strengths

• Extensive cloud service portfolio

• Strong focus on AI and GPU infrastructure

• Multiple European regions

• Managed services alongside core infrastructure

• HDS certification covering a selection of services, excluding managed databases

Things to consider

As with major public cloud providers, the flexibility of a large service catalog comes with additional architectural decisions. Your team will need to design its infrastructure and select the appropriate services.

It's also worth paying attention to additional costs. Some services are billed separately, including backup storage for managed databases.

Best suited for

Organizations looking to build a comprehensive cloud architecture with a European provider, particularly for Kubernetes, data, or AI workloads.

OUTSCALE

At a glance

A cloud subsidiary of Dassault Systèmes, OUTSCALE has traditionally focused on Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): compute, storage, networking, and the underlying infrastructure needed to build custom cloud environments.

Its IaaS offering is SecNumCloud-qualified, with operations and support for the qualified service delivered from France.

Strengths

• French cloud infrastructure

• SecNumCloud-qualified IaaS offering

• Strong positioning for sensitive and regulated environments

• Extensive control over the infrastructure layer

• Sovereign generative AI offering developed in partnership with Mistral AI, with GPU and AI capabilities available in SecNumCloud environments

Things to consider

OUTSCALE primarily provides the infrastructure foundation.

Compared with using a PaaS directly, this generally requires more in-house infrastructure and operations expertise.

Best suited for

Organizations that need French IaaS infrastructure, particularly for environments subject to demanding security or compliance requirements.

Note: Scalingo also relies on OUTSCALE infrastructure for its cloud regions.

Cloud Temple

At a glance

Cloud Temple focuses heavily on trusted cloud services and sensitive environments.

Its service portfolio has expanded considerably and now includes virtual machines, bare metal servers, storage, Kubernetes, OpenShift, managed databases, and AI services.

Some of its IaaS offerings are SecNumCloud-qualified and HDS-certified.

Strengths

• Strong specialization in sensitive and regulated workloads

• IaaS alongside several managed services and PaaS capabilities

• SecNumCloud qualification and HDS certification for specific offerings

• Focus on open-source technologies to reduce reliance on proprietary vendors

• AI services and GPU resources available in SecNumCloud-qualified environments

Things to consider

Cloud Temple is particularly oriented toward large enterprises, public sector organizations, and businesses with significant compliance requirements.

Its offering may therefore be more comprehensive, but also more complex, than what a small team, startup, scaleup, or SME needs to deploy an application.

The entry cost of its SecNumCloud-qualified OpenShift PaaS offering may also represent a substantial investment for smaller organizations.

As an indication, a basic configuration is listed at approximately €2,800 per month excluding VAT and OpenShift licenses, with a 12-month commitment.

Best suited for

Organizations where security, compliance, or trusted cloud requirements are central to the choice of provider.

NumSpot

At a glance

NumSpot is a relatively new French cloud provider founded around a platform designed to deliver sovereignty, hybrid cloud capabilities, and portability.

Its portfolio combines IaaS, Kubernetes, managed databases, and other PaaS services, alongside data and AI capabilities.

Its shareholders include Banque des Territoires, Docaposte, Dassault Systèmes, and Bouygues Telecom.

Strengths

• French ownership

• Strong focus on open source, portability, and reversibility

• Combination of IaaS (OUTSCALE), PaaS, data, and AI services

• Positioning suited to public sector and regulated environments

• Several PaaS services undergoing SecNumCloud qualification

Things to consider

As a newer entrant compared with OVHcloud or Orange Business, NumSpot has a service portfolio and partner ecosystem that are still developing, along with a more limited number of public customer references.

Best suited for

Organizations looking for a French platform combining infrastructure, managed services, data, and AI capabilities, with a strong emphasis on portability.

Orange Business

At a glance

Orange Business primarily targets enterprises and organizations looking to modernize significant parts of their IT infrastructure, rather than developers who simply want to deploy an application.

Its Cloud Avenue portfolio combines cloud infrastructure, professional support, and managed services.

Its Cloud Avenue SecNum offering is SecNumCloud-qualified for both shared and dedicated IaaS environments.

Strengths

• Infrastructure and operations based in France for its SecNum offering

• SecNumCloud-qualified services

• Extensive support for migration and operations

• Public, dedicated, and hybrid cloud options

• French-based support

Things to consider

Orange Business is primarily designed for IT departments, infrastructure migrations, and enterprise-scale projects.

Its approach may be less suited to small product teams looking for a lightweight, developer-friendly experience.

Best suited for

Established organizations looking to migrate or modernize their IT systems with extensive support and managed services.

Clever Cloud

At a glance

Clever Cloud is another French PaaS provider.

One of its main distinguishing features is its infrastructure model: the platform is available in a wider range of regions and relies on multiple hosting partners in France and internationally.

Strengths

• Wide range of runtimes and services

• Multiple regions and infrastructure providers

• Highly automated deployment and operations

• ISO 27001 and HDS certifications

• Option to use a region running on Cloud Temple's SecNumCloud-qualified infrastructure

Things to consider

Not all Clever Cloud regions run on the same infrastructure or are located in the same country.

If your goal is specifically to host your applications in France, you'll need to check both the selected region and its underlying infrastructure provider.

For example, Clever Cloud lists partner infrastructure in France, Poland, Canada, Australia, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates.

Best suited for

Teams looking for a French PaaS provider that offers greater choice in terms of cloud regions and infrastructure partners.

S3NS and Bleu: A Different Approach

For organizations with stringent security or compliance requirements that still want to use Google Cloud or Microsoft technologies, S3NS and Bleu offer a different model.

Their services are based on technologies from these hyperscalers but operate within a strengthened French legal and operational framework.

This approach may be particularly attractive to public administrations, healthcare organizations, and large enterprises already heavily invested in these ecosystems.

However, it doesn't eliminate technological dependence on Google or Microsoft.

That's an important distinction when discussing cloud sovereignty.

If your objective is also to reduce reliance on US technologies or support the French and European cloud ecosystem, this model may be less aligned with your priorities.

What About European Sovereign Cloud Providers?

This comparison primarily focuses on French providers. However, a sovereign cloud can also be European.

Several other providers are worth considering.

STACKIT is a German cloud provider belonging to the Schwarz Group. It hosts its services in Germany and Austria and explicitly positions itself as a sovereign European cloud alternative.

IONOS, also based in Germany, offers a broad cloud portfolio ranging from IaaS to PaaS. It operates several European data centers and emphasizes control over its own technology stack.

Infomaniak is another interesting option, although it is based outside the European Union. The Swiss company operates its own data centers in Switzerland and places considerable emphasis on technological independence, open source, and portability. However, Switzerland isn't an EU member state. Depending on your legal and contractual requirements, that distinction may matter.

Ultimately, the choice between a French and a European provider depends on your priorities.

Some organizations primarily want their infrastructure to remain within a European framework.

Others want to go further by directly supporting French companies, jobs, and technologies, while keeping their data and applications hosted locally.

There's no single right answer. It depends on how much importance you place on French sovereignty, European sovereignty, technological independence, and, of course, the specific needs of your project.

How to Choose the Right Sovereign Cloud Provider

Ultimately, the right cloud provider depends on what you're planning to host and how much infrastructure you want to manage yourself.

Building a SaaS product, API, or web application without wanting to manage servers?

Consider a PaaS provider such as Scalingo or Clever Cloud.

These platforms handle much of the deployment, day-to-day operations, and scaling for you.

Want full control over your infrastructure and the freedom to build a custom architecture?

An IaaS provider such as OVHcloud, Scaleway, or OUTSCALE will generally be a better fit.

You'll gain more control, but your team will also be responsible for more of the infrastructure and its operations.

Working with strict regulatory requirements?

Don't choose a provider based on its name alone.

Check the specific security and compliance guarantees associated with the services you intend to use.

SecNumCloud, HDS, and other certifications may be decisive depending on your industry and the type of data you process.

Already heavily invested in Microsoft Azure or Google Cloud?

Offerings such as Bleu or S3NS may allow you to continue using these technology ecosystems within a strengthened French framework.

The trade-off is that technological dependence on Microsoft or Google remains.

Simply need to host a company website or WordPress site?

You probably don't need a complete cloud platform.

A French web hosting provider such as o2switch may offer a simpler and often more affordable solution.

Looking to deploy an application in France on a secure, sovereign cloud platform, without having to manage the underlying infrastructure yourself? That's exactly what Scalingo is designed for 👇