Amazon promotes Amazon Glacier as a very affordable storage option. The service is tailored for rarely accessed data, where data retrieval durations can range from three to five hours, in order to keep costs down.
Amazon Glacier is also referred to as S3 Glacier because Amazon considers it to be an official component of Amazon Simple Storage Service. Thats the reason Amazon Glacier is considered as the most reliable storage solution in the world.
In this article, you will learn about the essential elements of Amazon Glacier, as well as its uses, distinctive qualities, and price.
What is the Amazon Glacier?
Amazon Glacier, sometimes referred to as Amazon Simple Storage Solution (S3) Glacier, is a low-cost cloud-based storage service provided by Amazon Web Services for data that requires longer access times (AWS).
Storage is available through Amazon Glaciers for cold data backup and preservation. In this context, files that are rarely accessed, but are stored anyhow are referred to as "cold data".
In order to save storage expenses, a developer will migrate data that is not frequently needed to archive storage using a cold data provider like Amazon Glacier.
Furthermore, database backups can also be moved by developers from tape storage to the cloud for long-term Glacier archiving. This method of cold data storage relieves IT staff from the responsibility of maintaining backups and archive data.
What are the main uses for Amazon S3 Glacier?
Let's examine the functions of Amazon S3 Glacier to better comprehend the amazon glaciers.
- 1
Accountability or recordkeeping:
Glacier makes it possible for businesses in the financial services sector and other sectors to store data for long periods of time for regulatory and compliance archiving.
- 2
Archived medical information:
Glacier can assist hospitals in adhering to legal standards by cost- and security-effectively storing patient record data.
- 3
Digital data preservation:
Glacier can be used for digital preservation projects by government, organisations and libraries.
- 4
Storage for media files:
When stored over time, media items like videos frequently use a large amount of storage space. Hence media files can be inexpensively stored with Glacier.
Where does the Amazon Glacier store data?
Data is kept in vaults and archives by Amazon Glacier. An archive is a collection of data that can be a single file or a collection of files, most frequently in the form of a ZIP file or Tape Archive. Glacier archives can be as small as 1 byte or as large as 40 terabytes (TB).
There are no restrictions on the quantity of data or archives that an AWS customer may store in Glacier. Amazon provides a multivolume upload capability to increase performance and reliability for archives with item sizes of more than 100 MB.
In order to better organise data, an AWS customer can compile archives into a vault. The AWS Management Console allows you to create and customise up to 1,000 vaults for each region.
To control who can access a certain set of archives and how they are accessed, an administrator configures a resource-based access policy to each vault.
In order to backup and recover from disasters, AWS keeps a list of all archives. Additionally, S3 Glacier offers average durability of 11 nines, or 99.999999999%, for data storage on several devices. It is available at numerous locations throughout various AWS Regions.
What are the benefits of using Amazon Glacier?
Amazon Glacier vs. Amazon S3: How do they differ?
Amazon S3 is a fast, web-based cloud storage service and use for the purpose of online data backup and archival of apps or data on AWS.
Amazon Glacier offers reliable storage for any type of data format. When combined with storage lifecycle management, a developer might use Amazon Glaciers to rotate data to cold storage and hence save money.
The primary distinction between the two Amazon storage options is that S3 is intended for data that must be retrieved immediately, whereas Amazon Glacier is used for archival purposes.
S3 Glacier is only used in low-cost contexts where data is not expected to be needed instantly. However, S3 is recommended for situations where a company needs frequent and quick access to its data.
How much does Amazon S3 Glacier cost?
In order to prevent enterprises from overspending on storage, S3 Glacier offers a pay-as-you-go pricing model.
Amazon charges per gigabyte (GB) of data held each month on Glacier and offers a minimum cost of $4 per terabyte, per month, with additional costs related to one of its three data retrieval options.
The cost of retrieving data from Glacier exceeds 5% of the customer's average monthly storage, despite the fact that uploading content to Glacier is free.This is done to discourage users from utilising Glacier as their primary online storage solution.
How to transition your data from S3 to S3 Glacier?
How to get the most out of using Amazon Glacier for your date?
Select Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive, the cheapest cloud storage with twelve-hour data retrieval. It leads you to preserve even more on long-term archive storage.
You may archive on AWS to gain access to very affordable cloud storage. Furthermore, you can also retain your data digitally for a long time, and take advantage of AWS's robust security and compliance features.
Conclusion
As people from various industries recognise the need of prioritising the storage and use of data for their businesses' growth. Therefore, it is crucial for people to keep their static or inert material and search out simple retrievals when necessary.
Hence, regardless of the type of business you run or the cloud infrastructure you've set up, you can still utilize Amazon Glacier to store and retrieve inactive data easily and without much difficulty.
