Cloud Storage Pricing India 2026: Drive, OneDrive, pCloud

Cloud storage pricing in India depends less on the headline rupees per month and more on whether you are buying storage for a person or for a business. Google's India page lists Google One Basic (100 GB) at ₹130 per month for individuals. A business on Google Workspace Business Starter gets 30 GB per user for ₹270 per user per month. pCloud sells annual plans priced in US dollars from $49.99 a year for 500 GB. Microsoft OneDrive and JioAICloud are the other options Indian buyers most often shortlist. This guide compares official prices, explains when a consumer plan is a compliance risk for a company, and gives a worked total-cost model.

Executive summary

• Consumer plans are cheap but not built for companies. Google One Lite (30 GB) is listed at ₹59/month and Basic (100 GB) at ₹130/month. These plans have no admin console, offboarding control or audit logs, which matter under CERT-In and the DPDP Act.
• Business storage is usually bundled with email and office apps. Google Workspace Business Starter (₹270/user/month, 30 GB per user) and Standard (₹1,080/user/month list, 2 TB per user) include Drive. For most SMEs, the storage decision is really a suite decision.
• pCloud prices in USD. Premium 500 GB is $49.99/year, Premium Plus 2 TB is $99.99/year and Ultra 10 TB is $299.99/year on its pricing page. Foreign-currency billing and GST on imported services affect the real cost.
• Several vendors' prices could not be read. The OneDrive and JioAICloud pages did not load for us, so we do not quote their prices. Check them yourself at purchase time.
• Storage is not backup. Sync services copy deletions and ransomware encryption across devices. Budget separately for backup. See our backup and disaster recovery guide.

Market context

Three official sources frame cloud storage decisions for Indian organisations.

CERT-In's cyber security Directions (28 April 2022) apply to "body corporate" as well as service providers. They require listed cyber incidents to be reported within 6 hours, and ICT system logs to be kept for a rolling 180 days within Indian jurisdiction (CERT-In Directions). If a staff member's personal cloud account holding customer files is compromised, the company may be unable to investigate, because it has no logs. That is the core argument against using consumer storage for company data.

The same Directions put extra duties on data centres, VPS providers and cloud service providers: they must keep validated subscriber information for 5 years or longer. So a business customer of an Indian cloud provider should expect KYC checks at sign-up.

The DPDP Act, 2023 and DPDP Rules, 2025 require data fiduciaries to protect personal data with reasonable security safeguards. The Rules follow an 18-month phased timeline, according to the Government's press release. Shared folders of employee KYC documents, customer invoices or patient records are personal data stores, so access control and deletion are compliance issues, not just housekeeping.

On pricing, vendors now publish INR prices for India in several cases: Google One plans and Google Workspace both do. Others, such as pCloud, publish in US dollars. We have not found a regulator-published figure for cloud storage market size or adoption in India, so we make no quantitative market claims.

Evaluation framework

This is App Advisor's methodology for cloud storage, weighted for Indian SMEs with 5–200 users.

Vendor comparison

Official prices as seen on vendor pages in September 2026. Consumer and business plans are listed separately. Taxes are extra unless stated.

Business plans

Personal and prosumer plans

Notes on each option:

• Google Drive storage pricing in India is the clearest of all the vendors. Google One gives personal INR prices with a note that annual billing saves up to 16%. Workspace gives business INR prices. For a company, Workspace wins because the admin, not the employee, owns the files.
• OneDrive is usually bought as part of Microsoft 365. If you already license Microsoft 365, check the storage your plan includes before buying extra storage elsewhere.
• pCloud is popular with freelancers and creative studios for large archives. Its pricing page also offers lifetime plans, but lifetime prices were not shown in the page content we accessed. The page states a 14-day money-back guarantee. pCloud free plan: the pricing page we accessed did not state a free storage allowance, so check pCloud's sign-up page for current free-tier terms rather than relying on third-party figures.
• JioAICloud targets Jio subscribers. Before relying on it for company data, businesses should check the terms, admin features and data location in writing.

Browse the cloud storage category and document management category for more options, including Dropbox and Box. If you need approval workflows and version control for contracts, read our document management software guide.

Personal vs business storage: what actually changes

Buyers often compare Google One against Google Workspace, or a personal pCloud plan against a business plan, on price per GB alone. The differences that matter for a company are elsewhere.

Ownership of files. In a personal account, files belong to the account holder. When an employee leaves, the company can only ask for files back. In a business plan, the administrator can suspend the user and transfer file ownership before deleting the account. For firms that hold client documents, this is the single most important difference.

Control over sharing. Business plans let an admin restrict public links, block sharing outside the company domain, or allow it only for certain teams. Personal plans leave these choices to each user. An accidental "anyone with the link" share on a folder of invoices or KYC documents can become a data breach under the DPDP Act, and a reportable incident under CERT-In's Directions.

Audit logs. Business plans typically record who viewed, downloaded or shared a file. Without these logs, a company cannot answer basic incident questions: what was exposed, when, and to whom. CERT-In expects ICT logs to be kept for 180 days within Indian jurisdiction, so check both the native retention period and whether you can export logs.

Pooled vs per-user storage. Google's Workspace Base plan describes 20 GB of pooled storage per person, while Business Starter lists 30 GB per user. Pooled models suit teams where a few people store a lot and most store little. Per-user allocations are easier to predict but can strand unused capacity.

Billing and tax. INR-priced plans with GST invoices simplify input tax credit and accounting. Plans billed in USD, such as pCloud's, need a forex buffer. Check how GST on imported services is handled in your books.

A simple sizing method

1. Export a storage report from your current tools, or estimate by department.
2. Separate "active" files (edited in the last 12 months) from "archive" files.
3. Put active files in the collaborative business tool, sized for 18–24 months of growth.
4. Put archive files in lower-cost storage with strict access, plus a backup copy.
5. Review every six months. Storage needs in design, media and engineering firms grow in jumps when large projects start.

Questions to ask vendors

• Which region stores our files and backups, and can this be stated in the contract?
• How long are audit logs retained, and can they be exported?
• What happens to data after the subscription ends, and for how long can we recover it?
• Is version history included, and for how many days or versions?
• Can we enforce MFA and block sign-ins from unmanaged devices?

Total cost of ownership

Illustrative model — assumptions stated. A 15-person architecture studio storing drawings and client files. Assumptions:

• Total current data: 1.2 TB, growing 40% a year (studio's own estimate, used only as an example).
• 10 staff need normal storage; 5 designers work with large files.
• List prices above; GST and foreign exchange excluded; no discounts.
• Admin effort: 1 hour per month at an assumed ₹800/hour, i.e. ₹9,600 per year for managed business plans. We assume double that for unmanaged personal accounts, because of manual offboarding and sharing clean-up.

Takeaways:

1. The cheapest option (C) fails the governance test: files belong to individuals.
2. Option A looks cheap but does not hold 1.2 TB. Price per usable GB matters more than price per user.
3. Option B fits today's data with room for growth, and upgrades only the heavy users.
4. Add a separate backup budget. Sync is not backup.

Hidden costs to include

• Overlapping subscriptions. Teams often pay for Google Workspace, a personal Dropbox and a Microsoft 365 licence at the same time. Audit card statements and reimbursement claims before buying more.
• Clean-up time. Migrating messy folder structures takes longer than copying data. Budget time for deciding what to archive or delete.
• Bandwidth. Uploading a terabyte over a typical office broadband line can take days. Plan migrations over weekends, or seed data in stages.
• Backup. A separate backup subscription or storage target is a real line item, not an optional extra.
• Currency movement. USD-billed plans can cost more at renewal even when the dollar price does not change.

Implementation roadmap

Week 1: Discover

• List where company files currently live: personal Drives, WhatsApp downloads, USB drives, NAS.
• Classify folders: public, internal, confidential, personal data.

Weeks 2–3: Design

• Create shared drives or team folders by department, not by person.
• Set external sharing defaults to "restricted" and allow exceptions per folder.
• Enforce MFA for all users and turn on audit logging.

Weeks 4–6: Migrate

• Move one department at a time. Validate file counts and permissions after each move.
• Retire personal-account storage of company files, with a signed acknowledgement from staff.

Weeks 7–8: Protect and review

• Configure version history/retention and test restoring a deleted folder.
• Set up a third-party backup if the risk assessment calls for it.
• Review sharing reports monthly and remove stale public links.

Risks and compliance checklist

• CERT-In 6-hour reporting: incident owner named; storage audit logs can be pulled quickly.
• 180-day log retention within India: confirm how long your plan keeps audit logs; export if it is shorter.
• DPDP Act: personal data folders identified; access limited to need-to-know; deletion on request possible.
• Data localisation: where a contract or sector regulator requires Indian storage, get written confirmation from the vendor.
• No company data in personal accounts, policy signed by staff.
• Offboarding: transfer file ownership before deleting a leaver's account.
• Ransomware: version history tested; offline or immutable backup exists.
• Currency and GST: USD-billed services budgeted with a forex buffer.

KPIs to track

How to choose

• Already on Google Workspace or Gmail? Use Google Drive through Workspace and tier users by storage need.
• Already on Microsoft 365? Use OneDrive and SharePoint, and check what storage your licence includes before buying more.
• Need large archives for a few people? pCloud's annual USD plans can work for media archives. Keep live collaboration in a managed business tool.
• Jio-centric mobile workforce? Evaluate JioAICloud, but confirm admin and business terms first.
• Need hosting or servers rather than file storage? See VPS and cloud hosting in India and website builders and hosting.

FAQs

Sources

• Google One plans (India)
• Google Workspace pricing (India)
• pCloud pricing plans
• Microsoft OneDrive plan comparison (India)
• JioAICloud / JioCloud
• CERT-In Directions under Section 70B(6), 28 April 2022
• PIB: Digital Personal Data Protection Rules, 2025