Apple cuts prices & upgrades iCloud storage plans, eliminates 500GB option
As a part of sweeping changes to its product lineup, Apple has also restructed the prices and tiers for iCloud storage upgrades, making the service more competitive with alternatives like Google Drive.
While the default amount of storage is still just 5 gigabytes, paying 99 cents a month will now get a subscriber 50 gigabytes of storage instead of 20. Apple has also scaled back the prices for its 200-gigabyte and 1-terabyte tiers, adjusting them from $3.99 and $19.99 to $2.99 and $9.99, respectively.
In the process Apple has eliminated a 500-gigabyte option, which previously cost as much as the new 1-terabyte level.
Google Drive, by comparison, offers 15 gigabytes for free, and 100 gigabytes for $1.99 a month. Its 1 terabyte plan is identical to Apple's, however. Both companies are currently trumped by Microsoft's OneDrive, which offers 1 terabyte and an Office 365 subscription for $6.99.
Apple announced the changes during its Wednesday press event, but has yet to update its official pricing guide.
Improving iCloud storage may be necessary for a few reasons. On top of competitiveness, many people are backing up multiple devices to iCloud, and even a single iPhone backup can consume several gigabytes. With iCloud Drive, Apple has also turned the service into a more open and easily browsable storage platform. An iCloud Drive app will come preloaded with iOS 9 when the latter launches on Sept. 16.
While the default amount of storage is still just 5 gigabytes, paying 99 cents a month will now get a subscriber 50 gigabytes of storage instead of 20. Apple has also scaled back the prices for its 200-gigabyte and 1-terabyte tiers, adjusting them from $3.99 and $19.99 to $2.99 and $9.99, respectively.
In the process Apple has eliminated a 500-gigabyte option, which previously cost as much as the new 1-terabyte level.
Google Drive, by comparison, offers 15 gigabytes for free, and 100 gigabytes for $1.99 a month. Its 1 terabyte plan is identical to Apple's, however. Both companies are currently trumped by Microsoft's OneDrive, which offers 1 terabyte and an Office 365 subscription for $6.99.
Apple announced the changes during its Wednesday press event, but has yet to update its official pricing guide.
Improving iCloud storage may be necessary for a few reasons. On top of competitiveness, many people are backing up multiple devices to iCloud, and even a single iPhone backup can consume several gigabytes. With iCloud Drive, Apple has also turned the service into a more open and easily browsable storage platform. An iCloud Drive app will come preloaded with iOS 9 when the latter launches on Sept. 16.
Comments
Are the new prices only for the US?
For me this is a great deal and sorely needed. I have 4 devices backed up on iCloud and pay for the 20 gb. Adding 30 gb allow me to include more things in the backups and iCloud Drive. Thanks Apple.
Im already paying 99 cents a month, because the default storage just doesn't cut it if somebody has a lot of devices, but it's nice that they bumped the 20 GB up to 50 GB for the same 99 cents!
Can I back up my iPad and iPhone to OneDrive?
You can back up photos and videos to OneDrive. In fact, last I checked, when you launch OneDrive for the first time, it asks you if you want to back up your photos and videos and if you agree, they give you an extra 3GB of space for the free in addition to the 15GB you already get (18GB total for free).
-kpluck
Does iCloud file storage mimic a traditional file system that lets you use one folder to hold documents of different types: (a) written docs, (b) spreadsheets, (c) PDFs, etc.
For Apple's push into the enterprise, this absence within the iPad itself has always seemed a major impediment to me. In a traditional Mac or PC file system, it's convenient to create a folder for a project (e.g., "New Kitchen") and then use that folder to store all artifacts related to that project. Since iOS traditionally allows access to documents via the app that created them (vs. via a general purpose file system windows), it seemed hard to combine artifacts in a single easily-accessible place.
I hope Apple updates the storage options soon so I can upgrade to the 50gb plan. I think that's a good deal for 99 cents.
The iCloud folder on a OSX system does exactly that. It contains a folder for each app, but you are also able to save whatever else in your own folders. At the moment that file structure is not visible on an IOS device but I assume this will change with the new iCloud app is IOS 9. At present you are able to create a hierarchy of folders within the iWorks App folders, though this hierarchy is not visible on an IOS device. Hopefully this too will change.
Does iCloud file storage mimic a traditional file system that lets you use one folder to hold documents of different types: (a) written docs, (b) spreadsheets, (c) PDFs, etc.
For Apple's push into the enterprise, this absence within the iPad itself has always seemed a major impediment to me. In a traditional Mac or PC file system, it's convenient to create a folder for a project (e.g., "New Kitchen") and then use that folder to store all artifacts related to that project. Since iOS traditionally allows access to documents via the app that created them (vs. via a general purpose file system windows), it seemed hard to combine artifacts in a single easily-accessible place.
It'd be nice to see tags start become more prominent, then it won't matter physical location or layout, you'll be able to tag a "project" and all its associated files, and where they reside, you won't care. Let the OS take care of that, local, cloud, network, who cares, as long as you can access them and sort, list and view them. I thought when tagging hit OS X we might begin to see Apple take advantage of this paradigm a bit more, it seems much more future friendly and legacy cutting, moving away from the c:\program files\ structure of data organisation, which is so yesterday.
That said, I hope that the iCloud Drive app begin to mimic Dropbox a bit more myself, I could then dump Dropbox, pay .99/month and have plenty of room for everything which currently is spread across SpiderOak, Dropbox and iCloud, as well as my network NAS.
Lower prices are great, but working services are better. I pay for iCloud storage so I can use photo library. Too bad photo library totally nuked my photos and now is inaccessible for another 18 days while it does whatever it does. I spent a while on the phone with apple care, even escalated up to the engineers, before finally giving up.
Pay for Dropbox. Pay for google drive. Pay for one drive. Skip iCloud.
We have family sharing and I pay 99 cents per account within that package for 20gb each. So no, unless it has changed now. 99 cent per account is so low it makes no difference. The only change I'd like to see is the ability to pay annually.
My account is billed annually
what do people backup to iCloud? I synch my phone to my Mac. What would I gain by backing it up to iCloud?
Double backups for one.