Backblaze says 92% of new hard drive deployments exceed 20TB as AI storage demand rises

Backblaze, Inc. Class A

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Backblaze published its Q1 2026 Drive Stats report, showing enterprise storage demand shifting to higher-capacity hard drives amid AI workload growth.
92% of new drive deployments exceeded 20TB; 10,220 drives were added in the quarter, including more than 9,400 at 20TB or larger.
Fleet annualized failure rate improved to 1.24% from 1.42% a year earlier; lifetime AFR held at 1.39%.
20TB-plus drives posted a 0.85% AFR across more than 86,000 units, supporting scale-up strategies without a reliability hit.
WDC’s 22TB model, the largest cohort at more than 45,000 drives, ran at 0.38% AFR; Toshiba’s 24TB model logged 0.22% in early deployment.

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