A petabyte archive
A petabyte archive is a digital storage system designed to retain very large collections of data for long-term access.
How big is it?
1 PB · data
Data · example
A little perspective
A petabyte archive vs Common Crawl June 2025 WARC snapshot: data size comparison
The data size of a petabyte archive is about 11 times the compressed WARC data of the Common Crawl June 2025 WARC snapshot.
BYTES OF DATA
A petabyte archive is a digital storage system designed to retain very large collections of data for long-term access.
The Common Crawl monthly web snapshot is a large, publicly available collection of web pages and related data gathered by automated crawlers each month.
Measurements, assumptions & sources +
A petabyte archive
Data: 1 PB; example.
A defined 1 PB archive before replication or redundancy overhead.
Defined examples — our methodology
The marked data is calibrated. Unmeasured illustration details are representative.
Common Crawl June 2025 WARC snapshot
Compressed WARC data: 91 TB; specified; range 90 TB–92 TB.
The June 2025 Common Crawl release reports 82.73 TiB of compressed WARC captures, about 91 trillion bytes. WAT, WET, indexes and uncompressed content are separate.
Common Crawl — June 2025 crawl archive
The marked compressed WARC data is calibrated. Unmeasured illustration details are representative.
Use the visual comparison to explore its scale, then check the measurements and sources.
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Why this measurement?
Why we use 1 PB
We compare the data size of a petabyte archive. This is an illustrative comparison value, not a claim that every example is the same.
A defined 1 PB archive before replication or redundancy overhead.
The picture identifies the subject; the diagram compares the recorded values. How calibrated comparisons work →
Recorded properties
Dimensions and measurements
| Property | Selected value | Recorded range | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 PB | Not recorded | example |
Around this scale
Explore nearby values.
Compare examples with lower, similar and higher values. Each card names the measurement being compared.
Nearest lower valueDigital informationCommon Crawl June 2025 WARC snapshot91 TBCompressed WARC dataThe Common Crawl monthly web snapshot is a large, publicly available collection of web pages and related data gathered by automated crawlers each month.Nearest higher valueDigital informationDNA storage theoretical capacity per gram215 PBTheoretical bytes per gramDNA storage theoretical capacity per gram is the maximum amount of digital information that can be encoded in one gram of DNA under ideal conditions.Sources and method
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The source records and measurement method remain available for inspection.
More ways to see it
Curated comparisons
There’s always another scale
Follow your curiosity.
DigitalText page3 kBA digital file containing one page of plain text characters without formatting or embedded fonts.
DigitalCompressed photo3 MBA compressed photo is a digital image file that has been processed to reduce the amount of data needed to store or transmit it.Digital128 GB phone128 GBPhone storage is the digital memory in a mobile phone used to keep apps, photos, videos and other files.
Digital1 TB drive1 TBA one-terabyte drive is a digital storage device capable of holding large amounts of computer data, such as documents, media and software.DigitalCommon Crawl June 2025 WARC snapshot91 TBThe Common Crawl monthly web snapshot is a large, publicly available collection of web pages and related data gathered by automated crawlers each month.DigitalAn exabyte archive1 EBAn exabyte archive is a digital storage system capable of holding extremely large datasets, often used by major organisations or data centres.DigitalDNA storage theoretical capacity per gram215 PBDNA storage theoretical capacity per gram is the maximum amount of digital information that can be encoded in one gram of DNA under ideal conditions.DigitalAutonomous vehicle sensor data per hour4 TBThe total uncompressed digital information generated by all sensors on a self-driving vehicle in one hour, including cameras, lidar and radar.