Vendor neutral comparison
Best IPFS pinning services and storage providers
Side by side comparison of 8 active IPFS providers — free tier, paid plans, dedicated gateways, SDKs, and the workload each one fits best. Every pricing claim cites the provider's own pricing page so you can verify before you commit to a monthly bill.
Providers at a glance
| Provider | Free tier | Entry paid plan | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pinata Managed IPFS with dedicated gateways and a developer-first SDK. | 1 GB storage, 10 GB bandwidth, 1 gateway on the Free plan. | Picnic · $20/month · 1 TB | Web app teams that want a managed pinning service with a clean SDK and a dedicated CDN gateway. |
| Storacha Open hot storage network built on IPFS and Filecoin (formerly web3.storage). | 5 GB storage and 5 GB egress on the Mild plan. | Medium · $10/month · 100 GB | Builders who want an open, content-addressed storage layer with Filecoin redundancy and delegation-friendly auth. |
| Filebase S3-compatible decentralized storage with unlimited IPFS pinning on the Pro plan. | 5 GB pooled storage across Object Storage and IPFS on the Free plan. | Pro · $7.50/month · 500 GB pooled | Teams that want IPFS pinning alongside an S3-compatible object store on a single bill. |
| Fleek DePIN cloud for hosting, storage, and AI agents on IPFS and Filecoin. | Free plan with resource limits across storage, bandwidth, and one custom domain. | Pro · $20/month + usage · Pay-as-you-go | Frontend and DePIN teams that want IPFS hosting plus storage from one provider. |
| Lighthouse Storage Permanent IPFS and Filecoin storage with pay-once and subscription tiers. | 5 GB free trial with hot IPFS storage and Filecoin backup. | Lite · $12/month · 500 GB | NFT, AI training set, and research teams that want long-lived, content-addressed storage with a one-time-payment option. |
| 4EVERLAND Web3 cloud platform with IPFS, Arweave, RPC, and decentralized web hosting. | Free tier with limited storage and bandwidth across Bucket, Hosting, and Gateway. | Pay-as-you-go · Metered · Usage-based | Web3 frontends that want IPFS storage, hosting, and gateway from one DePIN-backed vendor. |
| QuickNode IPFS IPFS pinning and dedicated gateways bundled with QuickNode RPC plans. | 1 dedicated gateway free for every signup; pinning included in paid plans up to 50 GB. | Build (RPC bundle) · Bundled with QuickNode plan · Up to 50 GB included | Teams already on QuickNode RPC who want IPFS pinning without onboarding a second vendor. |
| Crust Network Decentralized IPFS pinning paid on-chain with the CRU token. | No subscription; pay per storage order with CRU tokens. | On-chain storage order · Pay per file in CRU · Per file, no account cap | Crypto-native teams that want verifiable, decentralized pinning paid on-chain rather than monthly invoices. |
What is IPFS and what does a pinning service actually do?
IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) is a peer to peer protocol for storing and retrieving content addressed data. Files are identified by a Content Identifier (CID) derived from the file contents rather than a location. Any node holding the bytes for that CID can serve them, which makes IPFS attractive for NFT metadata, dapp frontends, AI model weights, and large datasets.
The catch is persistence. A bare IPFS node only serves what it currently holds. A pinning service stores your CIDs durably, replicates them across multiple nodes, exposes a dedicated gateway so the content loads fast, and gives you an API to upload, list, and remove pins. Every active provider on this page does at least pinning plus a gateway. The differences are in the auth model, gateway performance, redundancy layer (some add Filecoin storage deals), and which SDKs and APIs they ship.
Active IPFS providers
- Pinata
Managed IPFS with dedicated gateways and a developer-first SDK.
Free tier: 1 GB storage, 10 GB bandwidth, 1 gateway on the Free plan.
- Storacha
Open hot storage network built on IPFS and Filecoin (formerly web3.storage).
Free tier: 5 GB storage and 5 GB egress on the Mild plan.
- Filebase
S3-compatible decentralized storage with unlimited IPFS pinning on the Pro plan.
Free tier: 5 GB pooled storage across Object Storage and IPFS on the Free plan.
- Fleek
DePIN cloud for hosting, storage, and AI agents on IPFS and Filecoin.
Free tier: Free plan with resource limits across storage, bandwidth, and one custom domain.
- Lighthouse Storage
Permanent IPFS and Filecoin storage with pay-once and subscription tiers.
Free tier: 5 GB free trial with hot IPFS storage and Filecoin backup.
- 4EVERLAND
Web3 cloud platform with IPFS, Arweave, RPC, and decentralized web hosting.
Free tier: Free tier with limited storage and bandwidth across Bucket, Hosting, and Gateway.
- QuickNode IPFS
IPFS pinning and dedicated gateways bundled with QuickNode RPC plans.
Free tier: 1 dedicated gateway free for every signup; pinning included in paid plans up to 50 GB.
- Crust Network
Decentralized IPFS pinning paid on-chain with the CRU token.
Free tier: No subscription; pay per storage order with CRU tokens.
Public IPFS gateways
Use these gateways for development reads, fallbacks, or anywhere a dedicated gateway is overkill. They are free, shared, and rate limited. Production traffic should go through a dedicated gateway on one of the providers above.
| Gateway | URL pattern | Hosted by | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| ipfs.io | https://ipfs.io/ipfs/ | Interplanetary Shipyard / IPFS Foundation | Canonical public gateway maintained by the IPFS Foundation. |
| dweb.link | https://dweb.link/ipfs/ | Interplanetary Shipyard / IPFS Foundation | Subdomain-based gateway so each CID is served from its own origin. |
| storacha.link | https://storacha.link/ipfs/ | Storacha | Optimized for content uploaded through Storacha but resolves any public CID. |
| w3s.link | https://w3s.link/ipfs/ | Storacha (legacy web3.storage) | Legacy web3.storage gateway, still operational under Storacha. |
| nftstorage.link | https://nftstorage.link/ipfs/ | NFT.Storage | Read-only retrieval gateway for content pinned via Classic NFT.Storage uploads. |
Deprecated and restricted services
These services were widely used at various points and still show up in old tutorials, but they no longer accept new general signups, no longer accept uploads, or have been sunset entirely. Move existing workloads to one of the active providers above.
Infura IPFS Closed to general signups
Infura now limits IPFS access to a small set of pre-qualified ConsenSys customers. New developer signups for the IPFS product are not accepted from the public dashboard.
NFT.Storage Classic Uploads decommissioned
Free uploads to NFT.Storage Classic were decommissioned in June 2024. Existing data is still retrievable through the gateway and Filecoin, but the Classic web app, APIs, SDK, and Pinning API no longer accept new pins. The active NFT.Storage product page now redirects new users to Lighthouse.
Cloudflare IPFS Gateway Sunset
Cloudflare transitioned its public IPFS gateway traffic to the IPFS Foundation's gateway in mid 2024. Hostnames cloudflare-ipfs.com and cf-ipfs.com stopped serving IPFS content on 14 August 2024. Use ipfs.io, dweb.link, or a provider's dedicated gateway instead.
Related work
Pair IPFS with on chain primitives in the blockchain networks directory and the RPC providers comparison. For wiring IPFS into an application end to end, the IPFS integration guide covers JavaScript, S3 compatible, and IPFS Pinning Service API workflows.