Cloudflare R2 vs Azure Blob Storage
SEPT 2026 auditA comparison of Cloudflare R2 and Azure Blob Storage built from values read directly from each provider's own documentation, with the source recorded against every figure.
The short answer
Choose Cloudflare R2 if…
Serving files to the public, where egress is the bill everyone underestimates. Nothing to pay for bandwidth out, on any storage class, so a busy bucket costs what it costs to store rather than what it costs to read.
Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved
Choose Azure Blob Storage if…
Workloads already on Azure, where keeping storage in the same region as the compute avoids the bandwidth charge that dominates an object storage bill.
Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved
Consider something else if…
- Cloudflare R2: Operations are charged and rounded up to the whole million, so a workload of many tiny reads and writes pays here instead. The saving is on bandwidth, not on request volume.
- Azure Blob Storage: Egress is charged beyond the first 100 GB a month, where R2, Wasabi and Tigris charge nothing — and Azure's rates vary by region and redundancy, so a quoted figure only holds for the combination it was read for.
Neither quite fits? Every other option, ranked by iScore: Cloudflare R2 alternatives · Azure Blob Storage alternatives
9 sourced criteria separate them — see where, with sources, below.
Pick the criteria you care about. The chart counts how many of them lean toward each provider — the same read as scanning the bars below, just totalled for the ones you chose.
Cloudflare R2 0
Azure Blob Storage 0
At a glance.
| Criterion | Cloudflare R2 | Azure Blob Storage |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | ||
| Free tier | Yes | No |
| Kind of free offer | Free tier | Free credit |
| What the free plan includes | 10 GB-month of standard storage, 1 million Class A and 10 million Class B operations a month, and egress free with no cap. The allowance covers standard storage only, not infrequent access. | $200 of Azure credit for 30 days on a new account. Azure separately lists services that are always free and services free for 12 months to new customers, which is an account-wide programme rather than a Blob Storage allowance. |
| Egress over allowance | Free. Cloudflare charges nothing for egress to the internet on any storage class; Infrequent Access adds a $0.01/GB retrieval fee instead. | First 100 GB a month free, then $0.087 per GB over Microsoft's global egress meter, falling to $0.083 above 10 TB. |
| Limits | ||
| Storage (entry plan) | 10 GB-month free each month, plus 1 million Class A and 10 million Class B operations | None. Azure Blob has no plans and no free storage band: the Hot LRS meter is charged from the first GB. |
| Infrastructure | ||
| Uptime SLA | 99.9% monthly uptime, in a dedicated R2 SLA that applies to use of R2 only and names no plan tier. The SLA settles its own precedence — "in the event of a conflict between the terms of this R2 SLA and ... other agreement governing Customer’s use of the Services, the terms of this R2 SLA apply" — so Cloudflare’s application-services plan table, which covers the website plans rather than the Developer Platform, does not qualify it. The remedy is a credit set as a percentage of the fees paid for that product in the preceding 30 days, so the commitment stands on a free account while the compensation for breaching it is worth nothing there. | Not published as a web page. Microsoft consolidated its per-service SLAs into one downloadable document covering Azure, Dynamics 365, Office 365 and Intune; the former azure.microsoft.com SLA URLs now redirect to its licensing viewer. |
| Storage | ||
| Storage price | $0.015 per GB-month for Standard, $0.01 for Infrequent Access. Billed rounded up to the whole GB-month. | $0.0208 per GB-month for Hot LRS in East US, falling to $0.019968 above 50 TB and $0.019136 above 500 TB. |
| Operations price | $4.50 per million Class A operations (writes and listings) and $0.36 per million Class B (reads) on Standard; $9.00 and $0.90 on Infrequent Access. Rounded up to the whole million. | $0.05 per 10,000 write operations and $0.004 per 10,000 reads on Hot LRS in East US. |
| Minimum storage duration | None on Standard storage — billing averages peak storage per day, so an object deleted after five days is charged for five days. Infrequent Access carries a 30-day minimum, billed even if the object is deleted, moved or replaced sooner. | None on Hot. Cool carries a 30-day minimum, Cold 90 days and Archive 180 days — the longest early-deletion window of any provider here, and three times S3's 90-day Glacier figure. |
Where they differ.
Free tier
- Cloudflare R2
- Yes
- Azure Blob Storage
- No
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“Free tier [...] You can use the following amount of storage and operations each month for free.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Blob Storage pricing ↗
“Get free cloud services and a $200 credit to explore Azure for 30 days.”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Kind of free offer
- Cloudflare R2
- Free tier
- Azure Blob Storage
- Free credit
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“Free tier [...] You can use the following amount of storage and operations each month for free.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Blob Storage pricing ↗
“Get free cloud services and a $200 credit to explore Azure for 30 days.”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
What the free plan includes
- Cloudflare R2
- 10 GB-month of standard storage, 1 million Class A and 10 million Class B operations a month, and egress free with no cap. The allowance covers standard storage only, not infrequent access.
- Azure Blob Storage
- $200 of Azure credit for 30 days on a new account. Azure separately lists services that are always free and services free for 12 months to new customers, which is an account-wide programme rather than a Blob Storage allowance.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 Pricing — Cloudflare ↗
“Free storage 10 GB-month / month Class A operations 1 million requests / month Class B operations 10 million requests / month Egress (data transfer to Internet) Free”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Free Azure Services ↗
“Some are always free to all Azure customers, and some are free for 12 months to new customers only. [...] 12 months free services is available only to new customers who have not previously had an Azure account or received 12 months of free services.”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Egress over allowance
- Cloudflare R2
- Free. Cloudflare charges nothing for egress to the internet on any storage class; Infrequent Access adds a $0.01/GB retrieval fee instead.
- Azure Blob Storage
- First 100 GB a month free, then $0.087 per GB over Microsoft's global egress meter, falling to $0.083 above 10 TB.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“For the Infrequent Access storage class, data retrieval fees apply. There are no charges for egress bandwidth for any storage class. [...] Egress (data transfer to Internet) Free Free”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Retail Prices API — Bandwidth, East US ↗
“{"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0,"unitPrice":0.0,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2022-05-01T00:00:00Z","meterId":"9995d93a-7d35-4d3f-9c69-7a7fea447ef4","meterName":"Standard Data Transfer Out"," [...] {"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0,"unitPrice":0.0,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2022-05-01T00:00:00Z","meterId":"9995d93a-7d35-4d3f-9c69-7a7fea447ef4","meterName":"Standard Data Transfer Out","”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Storage (entry plan)
- Cloudflare R2
- 10 GB-month free each month, plus 1 million Class A and 10 million Class B operations
- Azure Blob Storage
- None. Azure Blob has no plans and no free storage band: the Hot LRS meter is charged from the first GB.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“You can use the following amount of storage and operations each month for free. [...] Storage 10 GB-month / month Class A Operations 1 million requests / month Class B Operations 10 million requests / month”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Retail Prices API — Blob Storage Hot LRS, East US ↗
“{"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0208,"unitPrice":0.0208,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2017-02-03T00:00:00Z","meterId":"272492b3-1c92-4a5f-bee9-52a8e10ca514","meterName":"Hot LRS Data Stored"," [...] {"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0208,"unitPrice":0.0208,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2017-02-03T00:00:00Z","meterId":"272492b3-1c92-4a5f-bee9-52a8e10ca514","meterName":"Hot LRS Data Stored","”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Uptime SLA
- Cloudflare R2
- 99.9% monthly uptime, in a dedicated R2 SLA that applies to use of R2 only and names no plan tier. The SLA settles its own precedence — "in the event of a conflict between the terms of this R2 SLA and ... other agreement governing Customer’s use of the Services, the terms of this R2 SLA apply" — so Cloudflare’s application-services plan table, which covers the website plans rather than the Developer Platform, does not qualify it. The remedy is a credit set as a percentage of the fees paid for that product in the preceding 30 days, so the commitment stands on a free account while the compensation for breaching it is worth nothing there.
- Azure Blob Storage
- Not published as a web page. Microsoft consolidated its per-service SLAs into one downloadable document covering Azure, Dynamics 365, Office 365 and Intune; the former azure.microsoft.com SLA URLs now redirect to its licensing viewer.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 Service Level Agreement — Cloudflare ↗
“This R2 Service Level Agreement ("R2 SLA") applies to use of R2 only. In the event of a conflict between the terms of this R2 SLA and the terms of the Enterprise Customer Support and Service Level Agreement, Enterprise Subscription Terms of Service, or other agreement governing Customer’s use of the Services (the "Agreement"), the terms of this R2 SLA apply, but only to the extent of such conflict. [...] Cloudflare will provide a Monthly Uptime Percentage of 99.9% for Customer’s use of R2 ("Service Level Objective"). [...] a credit against future payments for Customer’s R2 usage based on the percentage of the fees paid by Customer for R2 usage in the thirty (30) days preceding submission of a valid Claim”
Read 2026-09-21 · official site · Report a correction
- Service Level Agreements (SLA) for Online Services — Microsoft ↗
“the service level agreements (sla) describe microsoft's commitments for uptime and connectivity for microsoft online services. the current and archived editions of the sla are available for download and they cover azure, dynamics 365, office 365, and intune.”
Read 2026-09-15 · official site · Report a correction
Storage price
- Cloudflare R2
- $0.015 per GB-month for Standard, $0.01 for Infrequent Access. Billed rounded up to the whole GB-month.
- Azure Blob Storage
- $0.0208 per GB-month for Hot LRS in East US, falling to $0.019968 above 50 TB and $0.019136 above 500 TB.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“Storage $0.015 / GB-month $0.01 / GB-month [...] If you have used 1.1 GB-month, you will be billed for 2 GB-month.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Retail Prices API — Blob Storage Hot LRS, East US ↗
“{"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0208,"unitPrice":0.0208,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2017-02-03T00:00:00Z","meterId":"272492b3-1c92-4a5f-bee9-52a8e10ca514","meterName":"Hot LRS Data Stored"," [...] {"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0208,"unitPrice":0.0208,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2017-02-03T00:00:00Z","meterId":"272492b3-1c92-4a5f-bee9-52a8e10ca514","meterName":"Hot LRS Data Stored"," [...] {"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.0208,"unitPrice":0.0208,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2017-02-03T00:00:00Z","meterId":"272492b3-1c92-4a5f-bee9-52a8e10ca514","meterName":"Hot LRS Data Stored","”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Operations price
- Cloudflare R2
- $4.50 per million Class A operations (writes and listings) and $0.36 per million Class B (reads) on Standard; $9.00 and $0.90 on Infrequent Access. Rounded up to the whole million.
- Azure Blob Storage
- $0.05 per 10,000 write operations and $0.004 per 10,000 reads on Hot LRS in East US.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- R2 pricing — Cloudflare Docs ↗
“Class A Operations $4.50 / million requests $9.00 / million requests Class B Operations $0.36 / million requests $0.90 / million requests [...] If you have performed one million and one operations, you will be billed for two million operations.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing · Report a correction
- Azure Retail Prices API — Blob Storage Hot LRS, East US ↗
“{"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.05,"unitPrice":0.05,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2016-11-01T00:00:00Z","meterId":"14854f12-8d37-4299-842a-b0f2df82a305","meterName":"Hot LRS Write Operations"," [...] {"currencyCode":"USD","tierMinimumUnits":0.0,"retailPrice":0.004,"unitPrice":0.004,"armRegionName":"eastus","location":"US East","effectiveStartDate":"2016-11-01T00:00:00Z","meterId":"c5248cf8-ecba-4807-9304-6a8f14b5805a","meterName":"Hot Read Operations","”
Read 2026-09-13 · official pricing · Report a correction
Minimum storage duration
None on Standard storage — billing averages peak storage per day, so an object deleted after five days is charged for five days. Infrequent Access carries a 30-day minimum, billed even if the object is deleted, moved or replaced sooner.
None on Hot. Cool carries a 30-day minimum, Cold 90 days and Archive 180 days — the longest early-deletion window of any provider here, and three times S3's 90-day Glacier figure.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- Pricing — Cloudflare R2 docs ↗
“Storage class Minimum storage duration Standard storage None Infrequent Access storage 30 days [...] you will be charged for the object for the minimum storage duration even if the object was deleted or moved before the duration specified”
Read 2026-09-07 · official docs · Report a correction
- Access tiers for blob data — Microsoft Learn ↗
“Data in the cool tier should be stored for a minimum of 30 days. [...] Data in the cold tier should be stored for a minimum of 90 days. [...] Data in the archive tier should be stored for a minimum of 180 days.”
Read 2026-09-07 · official docs · Report a correction
When these numbers change, hear about it. Sources are re-checked monthly; a repricing goes out as a short note.
Documented by only one.
These criteria are published by one provider and not the other. An absence here means we have not found a source, not that the feature is missing — except where we say we read the other provider's own page on a given date and it does not state it. Those rows lean, and the provider can correct them with a link.
Questions this comparison answers.
Free tier: Cloudflare R2 or Azure Blob Storage?
Cloudflare R2: Yes
Azure Blob Storage: No
Egress over allowance: Cloudflare R2 or Azure Blob Storage?
Cloudflare R2: Free. Cloudflare charges nothing for egress to the internet on any storage class; Infrequent Access adds a $0.01/GB retrieval fee instead.
Azure Blob Storage: First 100 GB a month free, then $0.087 per GB over Microsoft's global egress meter, falling to $0.083 above 10 TB.
Storage (entry plan): Cloudflare R2 or Azure Blob Storage?
Cloudflare R2: 10 GB-month free each month, plus 1 million Class A and 10 million Class B operations
Azure Blob Storage: None. Azure Blob has no plans and no free storage band: the Hot LRS meter is charged from the first GB.
Should I choose Cloudflare R2 or Azure Blob Storage?
Pick Cloudflare R2 if Serving files to the public, where egress is the bill everyone underestimates. Nothing to pay for bandwidth out, on any storage class, so a busy bucket costs what it costs to store rather than what it costs to read.
Pick Azure Blob Storage if Workloads already on Azure, where keeping storage in the same region as the compute avoids the bandwidth charge that dominates an object storage bill.
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