File Storage · alternatives
Alternatives to Cloudflare R2
21 file storage tools sit alongside Cloudflare R2 in this directory. Below is what separates each from Cloudflare R2 on the figures we hold, price, model, tier count and rating, and a direct comparison for every one.
- Alternatives listed
- 21
- With a free tier
- 9
- Cheaper to start
- 3
- Cloudflare R2 starts at
- Free, then $0.015/month
Why people look past Cloudflare R2
Nothing on the record flags a reason to move. Cloudflare R2 has a free tier, and starts at $0.015/month against a category median of $5/month. People still switch over fit and workflow, and those are not things a catalogue entry can measure, which is what the comparisons below are for.
What each alternative does differently
Ordered by the aggregated rating on each catalogue entry. Differences are drawn from price, pricing model, tier count and rating, the fields the category listing carries. For a feature-level difference, follow the head-to-head link on each card: those pages read both full records.
Unlimited cloud backup at an affordable price
- No free tier, where Cloudflare R2 has one.
- Starts $8.985 a month dearer, at $9/month.
- 2 tiers to Cloudflare R2's 3.
Hot cloud storage without egress fees
- No free tier, where Cloudflare R2 has one.
- Starts $7.9750000000000005 a month dearer, at $7.99/month.
The leading cloud computing platform
- Starts $0.015 a month cheaper, at Free.
- Sold on a usage-based model rather than Per gigabyte stored per month.
- 2 tiers to Cloudflare R2's 3.
Google's consumer cloud storage app, sharing the same 15GB quota as Gmail and Google Photos
- Sold on a Free tier plus paid storage add-on model rather than Per gigabyte stored per month.
Low cost S3-compatible object storage with egress included up to a multiple of what you store
- Starts $3.985 a month dearer, at $4/month.
- Sold on a Per terabyte per month model rather than Per gigabyte stored per month.
- 2 tiers to Cloudflare R2's 3.
Open source distributed storage providing object, block and file from one cluster
- Sold on a Open source, no licence fee model rather than Per gigabyte stored per month.
- 1 tier to Cloudflare R2's 3.
Every Cloudflare R2 alternative at a glance
A dash means the catalogue entry carries no figure, not that the answer is nothing.
| Tool | Entry price | Model | Tiers | Head to head |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloudflare R2 (this page) | Free, then $0.015/month | Per gigabyte stored per month | 3 | |
| BackblazeCheaper per terabyte stored, with free egress capped at three times your stored data rather than uncapped | $9/month | - | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| WasabiFlat per terabyte pricing with no operation charges, if your workload does many small requests | $7.99/month | - | - | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| AWS (Amazon Web Services)If you need lifecycle tiering into deep archive, named regions, and the wider S3 feature surface | Free | Usage-based | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Google Drive | Free | Free tier plus paid storage add-on | 3 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| IDrive e2 | Free, then $4/month | Per terabyte per month | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Ceph | Free | Open source, no licence fee | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| MinIO | Free | Open source, no licence fee | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Storj | Free, then $4/month | Per terabyte per month | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Tigris | Free, then $0.004/GB/month | Usage-based tiered storage with per-request fees | 4 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Box | Free, then $5/month | Subscription | 4 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Nextcloud | Free | Freemium | 4 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| LucidLink | $7/month | Per member per month plus storage | 3 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| VAST Data | On request | Quote | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Panzura | On request | Quote | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Scality RING | On request | Quote | 2 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Cloudian | On request | Quote | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Nasuni | On request | Quote | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Veritas NetBackup | $100/month | Subscription | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Zerto | $5/month | Subscription | 1 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| Microsoft OneDrive | $1.99/month | Subscription | 4 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
| IDrive | $2.5/month | Subscription | 7 | vs Cloudflare R2 |
Ratings are aggregated from third-party sources and imported with each catalogue entry; Softwr hosts no reviews of these products. How each figure is used is set out on the Cloudflare R2 badges page.
Cheaper ways to solve the same problem
Free to start (9)
These publish a tier that costs nothing, so they can be evaluated before any money changes hands.
- AWS (Amazon Web Services) , Free
- Google Drive , Free
- IDrive e2 , Free, then $4/month
- Ceph , Free
- MinIO , Free
- Storj , Free, then $4/month
- Tigris , Free, then $0.004/GB/month
- Box , Free, then $5/month
Cheaper than Cloudflare R2 (3)
Entry price under Cloudflare R2's $0.015/month. The record does not say what unit that price is charged in, so confirm per-seat versus flat rate before comparing budgets.
- AWS (Amazon Web Services) , Free
- Tigris , Free, then $0.004/GB/month
- Nextcloud , Free
What you would be giving up
Cloudflare R2 is most often brought in for serving a large media or asset library to the public where transfer out, not storage, is the dominant cost, hosting a container or artefact registry that thousands of ci runners pull from every day, distributing model weights or open datasets that are downloaded far more often than they are updated, moving off s3 specifically to stop paying data transfer charges on a read heavy bucket. Anything replacing it has to cover the ones you actually depend on, and a cheaper tool that misses one of them is not cheaper.
Two things this page cannot settle. It compares on price, model, tier count and rating, because those are the fields the category listing carries, feature-level differences need both full records, which is what the head-to-head pages load. And the ratings are third-party aggregates imported with each entry rather than reviews written here, so a 0.2 difference between two tools is noise rather than a finding.
If Cloudflare R2 is broadly right and the question is cost, the Cloudflare R2 pricing breakdown covers every tier and what each one adds. If you want the whole field rather than a shortlist, the File Storage category lists everything the directory holds, and best file storage tools ranks them.
Cloudflare R2 runs on web, api. Platform coverage is not carried on the category listing for the alternatives, so it is one more thing to check on each head-to-head page rather than here.
Questions about Cloudflare R2 alternatives
- What are the main alternatives to Cloudflare R2?
- 21 other file storage tools are listed in this directory, led by Backblaze, Wasabi, AWS (Amazon Web Services), Google Drive. They are ordered by the aggregated rating on each catalogue entry, not by any Softwr ranking.
- What is the best free alternative to Cloudflare R2?
- 9 of the alternatives listed here can be used without paying: AWS (Amazon Web Services), Google Drive, IDrive e2, Ceph, MinIO.
- Is there a cheaper alternative to Cloudflare R2?
- Yes. 3 of the alternatives below start under Cloudflare R2's $0.015/month: AWS (Amazon Web Services) at Free, Tigris at Free, then $0.004/GB/month, Nextcloud at Free.
- Is there a reason to switch away from Cloudflare R2?
- Nothing in the data flags one. Cloudflare R2 has a free tier, and starts at $0.015/month against a category median of $5/month. Fit and workflow are the usual reasons to move, and those are not things this record can measure.
- What would I give up by switching from Cloudflare R2?
- Cloudflare R2 is most often brought in for serving a large media or asset library to the public where transfer out, not storage, is the dominant cost, hosting a container or artefact registry that thousands of ci runners pull from every day, distributing model weights or open datasets that are downloaded far more often than they are updated, moving off s3 specifically to stop paying data transfer charges on a read heavy bucket. Anything you replace it with has to cover the ones you actually rely on, the side-by-side comparisons linked from each alternative below put the two feature records against each other.
- Is there an open-source alternative to Cloudflare R2?
- None of the file storage tools listed here are recorded as open source. That is what the licence field on each entry says, and the field is not always filled in, so it is worth checking directly for any tool you are serious about.
- How were these Cloudflare R2 alternatives chosen?
- They are the tools filed in the same category, File Storage, ordered by the aggregated rating on each entry. There is no editorial shortlist, and nothing on this page is paid: no sponsored placement runs on alternatives pages and the order cannot be bought. Softwr has not used these products.
- Where can I compare Cloudflare R2 against one of these directly?
- Every alternative below has a side-by-side page against Cloudflare R2 covering price, platforms, features and what each one is used for. Those pages read the full record for both products rather than the summary shown here.
- Does this list cover every file storage tool?
- No. It covers what this directory holds in the File Storage category, 21 tools beside Cloudflare R2. The category page lists the rest of the catalogue as it grows.