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Tape pays off from roughly 15 TB of data: below that, disk plus cloud is cheaper; above it, LTO-8 or LTO-9 media at about $5 to $7 per TB beats keeping long-term copies on disk.
Enter how much data you protect, how many copies you keep and how fast you need it back. The calculator recommends tape, disk, cloud or a mix, and estimates cartridges and media cost from October 2026 LTO prices.
Example: 100 TB with two copies needs 12 LTO-9 cartridges. Enter your own numbers in the calculator below.
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How it works
Estimates exclude software, HBAs, libraries, tax and shipping. See the LTO price tracker for the listings behind these numbers.
Divide your data by the native capacity of the generation and multiply by the number of copies, ignoring compression: 100 TB with two copies is about 12 LTO-9 cartridges. Compression only helps with compressible data and should not be counted on for planning.
From roughly 15 TB upwards, once the cost of the drive is spread across enough cartridges. Below that, a NAS plus a cloud cold tier is usually cheaper and simpler.
Only for compressible data. Vendors quote 2.5:1, but video and images are already compressed and encrypted files cannot be compressed, so they store close to native capacity.