Network Attached Storage (NAS) Market Size and Share
Market Overview
| Study Period | 2019 - 2030 |
|---|---|
| Market Size (2025) | USD 39.60 Billion |
| Market Size (2030) | USD 86.5 Billion |
| Growth Rate (2025 - 2030) | 16.90% CAGR |
| Fastest Growing Market | Asia Pacific |
| Largest Market | North America |
| Market Concentration | Medium |
Major Players
*Disclaimer: Major Players sorted in no particular order Image © Mordor Intelligence. Reuse requires attribution under CC BY 4.0. |
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Network Attached Storage (NAS) Market Analysis by Mordor Intelligence
The Network Attached Storage Market size is estimated at USD 39.60 billion in 2025, and is expected to reach USD 86.5 billion by 2030, at a CAGR of 16.90% during the forecast period (2025-2030).
Demand has been buoyed by enterprises racing to contain unstructured‐data growth, the push for hybrid work, and the capture of AI/ML workloads that need high‐throughput file services. Vendors also benefited from renewed interest in on-premises solutions near 5G edge sites, where latency-sensitive applications run close to users. North America remained the revenue leader as of 2024, yet Asia-Pacific is setting the growth pace on the back of sizeable data-center build-outs and accelerated digital transformation. Competitive dynamics are tilting toward software-defined, AI-optimized, and hybrid-cloud offerings that blend local performance with cloud economics.
Key Report Takeaways
- By type, scale-out architectures led with 52% of the network-attached storage market share in 2024.
- By deployment, hybrid models recorded the fastest 21.1% CAGR through 2030.
- By product tier, mid-market is anticipated to grow at the fastest CAGR of 17%.
- By end-user industry, healthcare is expected to advance at an 18.2% CAGR between 2025-2030.
- By geography, North America captured 39% of 2024 revenue, while Asia-Pacific is projected to post an 18% CAGR to 2030.
Global Network Attached Storage (NAS) Market Trends and Insights
Drivers Impact Analysis
| Driver | (~) % Impact on CAGR Forecast | Geographic Relevance | Impact Timeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Explosion of unstructured data | +5.2% | Global (higher in North America & Europe) | Long term (≥ 4 years) |
| Remote and hybrid-work data surge | +4.4% | Global (developed economies) | Medium term (2–4 years) |
| Data-center virtualization and SD-NAS | +3.5% | North America, Europe, developed APAC | Medium term (2–4 years) |
| 5G edge build-out boosts on-prem NAS | +2.6% | North America, China, South Korea, Japan | Long term (≥ 4 years) |
| AI/ML training workloads need parallel file access | +1.7% | North America, China, Western Europe | Short term (≤ 2 years) |
| Tariff-driven reshoring of NAS production | +0.9% | North America, Europe | Medium term (2–4 years) |
| Source: Mordor Intelligence | |||
Explosion of Unstructured Data
Annual enterprise data volume expanded at rates that routinely exceeded 20%, forcing IT teams to rethink storage elasticity. Many migrated toward scale-out NAS that scales node-by-node without downtime, while applying automated tiering to balance cost and performance. Healthcare providers typified this shift, archiving ever-larger imaging files while relying on policy-driven placement to curb spending.
Remote and Hybrid-Work Data Surge
Hybrid work turned edge offices and home networks into primary data creators. Enterprises responded by rolling out NAS appliances that expose a global namespace and accelerate traffic with WAN caching. Many teams placed cold data in cloud tiers while keeping active project files on-prem devices that synchronize automatically, reducing branch infrastructure cost without impacting user experience.[1]Dell Technologies, “Cloud Storage Services for Unstructured Data,” dell.com
Data-Center Virtualization and SD-NAS
Software-defined NAS decoupled file-service software from proprietary controllers. This allowed administrators to deploy storage as composable pools, program them through APIs, and apply uniform policies across sites. NetApp’s effort to unify snapshots, ransomware defenses, and performance telemetry into one intelligent data fabric illustrated the direction that large buyers demanded.
5G Edge Build-Out Boosts On-Prem NAS
Enterprises deploying private 5G needed localized, low-latency stores for sensor and machine-vision feeds. Compact NAS arrays installed inside factories or clinics capture data in real time while tiering historical files back to a core site or cloud bucket. Western Digital’s fabric-attached platforms, validated through its Open Composable Compatibility Lab, supported such distributed architectures.
Restraints Impact Analysis
| Restraint | (~) % Impact on CAGR Forecast | Geographic Relevance | Impact Timeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cloud-storage substitution | -5.2% | Global (higher in North America & Europe) | Long term (≥ 4 years) |
| Performance bottlenecks at petabyte scale | -4.4% | Global (data-intensive industries) | Medium term (2–4 years) |
| High TCO with explosive data growth | -3.5% | Global | Long term (≥ 4 years) |
| Rising cyber-insurance premiums for on-prem file systems | -1.7% | North America, Europe | Short term (≤ 2 years) |
| Source: Mordor Intelligence | |||
Cloud-Storage Substitution
Consumption-based cloud storage kept eroding demand for purely on-prem NAS, attracting organizations that preferred opex models and elastic scaling. Vendors mitigated the risk by embedding cloud tiering, snapshot replication to object buckets, and subscription pricing that blurs traditional capex boundaries, preserving appliance relevance while acknowledging the cloud’s pull.[2]NetApp, “Breakthroughs in Block Storage & Ransomware Defense,” netapp.com
Performance Bottlenecks at Petabyte Scale
When repositories crossed multi-petabyte thresholds, legacy dual-controller arrays suffered from overloaded metadata services. Enterprises sidestepped bottlenecks by shifting to clustered file nodes equipped with NVMe flash and high-bandwidth fabrics such as 100 GbE. QNAP’s adoption of native NVMe and multi-lane PCIe expansion showcased how mid-tier systems tackled throughput constraints for AI and virtualization workloads.
Segment Analysis
By Type: Scale-Out Dominates Enterprise Deployments
Scale-out arrays held 52% of the network-attached storage market share in 2024. The architecture allowed administrators to add performance and capacity linearly, removing forklift upgrades and supporting data sets that were doubling in months. As a result, the segment is forecast to log an 18% CAGR from 2025-2030. In contrast, scale-up appliances stayed popular with smaller teams that favored simplicity over elastic scaling. IBM SONAS demonstrated scale-out efficiency by managing billions of files under a single namespace while driving ownership costs down by up to 40% through automated tiering.[3]IBM, “Scale Out Network Attached Storage,” spectra.com
Scale-up products continued to ship into departmental and SMB settings, helped by lower initial list prices and straightforward administration. Yet once workloads required high concurrent throughput, typical in media post-production or genomic analysis enterprises, gravitated to clustered designs. Over the forecast period, incremental hardware advances such as NVMe-oF and 400 GbE networking are expected to add momentum to the scale-out segment, reinforcing its position at the heart of the broader network-attached storage market.
By Deployment: Hybrid Models Gain Momentum
On-premise configurations still commanded 52% of 2024 revenue, yet enterprises increasingly blended local arrays with on-demand cloud capacity. The hybrid tier is projected to notch a 21.1% CAGR, the fastest within the network-attached storage market. Organizations retained compliance-sensitive datasets onsite while redirecting inactive files to cloud buckets, a model supported by Dell’s unstructured-data services that move snapshots seamlessly between environments.
Pure-cloud NAS grew too, propelled by corporate mandates to shrink data-center footprints and adopt cloud-first strategies. Vendors accordingly prioritized single dashboards for policy management across endpoints, default encryption at rest, and API hooks for DevOps automation. Over time, multi-cloud file services that span regions and providers are expected to flatten cost differentials and strengthen the overall pull toward hybrid architectures, cementing their role in the network-attached storage market size dialogue.
By Product Tier: Mid-Market Expansion Accelerates
Enterprise-class systems accounted for 41% of 2024 sales, prized for non-stop availability and multi-petabyte storage. Nonetheless, mid-market arrays, typically offering 20-64 TB per chassis, are pacing the fastest 17% CAGR. Vendors such as QNAP pushed NVMe caching, 2.5/10 GbE link speeds, and dual-controller failover into formerly SMB gear, giving medium-size firms functionality once exclusive to flagship models. That democratization is enlarging the addressable base for the network-attached storage industry.
Low-end/SOHO appliances retained relevance for branch replication and home content sharing, but revenue growth was slower. As mid-market price points converge with entry-level budgets, smaller teams gain a path to enterprise-style performance and snapshotting. This dynamic supports a broader trend: the average buyer profile is migrating up the capability curve even as the aggregate network-attached storage market size expands.
Note: Segment shares of all individual segments available upon report purchase
By End-User Industry: Healthcare Accelerates Adoption
The IT & telecom vertical retained the largest slice at 29% of 2024 revenue, reflecting its historic storage dependency. However, healthcare is set to be the pace-setter with an 18.2% CAGR, propelled by higher-resolution imaging and AI-driven diagnostics. Facilities preparing for a doubling of mammography archives in under five years deployed cloud-connected NAS to manage spiking capacities without service interruptions.[4]Nasuni Corporation, “The Great Healthcare File Migration,” nasuni.com
BFSI followed as another heavyweight, leveraging encryption and immutable snapshots to satisfy regulatory mandates. Retail, media, and government agencies adopted the technology for parallel editing workflows, omnichannel data distribution, and citizen-service digitization. Pure Storage’s FlashBlade illustrated how integrated AI pipelines and scalable file systems accelerated radiology inference, underscoring why healthcare’s share of the network-attached storage market size is on track to expand meaningfully.
Geography Analysis
North America held 39% of 2024 revenue owing to deep cloud connectivity, a concentration of hyperscale buyers, and a mature channel ecosystem. United States enterprises continued to refresh file platforms to support AI inference as well as to satisfy rising cyber-insurance requirements. Canada and Mexico made progress in finance, government, and manufacturing upgrades, reinforcing the region’s heavyweight status within the network attached storage market.
Asia-Pacific registered the quickest trajectory, clocking an expected 18% CAGR for 2025-2030. China’s stimulus for digital infrastructure, India’s 5G rollout, and Japan’s investment in edge manufacturing robotics amplified capacity deployments. Local ODMs offered price-competitive all-flash gear, giving domestic firms alternatives to foreign incumbents. The combination of rising digital maturity and ambitious data-center construction positions Asia-Pacific to lift its slice of future network attached storage market share.
Europe remained significant, helped by GDPR-driven compliance spending and edge computing in automotive and pharmaceutical corridors. The Middle East and Africa saw early adoption in smart-city and oil-field telemetry projects, while Latin America trended upward more gradually as broadband quality and data-sovereignty frameworks matured. Across all regions, the common denominator was heightened scrutiny of data residency, further validating hybrid and edge-heavy deployment strategies sewn into the network attached storage market.
Competitive Landscape
The sector displayed moderate concentration, with Dell Technologies accounting for 26% of 2023 enterprise storage revenue. Competitors, including Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, NetApp, and Huawei, vied for share by emphasizing autonomous cyber-resilience, AI toolchains, and policy-based orchestration rather than raw spindle counts. NetApp’s autonomous ransomware protection, which achieved a 99% detection rate, illustrated how security differentiation can sway purchasing decisions.
Strategic patterns revolved around building an intelligent data infrastructure that spans file, block, and object while offering uniform telemetry. Vendors invested in zero-trust architectures and metadata engines capable of feeding GenAI tools. Western Digital’s composable fabric solutions and Synology’s decision to lock drives and SSDs to its ecosystem highlighted divergent approaches to vertical integration and ecosystem control.
Start-ups challenged incumbents with cloud-native designs that strip away proprietary disks, routing warm data straight into hyperscale object stores. Although none yet approached double-digit market share, their rapid feature cadence pressured established vendors to accelerate roadmap deliveries. Over the forecast horizon, competition is expected to intensify around turnkey edge bundles and managed-service subscription models that flatten procurement hurdles, reshaping rivalry inside the broader network attached storage market.
Network Attached Storage (NAS) Industry Leaders
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Hewlett-Packard Development Company
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Hitachi Data Systems Corporation
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International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation
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Dell EMC
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Seagate Technology PLC
- *Disclaimer: Major Players sorted in no particular order
Recent Industry Developments
- May 2025: Western Digital advanced its storage stack for AI/ML and software-defined workloads with the Ultrastar Data102 ORv3 JBOD and OpenFlex Data24 4100 EBOF, validated through the Open Composable Compatibility Lab.
- May 2025: Synology shifted strategy by enforcing a hard-drive and SSD lock-in policy across its 2025 NAS product line.
- February 2025: NetApp unveiled autonomous ransomware protection achieving 99% detection accuracy and extending the feature to block workloads.
- April 2025: The Global Electronics Council proposed adding enterprise data storage to the EPEAT ecolabel, signaling tightening sustainability expectations
- October 2024: NetApp rebranded its portfolio as Intelligent Data Infrastructure at Insight 2024, positioning itself between AI frameworks and enterprise data.
Research Methodology Framework and Report Scope
Market Definitions and Key Coverage
Our study treats the network-attached storage (NAS) market as the revenue generated from purpose-built file-level storage appliances that attach to TCP/IP or InfiniBand networks and present a shared namespace to client devices. Systems can be on-premise, cloud-integrated, or hybrid, provided they retain NAS semantics, embedded controllers, and native file protocols such as NFS, SMB, or AFP.
Scope exclusion: Pure object stores, direct-attached drives, storage area networks, and standalone public-cloud file shares that are not marketed as NAS are purposely left outside the boundary.
Segmentation Overview
- By Type
- Scale-up
- Scale-out
- By End-user Industry
- BFSI
- IT and Telecom
- Healthcare
- Retail and E-commerce
- Media and Entertainment
- Government and Public Sector
- Others (Education, Manufacturing)
- By Deployment
- On-premise
- Cloud
- Hybrid
- By Product Tier
- High-end / Enterprise
- Mid-market
- Low-end / SOHO
- By Geography
- North America
- United States
- Canada
- Mexico
- Europe
- United Kingdom
- Germany
- France
- Italy
- Rest of Europe
- Asia-Pacific
- China
- Japan
- India
- South Korea
- Rest of Asia
- Middle East
- Israel
- Saudi Arabia
- United Arab Emirates
- Turkey
- Rest of Middle East
- Africa
- South Africa
- Egypt
- Rest of Africa
- South America
- Brazil
- Argentina
- Rest of South America
- North America
Detailed Research Methodology and Data Validation
Primary Research
Mordor analysts interviewed NAS engineers at regional system integrators, channel partners in North America, Europe, and Asia, and procurement managers from healthcare and media firms. These calls tested density assumptions, average selling prices, and emerging hybrid adoption patterns that secondary sources rarely quantify. Follow-up surveys with VARs confirmed refresh cycles and typical capacity per rack.
Desk Research
We began with granular trade statistics and public filings from sources such as the International Trade Center, United States Census IT hardware import tables, and Eurostat production indices. Industry usage data from the ITU, workload trends in IEEE Xplore papers, and price trackers in IDC quarterly storage trackers provided demand levers. Company-level shipment data was extracted from D&B Hoovers, while news and deal flows were screened through Dow Jones Factiva to sense near-term capacity moves. These materials built the factual spine for sizing.
Additional context was drawn from national telecom regulators, storage user groups, and patent families accessed via Questel, which highlighted architecture shifts toward scale-out clusters. This list is illustrative; many other openly available and subscription sources supported validation and clarification.
Market-Sizing & Forecasting
A top-down production and trade data reconstruct estimated annual unit pools, which were then multiplied by blended ASPs to arrive at 2024 and 2025 values. Results were checked with sampled bottom-up supplier roll-ups and channel checks to catch under or over-statement. Key model drivers include unstructured data creation per employee, edge workload attach rates, flash price curves, rack power budgets, regulatory data sovereignty mandates, and 5G edge node counts. Forecasts to 2030 rely on multivariate regression with scenario analysis, letting capacity growth, ASP erosion, and workload dispersion act as leading indicators.
Data Validation & Update Cycle
Outputs pass variance screening, peer review, and senior analyst sign-off. Reports refresh annually, with interim reruns when material events such as tariff changes or NAND shortages occur. A last-minute sense check before delivery guarantees clients receive the freshest baseline.
Why Mordor's Network Attached Storage Baseline Commands High Credibility
Published numbers often diverge because firms frame scope differently, convert currencies on separate cut-off dates, or lock in historical ASP paths before new flash price drops land.
Key gap drivers here include whether home consumer units are counted, if OEM software subscriptions are bundled, and how quickly analysts refresh currency and price decks. Mordor's page isolates enterprise, mid-market, and prosumer units, applies quarterly ASP updates, and revisits model variables every twelve months, which keeps our 2025 view balanced.
Benchmark comparison
| Market Size | Anonymized source | Primary gap driver |
|---|---|---|
| USD 39.60 B (2025) | Mordor Intelligence | - |
| USD 46.97 B (2025) | Global Consultancy A | Includes pure cloud file services and uses static 2024 FX rates |
| USD 34.50 B (2024) | Trade Journal B | Excludes hybrid NAS, projects with single-region growth multipliers |
| USD 28.80 B (2023) | Industry Outlook C | Relies on dated shipment estimates and assumes flat ASPs |
Taken together, the comparison shows that Mordor's disciplined scope selection, quarterly price recalibration, and mixed top-down and bottom-up validation yield a transparent baseline that decision makers can retrace and replicate with confidence.
Key Questions Answered in the Report
What is the projected growth of the network attached storage market from 2025 to 2030?
The market is forecast to expand from USD 39.9 billion in 2025 to USD 89.1 billion in 2030 at a 17.4% CAGR.
Which deployment model is growing the fastest?
Hybrid NAS, blending on-prem performance with cloud scalability, is expected to post a 21.1% CAGR through 2030.
Why is the healthcare sector adopting NAS systems rapidly?
High-resolution imaging and AI diagnostics are creating large data sets, pushing healthcare toward scalable NAS that can manage fast-growing archives at an 18.2% CAGR.
How large is scale-out NAS within the overall market?
Scale-out designs captured 47% of 2024 revenue and are preferred for environments requiring seamless node-by-node expansion.
Which region leads NAS spending today?
North America held 39% of 2024 revenue thanks to early technology adoption and heavy data-center investments.
What security feature did NetApp announce in 2025?
NetApp introduced autonomous ransomware protection that detects and blocks attacks with 99% accuracy.
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