Cloudflare R2 vs Backblaze B2
A comparison of Cloudflare R2 and Backblaze B2 built from values read directly from each provider's own documentation, with the source recorded against every figure.
The short answer
- 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 Backblaze B2 if
- Bulk capacity where egress is predictable — free up to three times what you store each month, which covers most backup and archive patterns comfortably at $6.95 per terabyte.
3 sourced criteria separate them:
- 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.
- Backblaze B2: Free up to three times your stored capacity each month on the $6.95/TB tier; unlimited free egress on the $15/TB tier. Egress beyond the 3x allowance is chargeable.
- Storage price
- Cloudflare R2: $0.015 per GB-month for Standard, $0.01 for Infrequent Access. Billed rounded up to the whole GB-month.
- Backblaze B2: $6.95 per TB per month on B2 Overdrive; $15 per TB per month on the unlimited-egress tier
- 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.
- Backblaze B2: Transactions are not charged on the $6.95/TB tier. Backblaze notes that its published chart uses U.S. West rates and that competitor rates vary by region and volume.
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
Backblaze B2 0
At a glance.
| Criterion | Cloudflare R2 | Backblaze B2 |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | ||
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| 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. | Free up to three times your stored capacity each month on the $6.95/TB tier; unlimited free egress on the $15/TB tier. Egress beyond the 3x allowance is chargeable. |
| Storage | ||
| Storage price | $0.015 per GB-month for Standard, $0.01 for Infrequent Access. Billed rounded up to the whole GB-month. | $6.95 per TB per month on B2 Overdrive; $15 per TB per month on the unlimited-egress tier |
| 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. | Transactions are not charged on the $6.95/TB tier. Backblaze notes that its published chart uses U.S. West rates and that competitor rates vary by region and volume. |
| S3-compatible API | Supported | Supported |
Where they differ.
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.
- Backblaze B2
- Free up to three times your stored capacity each month on the $6.95/TB tier; unlimited free egress on the $15/TB tier. Egress beyond the 3x allowance is chargeable.
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
- Cloud Storage Pricing — Backblaze ↗
“Free egress up to 3x storage [...] Free transactions [...] Unlimited free egress [...] B2 includes 750 TB of monthly egress in this scenario.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Storage price
- Cloudflare R2
- $0.015 per GB-month for Standard, $0.01 for Infrequent Access. Billed rounded up to the whole GB-month.
- Backblaze B2
- $6.95 per TB per month on B2 Overdrive; $15 per TB per month on the unlimited-egress tier
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
- Cloud Storage Pricing — Backblaze ↗
“$6.95 / TB / mo [...] Free egress up to 3x storage [...] $15 / TB / mo [...] Unlimited free egress”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
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.
- Backblaze B2
- Transactions are not charged on the $6.95/TB tier. Backblaze notes that its published chart uses U.S. West rates and that competitor rates vary by region and volume.
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
- Cloud Storage Pricing — Backblaze ↗
“Free transactions [...] This chart features published rates for the U.S. West region. Backblaze competitors' rates can vary by region, amount stored, and other factors.”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Which should you choose?
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 Backblaze B2 if…
Bulk capacity where egress is predictable — free up to three times what you store each month, which covers most backup and archive patterns comfortably at $6.95 per terabyte.
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.
- Backblaze B2: Egress is only free to that 3x ceiling. A bucket read far more often than its size, like a public media library, is the shape this pricing is not built for.
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.
Questions this comparison answers.
Egress over allowance: Cloudflare R2 or Backblaze B2?
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.
Backblaze B2: Free up to three times your stored capacity each month on the $6.95/TB tier; unlimited free egress on the $15/TB tier. Egress beyond the 3x allowance is chargeable.
Should I choose Cloudflare R2 or Backblaze B2?
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 Backblaze B2 if Bulk capacity where egress is predictable — free up to three times what you store each month, which covers most backup and archive patterns comfortably at $6.95 per terabyte.