Backblaze Publishes First Performance Stats Report: Transparent Cloud Storage Benchmarking
Independent testing aims to fill historic information gap in cloud storage performance, comparing data from Backblaze, AWS, Cloudflare, and Wasabi; full methodology and data to be published quarterly.
Backblaze, Inc. (NASDAQ:BLZE), the high-performance cloud storage platform for the AI era, today released its inaugural Performance Stats report—a transparent, quarterly benchmarking initiative that publishes performance data for Backblaze and its competitors tested from outside any provider's infrastructure.
The report examines upload and download performance across four cloud storage providers—Backblaze B2, AWS S3, Cloudflare R2, and Wasabi—using standardized testing from a neutral Vultr-hosted environment and Catchpoint's monitoring network. Unlike internal benchmarks that favor the testing provider, Performance Stats simulates real-world customer conditions at the "last mile," and publishes the full testing methodology for third-party replication and scrutiny.
"Most cloud performance testing is conducted inside a provider's own infrastructure, producing misleadingly favorable results," said Chris Opat, SVP of Cloud Operations at Backblaze. "We're publishing our competitors' data alongside our own—strengths, weaknesses, and all—because buyers deserve to understand actual performance, not marketing claims."
Key Findings from Q3 2025 Testing
The report reveals performance variations across providers, with different architectures excelling under different workload conditions:
- Sustained throughput matters more than averages: While AWS S3 demonstrated the lowest average download times, it won only one out of eight sustained throughput tests. Backblaze won six of eight categories, with Wasabi leading the remaining test—demonstrating that average speeds don't tell the complete performance story.
- Small file performance shows the greatest differentiation: In multi-threaded upload benchmarking for 256 KiB files, the highest throughput (Backblaze at 163.80MiB/s) was 580% greater than the lowest (Cloudflare R2 at 24.10MiB/s). Small files have the most overhead, so tend to be more sensitive to latency.
- Backblaze B2 demonstrates the fastest average upload speeds for small file sizes, with AWS S3 leading for larger file sizes. And, similar to downloads, the story becomes more nuanced when we look at sustained upload throughput, where Backblaze leads for both the smallest (256KiB) and largest (100MiB) file sizes.
Methodology and Transparency Commitment
All tests originated from a Vultr virtual machine in the New York/New Jersey area, targeting US-East regions across providers. Backblaze tested upload and download sustained throughput performance across file sizes from 256KiB to 100MiB using Warp, an open-source S3 benchmarking tool, with both single-threaded and multi-threaded five-minute profiles, as well as testing for average response time based on the same file sizes over a full month. Tests use binary measurements (KiB, MiB) rather than decimal units (KB, MB) for technical precision in benchmarking.
The complete testing methodology, raw data, and test configurations are publicly available, allowing competitors, researchers, and customers to validate results or conduct their own analyses. Backblaze plans to expand testing to additional providers (Google Cloud Platform, Azure, etc.), regions (US-West, EU), and larger file sizes in future quarters.
"Transparency has been central to Backblaze since our first Drive Stats report in 2013," said Gleb Budman, CEO at Backblaze. "Performance Stats extends that legacy, giving the world an open, data-driven look at cloud performance—including our competitors—so customers can make informed choices based on real testing, not vendor claims."
The Q3 2025 Performance Stats report is the first in a new quarterly series that complements Backblaze's Drive Stats and Network Stats initiatives. The full report, including detailed methodology and downloadable data, is available at www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-performance-stats/.
About Backblaze
Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) gives businesses the freedom to innovate without limits by removing the barriers of lock-in, complexity, and cost. Our high-performance cloud object storage accelerates AI workflows, powers data-heavy applications, streamlines media management, and protects critical data. As an award-winning independent cloud, we provide unparalleled levels of interoperability that enable over 500,000 of our customers to reach and serve hundreds of millions of end users in 175 countries around the world. For more information, please go to www.backblaze.com.
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