S3, B2, or Wasabi? The Real Cost of "Cheap" Cloud Storage Is Getting Files Back

# S3, B2, or Wasabi? The Real Cost of "Cheap" Cloud Storage Is Getting Files Back A remote media company is pushing 7 to 15 jobs a month. Each one clocks in at 300 to 600GB. Editors are scattered. Footage is uploaded from home offices. No one wants to touch a spinning disk in a closet somewhere. On paper, this is exactly what cloud storage was built for. In reality? It's where the cloud starts quietly charging you for every assumption you didn't think through. When people start comparing Amazon Web Services S3, Backblaze B2, and Wasabi Technologies Wasabi, the conversation usually begins with price per terabyte. That's the wrong place to start. Because storage isn't the expensive part anymore. Getting your files back is. ## The Illusion of "Cheap" Storage At first glance, B2 and Wasabi look like rebels in a hyperscaler world. Lower per-terabyte costs. Simpler pricing pages. No sprawling 40-tab pricing calculator. Then there's S3. The heavyweight. The one with more tiers than your local wedding cake: Standard, Intelligent-Tiering, Glacier Instant Retrieval, Glacier Flexible Retrieval, Deep Archive. On paper, Glacier Deep Archive can feel almost free. And that's where things get interesting. Cloud providers assume something very specific about your behavior: if you put something in archive storage, you're not touching it. Not next week. Not next month. Maybe not for years. If you violate that assumption, the bill reminds you. ## Hot, Cold, and "Oh No, We Need That File" Let's map this to real life. You finish a client project. Final delivery is done. Everyone's happy. The footage—400GB of 4K source material—goes into "long-term storage." You move it from hot storage to archive tier. Smart move. Monthly costs drop dramatically. Three months later? The client wants a cut-down. Or a new aspect ratio. Or social clips. Or they lost their masters. Now you're pulling that 400GB back. This is where the difference between S3, B2, and Wasabi stops being theoretical. ## S3: Powerful, Flexible — and Brutally Honest S3 is expensive if you don't understand it. It's cost-efficient if you do. With S3, you can automate lifecycle policies. Move files from Standard to Glacier automatically after 30 or 60 days. You can design a pipeline: Project complete → verify backup → move to Glacier → delete hot copy. That's clean. That scales. But retrieval from Glacier? That's not instant (unless you pay for the Instant Retrieval tier). Standard Glacier restore can take minutes to hours. Deep Archive can take 12 hours or more. And retrieval isn't free. You pay per GB to pull it back. Even worse: early deletion fees. Archive tiers assume minimum retention periods. Delete or move too early, and you're billed for the time you didn't store it. S3 isn't trying to trick you. It's just built for people who plan. ## B2: Simple Pricing, Fewer Traps — But Mind the Egress Backblaze B2 is often the darling of smaller media teams. Pricing is easier to understand. There's less tier complexity. It feels friendlier. But the catch isn't storage cost. It's egress. Download fees can add up quickly if you're constantly pulling large projects back for revisions. And in media, "archive" doesn't always mean "never touched again." It often means "probably touched again in six months." If your workflow includes frequent restores, B2 can still work — but the math shifts fast. ## Wasabi: No Egress Fees… With Strings Wasabi's big headline feature is no egress fees. For media companies, that sounds like magic. No download charges? Great. But Wasabi enforces minimum storage durations (typically 90 days). Delete before that, and you're paying anyway. There are also minimum storage object sizes and billing nuances that can surprise teams moving lots of small assets. If your workflow is stable — projects stay archived for long periods — Wasabi can be incredibly predictable. If your workflow is chaotic? It's still better than surprise egress fees, but not immune to billing quirks. ## Archive Is Cheap. Retrieval Is Strategy. One engineer in the discussion described migrating a massive media archive — hundreds of petabytes — into S3 Glacier tiers after retiring tape. They even created lightweight proxy files in standard storage so teams could screen footage without restoring full-resolution masters. That's the key insight. Don't treat archive like a freezer you constantly open. Treat it like deep storage. And create a middle layer. ## The Proxy Trick Most Teams Ignore Here's what sophisticated media teams do: - Store full-res masters in cold/archive tiers. - Generate small proxy files (1080p or even lower). - Keep proxies in hot storage. - Editors can review, search, and preview instantly. - Only when full-res media is absolutely required do you restore the archive copy. That one architectural decision can cut retrieval costs dramatically. It also changes how often you panic-click "Restore." ## The Cloud-to-Cloud Question One of the biggest pain points for remote teams is moving data from something like Google Drive to S3 or B2 without downloading everything locally. You don't want 20TB flowing through someone's home fiber line. Cloud-to-cloud transfer tools solve that. Many storage providers support direct transfers, or you can use third-party sync tools to move data server-side. That's essential if your active storage lives in one place and archive in another. Because the minute you start downloading and re-uploading manually, your "cheap cloud" strategy collapses under bandwidth and time costs. ## Do You Even Need a NAS? This question always pops up. Should you just buy a massive on-prem NAS and be done with it? For fully remote teams, a NAS introduces friction. You need VPN. You need infrastructure. You need someone responsible for hardware. It can be cheaper long-term for pure storage. But it doesn't solve global collaboration unless you layer more tech on top. Cloud storage is expensive monthly. Hardware is expensive upfront. The right answer depends on how often you retrieve archived material and how critical instant access really is. ## The Real Cost Model Let's simplify this. **If your archive projects are rarely touched:** - S3 Glacier or Deep Archive can be extremely cost-effective. - Wasabi can be predictable and safe. - B2 works if restores are occasional. **If your "archive" is more like "sleeping projects":** - Egress and retrieval costs become the dominant factor. - Archive tiers may cost more in practice than hot storage. - Intelligent tiering or even staying in a warm tier may be cheaper overall. The mistake isn't picking the wrong provider. It's misclassifying your data. ## Media Workflows Aren't Static Corporate IT thinks in decades. Media teams think in revisions. Clients come back. Formats change. Social platforms demand new cuts. You might think something is "done." The market doesn't. That's why lifecycle automation matters. That's why testing restore workflows matters. That's why running actual cost simulations based on retrieval frequency matters. Cloud pricing punishes guesswork. ## So… S3, B2, or Wasabi? If you want maximum flexibility and long-term scalability, **S3 wins**. It's complex, but you can design exactly what you need. If you want simplicity and reasonable pricing without diving deep into hyperscaler mechanics, **B2 is attractive**. If you hate egress fees and value predictability, **Wasabi can be compelling** — especially if your archive truly sits untouched. There's no universal winner. There's only the provider that aligns with how often you need your files back. ## The Hard Truth Cheap cloud storage is easy. Designing a retrieval strategy isn't. If you're pushing 15TB+ per month through a remote team, your storage cost isn't your biggest problem. Your movement cost is. The teams that thrive in this space don't just compare price per terabyte. They map their workflow. They measure restore frequency. They build proxy layers. They automate lifecycle transitions. And they treat archive as archive — not "stuff we'll probably need next quarter." Because the cloud will absolutely let you store everything forever. It just won't let you forget the bill when you want it back.