In a multitenant environment, customers share the same application, operating environment, hardware, and storage mechanism. This is distinct from virtualization, wherein every application runs on a separate virtual machine with its own operating system. A multitenant cloud is commonly likened to an apartment building—residents have keys to their own separate apartments, but they all share the infrastructure that delivers water and power. The provider (or the landlord, in this example) sets overarching rules and performance expectations for customers (tenants), but the individual customers have private access to their data. Read more.