How often do you back up your data? Chances are, you forget — unless of course there is an automatic cloud backup, working unattended. The key to answering the question asked beforehand, is finding an answer to another pertinent question. How do you back up your data? The latest Global World Backup Day Survey, by storage solutions giants Western Digital, suggests it is a case of workable alternatives.
They suggest there is a high demand for cloud storage worldwide, and also in India, where 77% of the survey’s respondents, use some cloud storage service to make copies of their data. However, cloud storage subscription costs are figuring prominently, as more consumers begin to adopt a combination of cloud and local external storage (read, physical drives) to find the balance between insurance of data backups and the costs involved.
“We believe that cloud and external drive backup solutions are complementary. While the usage of cloud storage worldwide is more widespread (75%), nearly half of all respondents (45%) utilise external drives as a local storage option. In India, this trend is even more evident with 77% storing their backup in the cloud and 54% using external drives,” says Owais Mohammed, sales director India, Middle East, and Africa at Western Digital, in a conversation with HT.
Here’s an illustration — a 5TB Google One Premium plan costs ₹1,625 per month, or ₹16,250 annually. Dropbox, another popular cloud storage platform, has priced the 3TB Dropbox Professional plan at ₹1,549 per month, which totals to around ₹18,588 annually. In comparison, a WD My Passport 4TB portable hard drive costs around ₹10,899 while a Seagate Expansion 4TB external hard drive also has a similar market price.
Also Read: Are you backing up your smartphone, beyond the cloud, to a physical storage?
For users, individuals and as part of teams in businesses and enterprises, will have to balance costs with convenience for their workflows and data backup processes.
The headline stats for India, indicate a positive trend. The survey suggests India leads in daily backups, with 30% of Indian respondents ensuring daily data back-ups, which is higher than US (27%) and UK (23%). PC and smartphone users in India are also relying heavily on less complicated external storage, with 54% of surveyed Indians use external drives; the second-biggest demographic globally.
These evolving habits perhaps stem from a heartbreak of data loss is common — the Global World Backup Day Survey notes that 71% of Indian respondents have experienced data loss due to device failure, accidental deletion, or cyber threats. Often, a complicated backup solution isn’t the best (or most robust) for users — even a simple drive that connects to your PC via USB (even the USB-C on phones and tablets exhibit the same capabilities) can be a useful way to keep your documents, photos and other files safe in multiplicity of copies.
But there is still an outlier. Around 28% of Indian consumers still do not back up their data, relying solely on device (PC, tablet, or smartphone) reliability. The survey had 6,118 respondents worldwide.
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There was a time in the past decade, when cloud storage was in vogue, and physical storage was considered a cumbersome, inferior choice. But the good old “USB drive”, is making a resounding comeback. According to research firm Statista’s latest numbers, India’s storage market (this will be a collective of personal and enterprise expenditure) is expected to grow annually at around 9.75%, with the market expected to be valued at $1.45 billion by the year 2029 — up from $1 billion, in 2025.
“These results show there is awareness of an appropriate backup strategy, such as the 3-2-1 backup rule. We recommend storing three sets of the same data (one original and two copies) on at least two different storage media (e.g. cloud and external hard drive). One of these copies should be in a different location or off-site. In India, a whopping 37% of respondents are aware of this rule and apply it,” explains Mohammed.
“This puts India in first place in this comparison, far ahead of China (29%) and Taiwan (25%),” he adds. The survey also states that among respondents in India, around 22% also rely on network-attached storage (NAS) for backing up data — the biggest demographic, worldwide.
Also Read: World Backup Day: How individuals can better secure their data| Interview
Western Digital recently expanded their extensive portfolio, adding higher capacity drives to their portfolio, including the 26TB G-DRIVE for creative workflows, a 52TB G-RAID PROJECT 2 for enterprises, and the WD My Passport 20th Anniversary Edition with up to 6TB storage. The storage solutions company’s product portfolio includes external storage including rugged drives, NAS storage and data centre drives.
For enterprises, data insurance is becoming even more important, as artificial intelligence (AI) implementation gathers pace. Greg Clark, director of product management, Data Security at OpenText Cybersecurity points out the need for identifying and eliminating unnecessary or non-useful data to reduce costs and compliance.
“As AI implementation across industries continues to grow, businesses are becoming increasingly reliant on data for AI-driven decision making and model training. This continued technological advancement means organisations are generating and storing more data than ever, requiring them to proactively manage their data – starting with data minimisation,” says Clark