Snap is changing how users store their Snaps, putting a limit of 5 gigabytes on free Memories storage and offering new paid plans to people who need more room. The move puts a cap on a long-standing free feature, instead adding it as a metered service — with the company promising that most people will keep access, but demanding more from those hoarding dozens of thousands over time.
In a company blog post, Snap said over 1 trillion Memories had been saved to date, showing how the feature has morphed from a convenient scrapbook to a gargantuan infrastructure challenge. The change comes with a catch: any content over the 5GB free allotment will be stored temporarily for 12 months, which provides users with time to download or upgrade before newer excess Snaps are wiped away.
What Changes Snapchat Users Will See With Memories Limits
Free storage amounts for all accounts have been reserved up to 5GB. Go beyond that, and you’ll have the option to purchase paid storage plans for Memories from Snap, with ones made specifically for people who save thousands of pictures and videos. “The overwhelming majority of users fall well below” the free threshold, Snap says, so the impact should be limited to prolific archivists.
There’s an important retention twist: If you stay over the limit and don’t subscribe, Snap says it will save your oldest Memories and delete the newest ones that put you over your cap after the 12-month grace period expires. You can export right on your device anytime.
Why Snap Is Charging for Memories Storage Space Now
Storing a trillion-plus items is not just a product decision; it’s also an entry on the balance sheet. Industry figures would compute its cloud object storage costs in pennies per gigabyte per month, but at Snap’s scale the math starts to balloon when you factor in object replication across regions, resilient backups, bandwidth and machine learning processing for search, resurfacing and safety scanning.
Even the most conservative back-of-the-envelope math foretells exabyte-scale storage for Memories when accounting for photos, videos, and metadata. An operation like that is costly and resource heavy, and it sets itself up beautifully for usage-based monetization. To an extent Snap already depends on subscriptions for premium functionality with its Snapchat+ offering that allows users to unlock added bells-and-whistles; paid Memories storage extends such stratagem to infrastructure-heavy features while preserving a free on-ramp opportunity.
How Snap’s Plan Compares to Rivals and Cloud Services
Snap’s new 5GB free tier matches that longstanding baseline on iCloud. Google Photos used to provide unlimited “high-quality” uploads before transitioning into a paid tier, with the company saying it’s not sustainable to offer infinite space free of charge at a worldwide scale. Both Amazon Photos and Dropbox operate on subscription storage. In other words, Snap is putting its archive product on par with standard consumer cloud offerings, instead of keeping a social scrapbook as an expense in perpetuity.
What is still unique is the Memories experience itself: a search- and resurfacing-forward library built right into camera-first messaging and AR. That contextual integration is a product moat, but it also ramps up compute usage for indexing, resurfacing “flashbacks,” and content discovery — arguments, again, in favor of paid-for capacity.
What to Do if You’re Over the New 5GB Memories Limit
First, look at what Memories is claiming in use within the app. Over 5GB and you’ll have a year of temporary storage for the excess. Take that window and figure out whether you want to subscribe, save files to your device or another cloud provider, or trim your library.
- Subscribe to a paid Memories storage plan.
- Save files to your device or another cloud provider.
- Trim your library to reduce usage.
Maintain rule of frugality. Be aware of the retention rule. Older Snaps are more likely to be preserved, so your recent over-the-cap uploads will be the first to go as soon as the grace period is up. If you care about those (think graduations, vacations or professional content), consider exporting those images early or paying for a plan that accommodates your footprint.
Implications for Snap and Its Users After the Change
For Snap, paid storage helps relieve the weight of a growing infrastructure without watering down the basic free experience. It also boxes high-intensity users into a predictable revenue stream, which is part of the playbook for consumer apps with extensive media libraries. That dependable recurring revenue, analysts have long noted, stabilizes businesses that live and die by advertising cycles.
For users, the trade-off is clarity. What you’ll receive: An unambiguous cap, the freedom to decide later, and a year to make decisions. The largest friction will be the psychological: Memories has seemed bottomless. Today it’s more like a slick, modern-day cloud drive with caps and tiers. For most people, that isn’t likely to change day-to-day behavior. For creators, veterans and casual users who rely on Memories as a de facto backup of their archives: It’s a nudge to premeditate.
The shift mirrors a larger industry truth: Forever free storage is an anomaly. As we see more and more platforms integrate AI and search functionality into their personal archives, the real cost isn’t just disks — it’s the compute and reliability required to make those archives useful. Snap’s new direction is a bet that its more heavily invested users will be convinced, and pay, based on utility, not just nostalgia.
