Amazon S3 vs Backblaze B2
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Amazon S3 and Backblaze B2.
Quick Verdict
4.1/5
Amazon S3
0 reviews
4.2/5
Backblaze B2
0 reviews
Backblaze B2 is rated higher (4.2 vs 4.1). AWS S3 stores and retrieves unlimited amounts of data via a simple web interface. Built for developers, enterprises, and anyone needing reliable, durable cloud storage with pay-as-you-go pricing. Backblaze B2 offers S3-compatible object storage at $6.95/TB/month (raised from $6/TB in May). Free egress up to 3x stored data for all customers, unlimited free egress to partner CDNs/compute.
 Amazon S3 Scalable object storage for any data size or type | Backblaze B2 S3-compatible object storage at $6.95/TB/month with 3x free egress | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 4.1 (0 reviews) | 4.2 (0 reviews)✓ |
| Pricing model | pay-as-you-go (per GB-month + per 1,000 requests + retrieval/transfer) | usage-based |
| Starting price | From $0.023/mo✓ | From $6.95/mo |
| Best for | Teams building on AWS who need durable, API-stable object storage for backups, data lakes, static content and archives — and who value tooling compatibility over the lowest per-GB rate | Backup targets, snapshot archives, and asset storage where low, predictable cost beats global distribution |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ||
| DDoS protection | ✓ | |
| Automated backups | ||
| Snapshots | ||
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ||
| Free tier | ||
| Data-center locations | ||
| Regions | 39 AWS regions / 123-124 AZs | ["US West (Sacramento, Stockton, Phoenix)", "US East (Reston, VA)", "EU Central (Amsterdam, NL)", "CA East (Toronto, ON)"] |
| Tags | ||
| Tags | free tiers3 compatibleapi accessus datacentereu datacenterapac datacenterterraform provider | free tiers3 compatibleus datacenterapi access |
| Visit Amazon S3 → | Visit Backblaze B2 → | |
Amazon S3
Pros
- + Designed for 11 nines durability with cross-AZ replication by default and strong read-after-write consistency
- + The S3 API is the industry standard — code written in 2006 still works, and third-party compatibility is everywhere
- + 23x cost ladder from Standard down to Glacier Deep Archive at $0.00099/GB-month, with lifecycle automation
- + Deepest storage feature set available: versioning, Object Lock, replication, inventory, event notifications, access management
Cons
- - Egress at $0.09/GB and per-request pricing produce surprise bills for chatty or restore-heavy workloads
- - IA and Glacier classes add retrieval fees and latency — the restore path must be priced separately
- - Policy configuration (bucket policies, IAM, Block Public Access, KMS keys) is complex and historically error-prone
- - SLA (99.9%/99.0%) is far below the durability figure — availability and durability are different promises
Backblaze B2
Pros
- + $6.95/TB/month storage with no minimum file size or storage duration fees
- + Free egress up to 3x average monthly storage for all customers; unlimited free egress to partner CDNs/compute
- + Genuine S3-compatible API plus native API, with free Class A/B/C transactions
- + 11 nines claimed durability with published Vault math (20 shards across 20 pods)
- + EU data residency via the Amsterdam region; permanent 10 GB free tier
Cons
- - One region per account (fixed at creation); no cross-region buckets or read replicas
- - S3 compatibility is partial: no IAM roles, object tagging, or website hosting; bucket-level ACLs only
- - SLA is thin: 99.9% objective with 5–10% service credits
- - Storage price rose from $6 to $6.95/TB in May — value still strong, but the direction is upward
- - No compute, functions, or database services
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