Cloudflare R2 vs S3 Glacier Deep Archive: which costs less for backups
Prices checked
On a 10 TB backup, Cloudflare R2 costs less in every month we priced, from a quiet month to restoring all 10 TB, by $18.59 to $1,121.38 a month. Each vendor is priced on its cheapest class for each month, however long that class takes to read; the bills below keep the class each one names.
Both sides use the same numbers, and the bills follow as you type. Files, requests, download speed and restore deadlines use the calculator defaults.
Cloudflare R2
Infrequent Access · Global
$120.80Normal month Cheaper
$221.70Restore month
Ready at onceS3 Glacier Deep Archive
S3 Glacier Deep Archive · US East (N. Virginia)
$139.39Normal month
$1,271.38Restore month
Ready within 12 hThree standard backups, both bills
| Backup kept | Cloudflare R2, normal month | S3 Glacier Deep Archive, normal month | Cloudflare R2, month you restore | S3 Glacier Deep Archive, month you restore |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 TB | $15.00Standard | $6.46 | $15.00Standard | $119.04 |
| 10 TB | $120.80Infrequent Access | $139.39 | $150.00Standard | $1,271.38 |
| 50 TB | $561.00Infrequent Access | $450.03 | $760.80Standard | $5,917.23 |
Each bill is the vendor's cheapest class with a complete total for that month. 1 TB, 10 TB and 50 TB kept; a tenth, a tenth and a twentieth downloaded in a normal month; everything downloaded in the month you restore. The lower bill in each pair of columns is underlined.
What decides it besides the price
Cloudflare R2
- Downloads: no download fees.
- Minimums: Standard, no minimum; Infrequent Access, 30-day minimum per object.
- Where the data sits: Automatic location.
S3 Glacier Deep Archive
- Downloads: the first 100 GB of downloads free each month.
- Minimums: 180-day minimum per object.
- Where the data sits: United States (Northern Virginia), Germany (Frankfurt).
- Object Lock: supported.
From the vendors' published rules
-
Recovery time objective: R2 Standard data is online. Deep Archive Standard retrieval is published as within 12 hours and Bulk as within 48 hours.
Cloudflare R2 docs: Pricing · AWS: Amazon S3 pricing, checked 25 July 2026
-
Retention behavior: R2 Standard has no minimum duration. Deep Archive has a 180-day minimum that applies only when an object is deleted, overwritten, moved, or transitioned early.
Cloudflare R2 docs: Pricing · AWS: Amazon S3 pricing, checked 25 July 2026
-
File count and size: Deep Archive adds 40 KB of metadata per archived object. R2 has no minimum object size in any of its storage classes.
AWS: Amazon S3 pricing · Cloudflare R2 docs: Pricing · Cloudflare developer docs: Storage classes, checked 25 July 2026
Price both on your own workload, with your region, an Object Lock requirement or a restore deadline.
Fixed example: 10 TB, line by line
These bills are for the standard 10 TB workload and do not follow the controls above. Prices checked .
Cloudflare R2: Infrequent Access, Global
Normal month $120.80
Calculated from the provider's listed rates.
Month you restore $221.70
Calculated from the provider's listed rates.
Price both on your own workload, including the day you restore.