What is Block Storage?

Block storage is a data storage type where data is kept in volumes, or "blocks," acting as individual drives. These blocks can be configured and moved around a storage area network (SAN). It is the most common type of storage used for applications, RAID arrays, and virtual machines. Block storage systems lack metadata but are familiar and easy to work with, performant, and can be used across distributed systems, at a relatively low loss to efficiency.

Block-level storage is commonly associated with and managed within storage area networks (SANs). It is distinguished from object storage, where data is stored with customizable metadata and tags which describe the data. Block storage is supplied by cloud service vendors providing IaaS. It may be available as an add-on to a product or available standalone for any purpose. Vendors offer inbuilt security for block storage services, such as data encryption, restricted (e.g. read only) access, and may offer performance and access SLAs. Pricing may be dynamic (e.g. pay-as-you-go), or packaged, depending on the vendor.

Features & Capabilities

Below are some of the most common features associated with block storage solutions:

Volumized storage
Individual block level management
Cloud Access
High Efficiency

Pricing

Block storage pricing is typically handled via either a pay-as-you-go model based on your usage, or is bundled in with pricing of a larger cloud service. Businesses can also expect to pay more for features like quick scalability or low latency. Many services also charge by IOPS.

Operating Systems	Unspecified
Mobile Application	No

AWS Elastic Beanstalk

Google Cloud Persistent Disk

Longhorn Block Storage

Red Hat Ceph Storage

Amazon DynamoDB

Google Cloud Storage

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure

Microsoft Azure

Azure Managed Disks

Azure Blob Storage