Cheapest cloud storage for social media backups in 2026

Keeping a copy of everything you post costs far less than most creators expect. A year of Reels can fit in the cheapest paid plan of almost any service, and the very cheapest option stores a full terabyte for about a dollar a month.

The catch is that price per gigabyte is only one line on the bill. How fast you can get a file back, what it costs to download everything, and whether the backup fills itself matter just as much. This guide compares the popular options side by side, then walks through what to check before you choose.

All prices are in US dollars before tax, taken from each service’s own pricing pages on 19 October 2026. Storage services bill a terabyte (TB) as 1,000 GB, so we do too.

How much space do you actually need?

Work it out from what you post, not from your camera roll. A backup of your posts holds the finished files the platform serves, which are much smaller than raw footage.

Multiply how often you post by the size of a typical file. Say you post one Reel a day at around 30 MB, plus three carousels a week with three photos of 2 MB each. That’s about 11 GB of Reels and 1 GB of photos a year, roughly 12 GB in total.

To get your own number, download one of your recent Reels and check its size. Most creators who only back up what they post fit inside 100 GB for years. You need 1 TB or more if you also keep raw clips, long videos or several accounts.

Monthly plans: Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud and OneDrive

These are the services most people already have. You pay a fixed price for a fixed amount of space, and your files open instantly on any device.

Service	Free space	Paid plans (per month)
Google Drive (Google One)	15 GB, shared with Gmail and Photos	100 GB $1.99, 2 TB $9.99, 5 TB $19.99
Dropbox	2 GB	2 TB $11.99 ($9.99 billed yearly), 3 TB $19.99
iCloud+	5 GB	50 GB $0.99, 200 GB $2.99, 2 TB $9.99, 6 TB $29.99, 12 TB $59.99
OneDrive (Microsoft 365)	5 GB	100 GB $1.99, 1 TB $9.99 with Office apps, 2 TB shared $12.99

Google’s 2 TB and 5 TB tiers now come bundled as Google AI Plus and Google AI Pro. Paying yearly saves about 16% on Google, Microsoft and Dropbox plans. iCloud+ is billed monthly only.

Pay for what you use: Backblaze B2, Wasabi, R2 and Amazon S3

Object storage bills per gigabyte, so a small archive costs pennies and you never pay for empty space. You create a “bucket” and connect it with a key instead of a regular login, which takes a few more minutes to set up.

Service	Per TB a month	Free	The catch
Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive	$0.99	None	Files take up to 12 hours to come back, and downloads cost extra
Backblaze B2	$6.95	First 10 GB	Downloads free up to 3x what you store each month
Wasabi	$7.99	None	You pay for at least 1 TB, and for 90 days on anything you delete early
Cloudflare R2	$15	10 GB a month	No download fees at all

Amazon has faster classes too: S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval costs $4 per TB a month and opens files right away, and S3 Standard costs $23.

What a year costs at your size

This is the number that matters. For each service we took the cheapest plan that fits, billed yearly where the service offers it, or the per-gigabyte price times twelve months.

Service	100 GB	500 GB	1 TB	2 TB
Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive	$1.19	$5.94	$11.88	$23.76
Backblaze B2	$7.51	$40.87	$82.57	$165.97
Cloudflare R2	$16.20	$88.20	$178.20	$358.20
Google Drive	$19.99	$99.99	$99.99	$99.99
OneDrive	$19.99	$99.99	$99.99	$129.99
iCloud+	$35.88	$119.88	$119.88	$119.88
Wasabi	$95.88	$95.88	$95.88	$191.76
Dropbox	$119.88	$119.88	$119.88	$119.88

A few things jump out:

• Below 500 GB, paying per gigabyte wins, except on Wasabi with its 1 TB minimum. Backblaze B2 costs about $7.51 a year for 100 GB.
• At 2 TB, the bundles catch up. Google Drive, Dropbox and iCloud+ all land between $100 and $120 a year for 2 TB, less than B2, R2 or Wasabi.
• Glacier Deep Archive is in a league of its own for storage alone: 2 TB for under $24 a year. Read the next section before you pick it.

The catch with the cheapest option

Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive is cheap because it’s built for files you hope never to open. Three things to know:

1. Files aren’t instant. You ask for a file back first. Amazon says a standard restore finishes within 12 hours, and the cheaper bulk restore within 48 hours.
2. Getting everything out costs money. Restoring costs $0.02 per GB (or $0.0025 for bulk), and downloading costs $0.09 per GB after the first 100 GB each month. Pulling back a full 1 TB comes to about $84 with bulk restore, or about $101 with standard. Getting back 100 GB costs about 25 cents with bulk restore.
3. There’s a 180-day minimum. Delete a file sooner and you still pay for the rest of the 180 days. For a backup you never delete, that never comes up.

That makes Deep Archive a great insurance copy, and a poor place to browse. Many creators pair it with a cheaper-to-open copy elsewhere.

What to look at before you pick

The price at your size, now and in two years

Fixed plans are cheap per gigabyte only when they’re nearly full. If you need 150 GB, you pay for 2 TB on Google Drive, Dropbox or iCloud+. Pay-per-gigabyte services grow with you, apart from Wasabi, which bills at least 1 TB.

How fast you need a file back

If you regularly pull old clips for recuts, a best-of or a brand pitch, choose storage that opens instantly. If the copy is only there in case your account disappears, waiting 12 to 48 hours is fine.

What it costs to get everything out

The bill you’ll notice is the one on the day you need your archive. Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud+, OneDrive and Cloudflare R2 don’t charge for downloads, and Wasabi doesn’t either under its fair-use policy. Backblaze B2 is free up to three times what you store each month. Amazon charges to restore and download.

Minimum storage periods

Glacier Deep Archive bills at least 180 days per file, Wasabi 90 days, and R2’s Infrequent Access class 30 days. Backblaze B2 has no minimum. These only bite if you delete or replace files soon after saving them.

Whether it fills itself

A backup you have to remember is a backup you’ll skip. Ask how files get there. Google Drive, Dropbox and the pay-as-you-go services above let other apps save into them, so the backup can fill itself. iCloud has no public way for online services to save into your iCloud Drive, so files only get there from your own devices.

Post Once does this for you. Each new post and Story is saved to your storage as soon as it goes up, with its caption. That matters most for Stories, which disappear from your profile after 24 hours, so a backup you make by hand later can miss them.

Whether your captions come along

A video without its caption loses the hashtags, the hook and the brand mentions. Check that the caption is saved next to each post, not only the media file.

What else shares the space

Google’s free 15 GB is shared with Gmail and Google Photos, and iCloud’s 5 GB with your phone backups. If those are already nearly full, your post backups will tip you over.

Sharing with an editor or a brand

Google Drive and Dropbox make sharing a folder easy. Buckets on S3, B2, Wasabi or R2 need extra steps to share a file with someone outside your account.

What happens if you stop paying

On Google, going over your storage limit stops new uploads, and if you stay over quota for two years or more, your content may be removed. Other services have similar rules, so keep your card details current on whichever one holds your archive.

Other ways creators back up

• The platform’s own export. Instagram, Facebook and TikTok will give you a copy of your data for free. It’s worth doing once, but you have to remember to ask, and it’s only current to the day you asked. Why that isn’t a real backup.
• Amazon Photos. Prime members get unlimited full-resolution photo storage but only 5 GB for videos, which a few months of Reels will fill.
• A hard drive at home. No monthly bill, but it’s one copy in one place. A flood, a theft or a dropped bag takes it with everything else.

The 3-2-1 rule, for creators

The classic backup rule: keep 3 copies, on 2 different kinds of storage, with 1 of them somewhere else. For a creator that can be as simple as the post on the platform, a copy in Google Drive you can browse and share, and a deep copy in Glacier Deep Archive for a dollar or two a year.

Quick picks

• Just starting out (under 100 GB): Google Drive’s 100 GB plan, or Backblaze B2 if you’d rather pay only for what you use.
• You open and share old posts often: Google Drive 2 TB or Dropbox Plus.
• You want the cheapest insurance possible: Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive.
• You already pay for iCloud+ or Microsoft 365: fine for copying files in by hand, if you remember to.

How Post Once fits in

Post Once is the part that fills your backup for you. You keep posting on Instagram, Threads, Facebook or X as usual, and Post Once reposts it to your other accounts and saves a copy of every post and Story, with its caption, to storage in your own name: Google Drive, Dropbox, Backblaze B2, Amazon S3 or an S3-compatible service like Wasabi or Cloudflare R2. On Amazon S3 you pick the storage class, Glacier Deep Archive included.

You pay your storage provider directly, at the prices above, and the files stay in your account. The Free and Solo plans back up your first 10 posts free. Studio and above back up every post. If you’re weighing Post Once against Repurpose.io, whose docs only mention Google Drive and Dropbox, see the Repurpose.io alternative comparison.

FAQ

What is the cheapest cloud storage?

For storage alone, Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive, at $0.99 per TB a month. It takes up to 12 hours to get a file back, and downloads cost extra. For storage you can open instantly, Backblaze B2 ($6.95 per TB a month) is the cheapest below about 1.2 TB, and Google Drive’s 2 TB plan ($99.99 a year) is the cheapest above it.

How much does 1 TB of cloud storage cost?

Between about $12 and $180 a year, depending on the service: $11.88 on Glacier Deep Archive, $82.57 on Backblaze B2, $95.88 on Wasabi, $99.99 on Google Drive (its 2 TB plan) or OneDrive, and $178.20 on Cloudflare R2.

Is Google Drive or Dropbox cheaper?

Google Drive. Its 2 TB plan costs $99.99 a year against $119.88 for Dropbox Plus, and Google also has a 100 GB plan for $19.99 a year. Dropbox has nothing between its free 2 GB and 2 TB.

Do I need a backup if I already download my data?

Yes, if you want every post covered. An export is a snapshot of one day, and you can’t request one if you’re locked out of your account. An automatic backup saves each post as it goes up.