BackBlaze icon
BackBlaze icon

BackBlaze

 103 likes

Pioneering scalable cloud backup offers unlimited data protection and application storage with S3 compatibility, ensuring seamless data recovery and privacy compliance, backed by 24/7 support at one-fifth the cost of traditional solutions.

BackBlaze screenshot 1

License model

Country of Origin

  • US flagUnited States

Platforms

  • Mac
  • Windows
  • Online
  • Android
  • iPhone
  • Android Tablet
  • iPad
3.6 / 5 Avg rating (11)
103likes
15comments

Features

Suggest and vote on features
  1.  Remote backup
  2.  Incremental Backup
  3.  Unlimited storage
  4.  Encrypted sync
  5.  Encrypted Backup
  6.  AES-256 Encryption
  7.  File Versioning
  8.  Dark Mode
  9.  Cloud Sync
  10.  Automatic Backup
  11.  End-to-End Encryption
  12.  Two-factor Authentication
  13.  File Sync
  14.  S3 compatible
  15.  Large File Transfer

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BackBlaze information

  • Developed by

    US flagBackblaze
  • Licensing

    Proprietary and Commercial product.
  • Pricing

    Subscription ranging between $6 and $15 per month.
  • Rating

    Average rating of 3.6 (11 ratings)
  • Alternatives

    118 alternatives listed
  • Supported Languages

    • English

AlternativeTo Categories

Backup & SyncSecurity & PrivacyFile Sharing

Apple AppStore

  •   Updated Mar 4, 2025
  •   2.78 avg rating
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Our users have written 15 comments and reviews about BackBlaze, and it has gotten 103 likes

BackBlaze was added to AlternativeTo by Ola Johansson on Sep 22, 2009 and this page was last updated Jun 18, 2025.

Comments and Reviews

   
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Comment summary: Backblaze offers affordable and simple backup services, appreciated for its ease of use and automation. However, users express concerns over its inability to prioritize folders, lack of clear encryption protocols, limited file-type support, and hidden costs associated with data retrieval. Installation issues and slow backup processes are noted, and the service's security measures are questioned despite positive remarks on pricing. Users find it an inexpensive solution but wish for enhancements in security and file management.
Top Positive Comment
Duncan Briggs
Jul 7, 2020
1

Wirecutter recommends Backblaze in the guide "The Best Online Cloud Backup Service."

https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-online-backup-service/#our-pick-backblaze

Top Negative Comment
Anamon
May 21, 2017
11

Long story short: for all of Backblaze's marketing talk about security and end-to-end encryption, that is only the case if you never need to restore anything from your backup! Which is, of course, not the point of doing backups.

The idea behind end-to-end encryption is this: you use a private key to encrypt your files locally, before sending them to Backblaze servers. They only ever store the encrypted data, and, since they don't know your private key, have no reasonable way to decrypt it – neither would any malicious attacker that in some way or another gains access to your backups. If you request back your files, you get the encrypted version, that only you can decrypt again with your private key, which is supposed to never leave your computer and control. Never sharing your private encryption key with anyone is the whole point of end-to-end encryption.

Backblaze pretends to uphold this while backing up your data. You enter your private key in the client, your data is encrypted locally before transmission. That is, as long as you trust that that's really what their closed-source client is doing behind the scenes.

I have been happy with this – until I actually needed to restore files from a hard drive that died. In short: there doesn't seem to be a way to restore your files without first sending your private encryption key to Backblaze, letting them decrypt your data on their servers, and send the restore to you. Backblaze claim to have years of experience in implementing security. And then they do that! Sharing your private key with anyone is the absolute biggest "no-no" in information security. It should never, ever be done. But this is exactly what Backblaze requires you to do if you want to retrieve your backed up files.

You have the option of either downloading a backup as a ZIP file, or having it delievered to you on a USB drive or hard disk. In the ZIP method, you request your backup through the web interface. You supply your private key, select what to restore, then wait for Backblaze to prepare an unencryped, not even password-protected, ZIP archive of your files on their servers for you to download. If you choose the USB method, you still have to supply your private key. They will decrypt your data, and actually re-encrypt it on the USB drive for some semblance of security in transit of the drive to you, but it will be with a separate encryption key that is displayed to you in your account. Hence, Backblaze still handles your data on their servers in unencryped form.

All of this turns the entire concept of end-to-end encryption into a fake, a completely pointless exercise. Because you'll have to undo the entire security effort the moment you want to get back any of your files. And why would you set up a backup solution if you never intended to retrieve any files from it?

This may sound harsh, and since I don't store any really sensitive data with them I'm kind of fine with still using their service – the price is good, the servers fast, the client nice. But I really hope they'll step up their game and actually follow through on their promises of security and encryption. Looking at their marketing talk on the website now, it all seems like one big lie. I believed in the lie for more than two years, because only when you get to the point of needing to restore files, you realise that none of it was true.

If you care about encryption, CrashPlan is probably the better choice for now. Their servers may be slower, their client harder to use, and generally less stable and performant (Java! Ugh! Who still uses Java for productive software?) but they seem more concerned about letting actions and processes follow their promises. Technically, you still need to trust a closed-source client, so for the really security-aware it's still not an option. But their solution seems much clearer and thought-through. For reference and comparison, here are CrashPlan's promises on private key encryption: "Encryption key exists only on source computer. Your custom key is never cached at any remote location. The custom key is held in memory for the purpose of restoring files; it is never written to disk. The custom key is flushed from memory once files are restored."

All of these promises are fundamental for encryption to make any sense at all. Backblaze breaks all of them. If CrashPlan at some point does the switch to a native client, which they've promised for many years now, Backblaze will have a very tough stand. And if they actually made their client open-source to make independent security audits possible, that would pretty much enable them to beat all of their competitors. Let's see how things develop on both sides.

[Edited by Anamon, January 07 2018]

ImNotARobot
Jul 9, 2020

I really appreciate your review highlighting Backblaze's security practices. Are there any better alternatives in the current year?

Anamon
Sep 11, 2020

@ImNotARobot: Unfortunately not that I know of. Despite my two-star review, I'm still a customer and have my private backups there. I keep checking out the competition occasionally, but the value-for-money with Backblaze is still so good that for now I just put up with the fact that their encryption concept is a joke. For my personal backup, I can live with it, until someone comes along that does it right, for a similar price. I stand by my two-star rating, despite the fact that I really like the company (nice people, great support), because it's such a fundamental (and unnecessary) technical flaw and borderline false advertising. But all the competitor's I've tried so far are getting stuff wrong that would get them a one-star rating from me.

altmltky
Feb 23, 2024

Thanks for the review. I'd like to ask you a few question about encryption in Blackblaze - particularly doesn't the manual encryption of the backups solve the problem? Like encrypting the backups with cryptomator/veracrypt/password protected 7zip etc before uploading them to Blackblaze. Even with the 'sending your private key to Blackblaze' issue your backup files still keep being manually encrypted, doesn't it? Or do they require even the password of your, say, password protected 7zip file? Well in that case that's completely unaccepted ofcourse. Thanks in advance for your reply. Best regards

Anamon
Apr 20, 2024

Hi @altmltky, thanks for the question. If you separately encrypt the files that you back up with Backblaze, then that should be safe (unless you also back up the key along with everything else, of course ;)). Backblaze itself doesn't care what you back up, it just funnels the files up to their servers with their additional encryption on top.

My issue is only with their marketing, which implies that their backups are securely encrypted by default, which isn't really true. To have actual end-to-end encryption, you'd have to add manual steps like the ones you suggest. I'm personally too lazy and/or nonchalant about my data privacy to do it, though :D and I still stick with Backblaze despite everything, because of their great value for money. I just wanted to warn people against a false sense of security.

Anamon
Apr 20, 2024

Also, an update to my review: since I wrote it, CrashPlan has discontinued their unlimited offer for personal use (in late 2018, I think). So that alternative isn't around anymore. I'm currently unaware of any other service besides Backblaze which offers truly unlimited (also in terms of the types of files you can back up) cloud backup for home users.

redtrillix
May 28, 2023
0

Good pricing with bad interfaces (web and app), but that's not the focus of the service.

Lexi
Oct 26, 2021
0

I recommend Backblaze to colleagues, friends, and family. Not only is it inexpensive, but it's also easy to use. I use it for work, and it's excellent!

BarnMTB
Jun 15, 2020
0

Cheap and unlimited online backup for computer. Allow access-backed up files from phone and website. Option to buy hard drive filled with backed up files and shipped it to you to skip downloading files yourself. The downside is that they do not back up folders that belongs to apps installation, so all those settings and configuration files won't be backed up by them. They also won't backup files they claim are "typically non-user data" such as .ISO files, so all those digital CDs & DVDs images/copy won't be backed up too. These are one of the few fine prints for their "unlimited" claim.

Anamon
Sep 11, 2020

The file type exclusions are defaults, but you can change them in settings if you do explicitly want them backed up. This was actually my reason for dropping CrashPlan, who introduced a lengthy list of default exclusions last year. The reason why I use a cloud backup service is because I don't want to have to worry and micromanage my backups. I'm not in the mood to permanently check if some obscure application I use happens to save my user data in files with an .rbf or .tib extension! And file extensions are an extremely poor way to identify file types, anyway. All file extension and file size exclusions in Backblaze can be removed so that everything is backed up. The only fixed exclusions that you can't remove are the default folders you mentioned (default locations for Windows installation, recycle bin, program files, installation caches, etc.). The list is available here: https://help.backblaze.com/hc/en-us/articles/217664948-How-do-I-exclude-folders-file-types-or-file-sizes- Current-day Windows applications store their configuration in user directories, so those should still be backed up.

WalrusTusks
May 21, 2019
0

Great prices and great service.

INSIDE
Mar 16, 2019
0

For storing data they're pretty not bad. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/cloud-storage-pricing.html

enter image description here

1TB = 5$ / mo. But you can use smaller amounts of data. For example for regular backups whole WordPress database and site, I need around 40GB (by last 3 years of using the service) and my price tag is 1.2$ yearly.

Is it cheaper for me to store data somewhere else? No, I do not think so. 120 cents for 40GB of data per YEAR, I do not think, that I can find something cheaper.

But here is a big BUT! If I wanna to download all of my data or restore frequently from my b2 storage, my bills will be next:

enter image description here

As you see, a price for downloading backups 3x more then a price for storing data. I realized it, when I tried to take all my backups from them (which is not easy to do, if you wanna download whole bucket). And I realized that I must to pay them some money ( I have backups of several terrabytes also there too).

Here is example:

enter image description here

As you see on the image above, if I willing to download all my data, I will forced to pay them 51$ Instead of 17$. Imagine that you have not 3TB but for example 10TB of data.

Summary: I have NOTHING against this service, I just wish to warn people about this service, that there are not really hidden costs, but what to expect. If you back up a lot of your data and store it online, it's great. But if you need access to your files and download them - it's not really cost effective.

Much cheaper will be to use any cloud storage.

For example something like sync, or any other alternative.

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What is BackBlaze?

Backblaze is a pioneer in robust, scalable low cost cloud backup and storage services. Enterprise hot storage, low cost backup and archive, and more. Unleash innovation, unburden teams, and unlock budgets with S3 compatible cloud storage at 1/5 the cost.

  • Systems backup and recovery: Protect VMs, servers, and NAS data for business continuity and DR with accessible backup and second copies.
  • Active media archive: Produce and share content, from pre to post, within your existing workflows and preferred media management tools.
  • Application storage & IaaS: Build applications and run services with S3 compatible APIs, SDKs, and CLI, with connected compute and CDN.
  • Unlimited computer backup: Protect business or home workstations with automatic, unlimited, secure backups for your files in the cloud.

Always-hot storage for building applications, creating and serving content, and safeguarding your data at 1/5 the cost of legacy providers. Whatever solution or use case, B2 Cloud Storage is open for business.

Protect your business, your memories, or both with the world’s easiest backup for Macs and PCs—secure in the trusted Backblaze Storage Cloud and customizable for one or one thousand computers.

Enterprise grade platform, accessible for everyone

  • Securing every byte: There’s no lock-in, but Backblaze’s security is lock-tight.
  • Built for performance: Backblaze B2 is built to deliver all the performance at 1/5 the cost.
  • Backing up your backup: Backups protect your data; account security protects your backups.
  • Always-on support: From solution engineers to support techs, actual humans are here to help.
  • Providing actual privacy: The cloud is the only thing on sale, not customer data. PII safety is a top priority.
  • Scaling compliance: Backblaze is compliant for most use cases, and steadily adding certifications.

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