After Amazon raised the prices for its Prime service in the summer of 2022, the next unpleasant news came straight away. At the end of January, the Amazon Drive cloud storage will no longer be available.
Amazon is no longer just an online mail order company. In addition to a large range, the company now also offers a streaming and music service, e-books and magazines and much more. So far, the cloud Amazon Drive has also been part of the portfolio, for many an insider tip when it comes to data backup online. That should change now.
Amazon Drive is being discontinued
According to official announcement Amazon will stamp out the Drive service very soon. Incidentally, this applies to both the limited, free version and the unlimited version integrated in Prime. Already from that January 31, 2023 it is then no longer possible to upload data to the cloud. However, the files already stored there are still valid until December 31, 2023 reachable. If you use Amazon Drive, you only have a few days to store additional data in the cloud if necessary. From 2024, Amazon Drive users will finally have to look for an alternative. App users should also note that from the October 31, 2023 access is no longer possible.
As to why, Amazon said: “We are taking the opportunity to focus our efforts more on Amazon Photos to offer customers a dedicated solution for storing photos and videos.” The related cloud service Amazon Photos is accordingly not part of the measure affected.
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What happens to the stored data?
Even after the final discontinuation at the end of 2023, the stored data will not be completely lost. Until then, you can no longer deposit new files from January 31st, but you can download everything stored in the cloud, so that nothing is lost, at least for the time being. Anyone who has not already found an alternative and deleted their Amazon Drive account by 2024 will at least automatically find the photos and videos they have stored on Amazon Photos from then on. However, all other data will be deleted by Amazon after an explicit notification.
Incidentally, the Amazon Photos service is also available in a paid and a free version. However, the latter is limited to 5 GB of storage space. Prime members, on the other hand, have unlimited photo storage and only the video storage space is also capped at 5 GB. From 19.99 euros per year (or 1.99 euros per month) you can expand the storage space at Amazon Photos with or without a Prime subscription. The most comprehensive package contains space for around 30 TB for images and around 4200 hours of video material in 1080p HD, but it also costs 2999.70 euros a year. In between, however, there are still various gradations.
Also Read: Best Free Cloud Alternatives to Google Photos
Alternatives to Amazon Drive
Although there are still a few months until the final discontinuation, users should try to find an alternative to Amazon Drive as soon as possible. If you only save photos and videos in the cloud, you can of course simply switch to Amazon Photos, as mentioned. But those who like to store other file types should slowly start looking around at the competition.
Apple’s iCloud Drive and Microsoft’s OneDrive, for example, also offer 5 GB of free storage, Google Drive even offers 15 GB, while Dropbox offers 2 GB. With all the providers mentioned, you can also book different amounts of storage in the subscription.