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File Storage · head to head

Cloudflare R2 vs LucidLink

Cloudflare R2 logo

Cloudflare R2

File Storage

S3-compatible object storage that charges nothing for egress to the internet

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
LucidLink logo

LucidLink

File Storage

Cloud filesystem that streams large media files on demand instead of syncing them

From
$7/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Cloudflare R2 has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Cloudflare R2 there is no archive tier below Infrequent Access, so genuinely cold data costs roughly ten to fifteen times what it would cost in a deep archive class and there is nowhere cheaper to lifecycle it to.; LucidLink additional storage at $7 to $8 per 100GB per month is roughly three to four times raw S3 pricing, so teams with large cold archives pay a heavy premium for data they rarely touch.
  • They diverge on capability: Cloudflare R2 covers Zero egress billing, LucidLink covers Filespaces.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Cloudflare R2 and LucidLink actually diverge.

Attributes where Cloudflare R2 and LucidLink differ
AttributeCloudflare R2LucidLink
Starting priceFree$7/month
Pricing modelPer gigabyte stored per monthPer member per month plus storage
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWeb, APImacOS, Windows, Linux, iOS

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (File Storage).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Cloudflare R2

  • Zero egress billing
  • S3 API compatibility
  • Worker binding
  • Jurisdictional restriction
  • Infrequent Access tier
  • Custom domain serving

Only in LucidLink

  • Filespaces
  • On-demand streaming
  • Client-side encryption
  • Customer-managed keys
  • Bring your own storage
  • Snapshots

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Cloudflare R2

  • Serving a large media or asset library to the public where transfer out, not storage, is the dominant costnot LucidLink
  • Hosting a container or artefact registry that thousands of CI runners pull from every daynot LucidLink
  • Distributing model weights or open datasets that are downloaded far more often than they are updatednot LucidLink
  • Moving off S3 specifically to stop paying data transfer charges on a read heavy bucketnot LucidLink

LucidLink

  • A post house with editors in three countries cutting from one shared 4K rush library without shipping drivesnot Cloudflare R2
  • A broadcaster giving freelancers access to a project for a fortnight without provisioning VPN and a NAS mountnot Cloudflare R2
  • A game studio sharing multi-gigabyte asset builds where syncing every file to every workstation is impracticalnot Cloudflare R2
  • An architecture practice opening large point cloud and BIM files from a laptop on a hotel connectionnot Cloudflare R2

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Cloudflare R2

  • There is no archive tier below Infrequent Access, so genuinely cold data costs roughly ten to fifteen times what it would cost in a deep archive class and there is nowhere cheaper to lifecycle it to.
  • Class A operations are billed at 4.50 USD per million, so a workload that writes millions of small objects can spend more on operations than on the storage those objects occupy.
  • Infrequent Access carries both a retrieval fee and a thirty day minimum storage duration, so data that is deleted or re-read sooner ends up more expensive than if it had stayed on Standard.
  • You choose a location hint rather than a region, so you cannot prove to an auditor which datacentre holds an object unless you use a jurisdiction restricted bucket, and jurisdictions are limited.
  • Support level follows your Cloudflare account plan rather than the storage spend, so a team on a low tier account gets ticket support with no storage specific SLA, and an R2 incident is a Cloudflare incident you cannot fail over from because the free egress only exists inside Cloudflare.

LucidLink

  • Additional storage at $7 to $8 per 100GB per month is roughly three to four times raw S3 pricing, so teams with large cold archives pay a heavy premium for data they rarely touch.
  • Included storage is pooled per member, so adding a seat is also how you buy capacity, and teams with a few heavy users and many light ones buy seats purely for the gigabytes.
  • Performance is bounded by the network link and local cache size, so a workstation with a small cache on a poor connection performs far worse than the demonstrations suggest.
  • Small-file and metadata-heavy workloads such as code repositories, node modules trees or build outputs perform badly, so it is not a general-purpose file server replacement.
  • Customer-managed keys and bring your own storage are Enterprise-tier options, so organisations that cannot let a vendor hold their keys cannot use the published pricing at all.

Pricing, plan by plan

Cloudflare R2

Free
  • Free tierFree
    • 10 GB stored per month
    • 1 million Class A operations
    • 10 million Class B operations
  • Standard$0.015/month
    • Per gigabyte stored per month
    • 4.50 USD per million Class A operations
    • 0.36 USD per million Class B operations
  • Infrequent Access$0.01/month
    • Per gigabyte stored per month
    • Per gigabyte data retrieval fee
    • Thirty day minimum storage duration

LucidLink

$7/month
  • Starter$7/month
    • 100GB included per member, pooled across the team
    • Additional storage $7 per 100GB per month
    • Client-side encryption
  • Business$32/month
    • $27 per member per month billed annually
    • 400GB included per member, pooled across the team
    • Additional storage $8 per 100GB per month
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Custom pricing and storage terms
    • Customer-managed encryption keys
    • Bring your own object storage bucket

Which should you pick?

Choose Cloudflare R2 if

  • You need zero egress billing.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, API.
  • You also want s3 api compatibility.
Cloudflare R2 review

Choose LucidLink if

  • You need filespaces.
  • You work on macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS.
  • You also want on-demand streaming.
LucidLink review

Questions people ask

Is Cloudflare R2 or LucidLink better?
Neither clearly leads. Cloudflare R2 starts at Free and LucidLink at $7/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Cloudflare R2 or LucidLink?
Cloudflare R2 has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Cloudflare R2 and $7/month for LucidLink.
Does Cloudflare R2 or LucidLink run on more platforms?
Cloudflare R2 runs on Web, API. LucidLink runs on macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS.
Can I use Cloudflare R2 for free?
Yes. Cloudflare R2 has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. LucidLink starts at $7/month.
What is Cloudflare R2 best used for?
Cloudflare R2 is most often used 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. Of those, serving a large media or asset library to the public where transfer out, not storage, is the dominant cost and hosting a container or artefact registry that thousands of ci runners pull from every day are not what LucidLink is typically brought in for.
What can Cloudflare R2 do that LucidLink cannot?
Cloudflare R2 covers Zero egress billing, S3 API compatibility, Worker binding, Jurisdictional restriction. LucidLink covers Filespaces, On-demand streaming, Client-side encryption, Customer-managed keys.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Cloudflare R2: Is egress really free, with no hidden transfer charge?

Yes for data served out of R2 to the internet. You still pay per operation for the requests that serve it, and if you pull data into R2 from another provider you pay that provider the egress on the way in.

LucidLink: What does storage actually cost?

$7 per 100GB per month on Starter and $8 per 100GB per month on Business, above the pooled allowance. Model this separately from the seat cost.

Cloudflare R2: How does the total cost compare with S3 for a public download bucket?

Storage is more expensive per terabyte than S3 Infrequent Access, but S3 charges roughly 90 USD per terabyte served. Any bucket that serves more than about a fifth of its stored volume each month is cheaper on R2.

LucidLink: Can we hold our own encryption keys?

On the Enterprise tier, yes, along with pointing the filespace at your own S3 or Azure bucket. Not on Starter or Business.

Cloudflare R2: Can I use R2 without using the rest of Cloudflare?

Yes, it works through the plain S3 API from anywhere. You lose the Worker binding and the free CDN caching in front of it, which is where a lot of the practical benefit sits.

LucidLink: Does it work for source code?

Not well. It is built for large sequential reads. Many small files is the workload it handles worst.

Cloudflare R2: Does R2 have a cold archive class like Glacier?

No. Infrequent Access is the coldest tier, at two thirds of the Standard rate plus retrieval fees.

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