Block Storage
Why should I use Block Storage instead of local storage?
The size of local storage depends on your Instance type. With today’s configurations, the maximum local storage available is 600 GB.
Block storage allows you to create bigger volumes and those volumes are persistent which means that they can live without being attached to an Instance.
| Block Storage | Local storage | |
|---|---|---|
| Availability | High | HV dependant (needs physical intervention to retrieve storage and data if HV dies) |
| Redundancy | High (replica 3) | Low (RAID 5 - 5 disks) |
| Persistency | Yes | Semi-persistent (a snapshot of the volume is uploaded and downloaded each time the Instance is powered off/on) |
| Latency | Average | Local NVMe |
| Volume size | Max 10 TB/volume | Up to 600 GB (GP1-XL) |
What are the performances expected from a block volume?
Block Storage offers 5,000 input/output operations per second (IOPS) through powerful SSDs. This guarantees 99.99 % availability to all our customers. However, this performance is subject to fluctuation during peak load periods.
What is the behavior of the block volume when an Instance is stopped, deleted, or crashed?
A block volume is persistent which means that it can live without being attached to an Instance. Nevertheless, when an Instance is deleted, the following can be expected:
- When the Instance is deleted via the Scaleway console, you will be asked if you want the distant block volumes to be deleted as well or not.
- When deleting an Instance via the
API, all the attached volumes (local and Block Storage) are deleted. So if you want to keep your local volumes, you must use the archive action instead of the terminate action. - If you want to keep Block Storage volumes, you must detach them before you issue the terminate call.
How many volumes can be attached?
A virtual Instance can bear up to 16 volumes, including the mandatory local volume. Therefore, the maximum number of blocks that can be attached to an Instance is 15.
What is the maximum size of a block volume?
The maximum size of a block volume is 10 TB.
How is the Block Storage fee calculated?
The Block Storage billing scheme is not the same as for Object Storage. You are billed by the hour based on the size of the volume and not the data that is actually stored on it. Just like a local drive, you can select the size of the volume directly from the Scaleway console or the API.