The per-GB rate is a trap. The real bill is dominated by egress, the fee to download your data, which AWS S3 charges at about $90 per TB and Cloudflare R2, Wasabi and iDrive e2 charge at zero. Set how much you store and download per month to rank S3-compatible providers by true cost.
Indicative published USD list prices for standard/hot tiers. Request fees not modelled; confirm on the provider before committing.
| Real $/mo ▲ | Provider | Storage $/GB | Egress $/GB | Free tier | Notes |
|---|
Egress is the fee to download data out of the provider, the biggest hidden object-storage cost. AWS/Google/Azure charge ~8-12¢/GB (≈$80-120 per TB/month), while R2, Wasabi and iDrive e2 charge $0. Serving a lot of data makes zero-egress providers far cheaper. Set your monthly download above to see it.
For storage alone, iDrive e2, Storj and Backblaze B2 (~½¢/GB or less). But if you download a lot, zero-egress R2/Wasabi/iDrive e2 usually win overall. Rank by your real workload above, not the headline rate.
Mostly yes, same API, just change the endpoint and keys. R2, B2, Wasabi, DO Spaces and others are S3-compatible. A few niche S3 features vary, so check the provider's list, but standard operations just work.
Wasabi: 1TB and 90-day minimums. B2: free egress up to 3× stored/day. DO/Linode/Vultr bundle a base allowance into a flat fee. Per-request fees apply on all and aren't modelled here.