# Object storage for enterprise buyers: what AI models recommend, September 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "object storage service" and as "S3-compatible cloud storage", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/cloud/object-storage/enterprise/

**Standing:** Amazon S3 leads with 30% of first choices; verdict contested. 40 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Amazon S3 | 30% | 23% | 52 |
| 2 | Wasabi | 25% | 23% | 35 |
| 3 | Cloudflare R2 | 12% | 21% | 28 |
| 4 | Backblaze B2 | 10% | 16% | 31 |
| 5 | NetApp StorageGRID | 8% | 0% | 15 |
| 6 | Scality RING | 5% | 6% | 17 |
| 7 | IBM Cloud Object Storage | 2% | 0% | 20 |
| 8 | Azure Blob Storage | 2% | 31% | 39 |
| 9 | MinIO | 0% | 11% | 27 |
| 10 | Cloudian HyperStore | 0% | 0% | 18 |
| 11 | Google Cloud Storage | 0% | 29% | 42 |

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage, IBM Cloud Object Storage
- GPT-5.4 mini: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Cloudflare R2; alternatives Amazon S3, Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage, MinIO
- Perplexity Sonar: Amazon S3, NetApp StorageGRID; alternatives Cloudian HyperStore, IBM Cloud Object Storage
- Grok 4.1 Fast: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Dell ECS, Google Cloud Storage, IBM Cloud Object Storage
- Mistral Small: NetApp StorageGRID, Scality RING; alternatives Amazon S3, Cloudian HyperStore
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Cloudflare R2, Google Cloud Storage
- Llama 4 Maverick: no first choice
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Dell ECS, Google Cloud Storage, MinIO
- Kimi K2: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Amazon S3; alternatives Azure Blob Storage, Ceph, Cloudian HyperScale, Google Cloud Storage
- MiniMax M2.5: Amazon S3, Cloudflare R2; alternatives Backblaze B2, MinIO, Wasabi

## Sources the answers cite

62 of 72 answers came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- solved.scality.com: 30 answers, 39 citations
- cloudian.com: 24 answers, 36 citations
- worldmetrics.org: 23 answers, 29 citations
- backblaze.com: 22 answers, 25 citations
- mixpeek.com: 20 answers, 25 citations
- gartner.com: 20 answers, 23 citations
- enterprisestorageforum.com: 18 answers, 18 citations
- wasabi.com: 17 answers, 27 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://gartner.com/reviews/market/file-and-object-storage-platforms (20 answers)
- https://enterprisestorageforum.com/cloud/best-object-storage-solutions (18 answers)
- https://solved.scality.com/best-object-storage-solutions-for-enterprises (18 answers)
- https://solutionsreview.com/data-storage/the-best-object-storage-solutions (16 answers)
- https://digitalocean.com/resources/articles/object-storage-solutions-cloud-data (15 answers)
- https://worldmetrics.org/service/object-storage (15 answers)
- https://cloudexpat.com/blog/enterprise-cloud-storage-comparison-2025 (14 answers)
- https://mixpeek.com/curated-lists/best-s3-compatible-object-storage (13 answers)
- https://backblaze.com/cloud-storage (12 answers)
- https://cloudexpat.com/blog/enterprise-cloud-storage-deep-dive-p2 (11 answers)

## Warned against

- Google Cloud Storage: 12 of 42 labels negative. "avoid or be cautious about ... those with high egress fees or minimum retention periods, such as GCS and Azure Cold" (Llama 4 Maverick, negative prompt)
- Amazon S3: 12 of 52 labels negative. "Why Not Hyperscalers (AWS S3, GCP, Azure Blob)? ... leads to unpredictable bills" (Grok 4.1 Fast, budget prompt)
- Azure Blob Storage: 12 of 39 labels negative. "Avoid: Traditional hyperscalers (AWS/Azure/GCP)" (Kimi K2, budget prompt)
- Wasabi: 8 of 35 labels negative. "Some services, like Wasabi, enforce a 90-day minimum retention period... Enterprises should avoid such providers for workloads with unpredictable or frequent data deletion needs." (Mistral Small, negative prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://it-ai-index.com/methodology/
- Raw judge labels and full responses: https://it-ai-index.com/data/
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition, it-ai-index.com.