Google triples free cloud storage to 15GB for all your Gmail, Drive, and Google+ needs

By Gloria Sin May 13, 2013

Google Drive_tier plans — Image used with permission by copyright holder

This story is part of our complete Google I/O coverage

Google I/O, the company’s annual conference for developers, is just two days away, and it looks like Google is getting the party started early by announcing some good news: your free Google cloud storage just tripled in size from 5GB to 15GB.

As if getting three-times the storage space for free wasn’t enough of a bonus, Google is letting you decide how you’d like to use up all the extra space between your Gmail, Google+ Photo,s and Google Drive accounts. After all, a user who depends on his Gmail account for school would rather devote more space for email, than someone who likes to upload a ton of mobile photos to her Google+ Photos account. With unified cloud storage, you get to decide on how to allot that 15GB, or buy more storage space that is accessible across your accounts.

Google Drive_Shared storage — Image used with permission by copyright holder

If you need more than 15GB of cloud storage, you can pay Google $5 per month for 100GB on Google Drive, or get 200GB for $10 per month. These prices are basically half of what Dropbox is charging for similar capacities. For example, Dropbox‘s free account starts with only 2GB of storage (though you can earn up to 18GB by referring many people to the service), but if you want 100GB of space you need to spend $10 per month or $20 per month for 200GB of cloud storage.

Google Apps users that use cloud-based software like Docs will also be getting a bit more free storage – from 25GB to 30GB – to store their files on Google Drive and emails on Gmail, according to the company’s enterprise blog.

It’ll take Google a couple of weeks to roll out this extra storage for users, so don’t start uploading all your high-definition movies to your Google Drive account just yet. As CNET mentioned, it’s hard to believe Google would randomly increase its storage capacity for consumers by three fold – and for free – just because it can. It must have some even bigger trick up its sleeves to warrant this extra free cloud storage for users, so stay tuned for even bigger announcements from San Francisco later this week.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Gloria’s tech journey really began when she was studying user centered design in university, and developed a love for…

Computing

Scores of people are downgrading back to Windows 10

The screen of the Galaxy Book4 Ultra.

Microsoft continues to struggle with the adoption of Windows 11 among its users. Recent data from Statcounter reveals a notable decline in the operating system’s market share, specifically compared with Windows 10.

After reaching an all-time high of 28.16% in February 2024, Windows 11 has experienced a drop, falling below the 26% mark.

Computing

The ASUS ROG Ally handheld gaming PC has a nice discount today

Starfield running on the Asus ROG Ally.

If you love the power of gaming PCs and the portability of the Nintendo Switch, you should think about getting a handheld gaming PC like the Asus ROG Ally. If you're interested, it's currently on sale from Walmart with an $87 discount that pulls its price down to $400 from $487. It's a pretty popular device so we expect this offer to attract a lot of attention, which means it's probably not going to last long. If you want to get this handheld gaming PC for this cheap, you should proceed with the transaction immediately.

Why you should buy the Asus ROG Ally handheld gaming PC
It's the version of the Asus ROG Ally with the AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme that's listed in our roundup of the best handheld gaming PCs, but the Asus ROG Ally Z1 is still a worthwhile purchase because it gives you a gaming PC that you can bring with you wherever you go. Unlike a gaming laptop that's still pretty bulky with its large screen and keyboard, the Asus ROG Ally takes on the form of a portable gaming console like the Nintendo Switch, but with Windows 11 pre-installed as a familiar operating system to navigate and launch the best PC games.

Computing

The HP Victus gaming PC with RTX 3060 has a $550 discount

The HP Victus 15L gaming PC in white.

Gamers don't need to spend more than $1,000 if they want to buy a new gaming PC because there are affordable options like the HP Victus 15L gaming desktop. From its original price of $1,400, you can get it for just $850 as HP has applied a $550 discount on this machine. However, you shouldn't delay your purchase because there's no assurance that the gaming PC will still be 39% off tomorrow. If you want to make sure that you get it for less than $1,000, you're going to have to complete the transaction for it within the day.

Why you should buy the HP Victus 15L gaming desktop
You shouldn't expect the HP Victus 15L gaming desktop to match the performance of the top-of-the-line models of the best gaming PCs, but it's surprisingly powerful for its cost. Inside it are the 13th-generation Intel Core i7 processor and the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card, with 16GB of RAM that our guide on how much RAM do you need says is the best place to start for gaming. It's enough to play today's best PC games without any issues, and it may even be capable of running the upcoming PC games of the next few years if you're willing to dial down the settings for the more demanding titles.