Microsoft gifts Windows Phone “enthusiasts” another 20GB of SkyDrive space

It’s the season of goodwill to all men, which may be why Microsoft has decided to offer loyal Windows Phone users another 20GB of room on its SkyDrive cloud storage platform. The deal must be claimed by January 31st and adds on 20GB to whatever storage space you already have for a period of one year.

The deal was first spotted by Windows Phone users who received an official email from Microsoft. “To show our appreciation of Windows Phone customers,” the message reads, “we are giving you an extra 20GB of free SkyDrive storage for one year. This is in addition to the 7GB of free SkyDrive storage that all customers currently have.”

If you are a Windows Phone user, check your email inbox. The communication does refer to “Windows Phone Enthusiast Users” so it may not be rolling out to everyone who’s ever registered a WP handset — as yet Microsoft hasn’t made an official comment, but we’ll update our post if further details emerge.

SkyDrive is an increasingly important product for Microsoft, as it seeks to unify its strategy across computers, smartphones and games consoles. With the ecosystem wars now being fought across so many fronts — music, apps, storage, video, maps, photos, personal assistants — even small differences can sway customers to one platform or another. Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud, Box and others are all scrabbling for the rights to host users’ files in the cloud, so there’s no shortage of services to pick from.

It’s not the only deal that Microsoft is offering this holiday season: the company is also dishing out a generous 200GB of space to anyone who buys a Surface 2 or Surface Pro 2 tablet over Christmas. This offer lasts for two years, and you can get details over at the Microsoft website.