IBM Cloud Object Storage

IBM Cloud Object Storage (COS) is a highly scalable, durable, and secure storage service for unstructured data. It is the equivalent of AWS S3 or Azure Blob Storage, and is one of the most widely used IBM Cloud services.

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What is Object Storage?

Object storage stores data as objects within buckets. Each object consists of:

• Key — a unique name within the bucket (e.g., logs/2024/access.log)
• Data — the file content (up to 10 TB per object)
• Metadata — system and custom metadata about the object

Object storage uses a flat namespace — there are no real directories, but key prefixes simulate a folder structure.

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Buckets

A bucket is a container for objects. When creating a bucket, you choose:

• Location — region, cross-region, or single data centre
• Storage class — determines cost and retrieval behaviour
• Resiliency — how data is distributed for durability

Resiliency Options