Object Storage
Storage for the files that should not live on your server.
Object storage is a place to put files that is not a disk on a machine. You reach it over the network with the S3 API, from any server or from a browser, and it grows without anybody deciding how large it should be.
- S3 API
- your existing tools work
- No capacity plan
- it grows as you put things in it
- Public or private
- decided per file
- Off your server
- the app disk stays for the app
What it is
Most applications end up keeping user uploads on the server they run on, and it works until the day it does not: the disk fills, or a second server is added and half the files are on the wrong one, or the server has to be rebuilt and now the photographs are the reason it cannot be.
Object storage takes that class of file off the server entirely. The application writes to a bucket instead of a folder, every server sees the same files, and the disk your application runs on goes back to being a disk your application runs on.
What it does for you
Six things Object Storage changes about how your infrastructure behaves.
The S3 API, so nothing needs rewriting
Point your existing credentials and endpoint at us. Laravel, Django, Rails, Node — the storage adapter you already have supports it.
Nobody has to size it
There is no volume to run out of. It holds what you put in it, and you pay for what is there.
Public or private, file by file
Serve a product image straight from storage, keep an invoice PDF reachable only by a signed link that expires.
Every server sees the same files
Which is what makes a second server possible at all. Files stop being tied to the machine that received them.
Right for backups and archives
Things you write once, keep for years and read rarely are exactly what this is shaped for.
It keeps your application disk free
The most common cause of a full disk is files nobody meant to keep on it. This is where they go instead.
What people use it for
- User uploads
- Photographs, documents, avatars — written by whichever server took the request, read by all of them.
- Media and static assets
- Images, video and files a website serves, kept off the application server and out of its disk budget.
- Backups and log archives
- Retention that grows forever, somewhere that does not need to be tidied to make room.
- Software and file distribution
- Large downloads served to customers without your application server carrying the bandwidth.
- Data for analysis
- Exports and datasets kept in one place that several machines can read at once.
- Instead of a file server
- Shared storage that several cloud servers read and write, without a machine in the middle that can fall over.
It works with what you already use
The S3 API is the standard. Point these at our endpoint with your own keys and nothing else changes.
- AWS CLI
- rclone
- s3cmd
- Cyberduck
- WinSCP
- Laravel Flysystem
- django-storages
- boto3
- AWS SDK for Node.js
What it costs
Object storage is priced by the gigabyte stored per month. Tell us roughly how much you hold today and how fast it grows, and we will quote it.
We would rather quote you than publish a number we have not checked. Everything on the pricing page is a figure the order form actually charges — this will join it the day the same is true here.
Questions
Will my application work with it unchanged?
If it already talks to S3, yes — change the endpoint and the credentials. If it writes to a local folder, you need a storage adapter, which for most frameworks is a configuration change rather than code.
Can I serve a website straight from it?
You can serve files from it — images, downloads, video. It is storage rather than a web server, so anything that has to be generated per request still belongs on your server.
How is it different from block storage?
Block storage is a disk attached to one server. Object storage is reached over the network by any number of servers, has no fixed size, and is addressed by file rather than by filesystem. Databases want the first; files want the second.
What happens if I delete a file by mistake?
It is gone, unless you have versioning or a backup of the bucket. Object storage is durable, which means it will not lose your file — it is not a safeguard against you deleting it.
Something not answered here? Ask us — it is a short answer or it is a phone call, and either is fine.
The rest of the cloud range
These are built to be used together — a server inside a private network, behind a firewall, with its data on a volume and its history in backups.
Cloud Server (VM)
Scalable Linux and Windows instances
See sizes and pricesBare Metal
A whole physical machine, for demanding workloads
Learn moreLoad Balancers
One address in front of many servers
Learn moreVPC (Virtual Private Cloud)
A private network only your servers can see
Learn moreCloud Firewall
Control incoming and outgoing network traffic
Learn moreBlock Storage
High-performance storage you mount to a server
Learn moreSnapshot
On-demand disk images of a server
Learn moreBackup
Automated data protection and recovery
Learn moreNot sure whether you need this?
Tell us what you are running and what is going wrong with it. We will say which of these actually helps — including when the answer is none of them.