S3

Definition

AWS object storage for any file type — images, videos, logs, backups — with virtually unlimited capacity, 11-nines durability, and pay-per-use pricing.

Use Cases

• Dropbox: File Storage Backend — Originally built on S3 before moving to custom infrastructure (Stored petabytes of user files with 99.999999999% durability)

Provider Equivalents

• AWS: S3 (Simple Storage Service)
• Azure: Blob Storage
• GCP: Cloud Storage
• OCI: Object Storage

Frequently Asked Questions

What is S3 best used for?

S3 is ideal for storing backups, static website assets, data lakes, and any unstructured data like images, videos, and logs.

How durable is S3?

S3 is designed for 99.999999999% (11 9s) durability, meaning statistically you would lose one object once every 10 million years.

Category: data

Difficulty: basic

Related Terms

• AWS
• Cloud Storage
• Object Storage
• CloudFront
• Lambda

See Also

• Database
• Backup
• Data Replication
• Event Streaming
• Big Data