Backblaze says AI traffic and neoclouds could shape future networks
(2026/01/30)
- Reference: 1769791128
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2026/01/30/backblaze_ai_traffic_bandwidth/
- Source link:
Cloud storage firm Backblaze says that a sharp rise in AI-driven data traffic to neocloud operators may signal a shift from internet-style traffic patterns to large, high-bandwidth flows characteristic of large-scale model training and inference work.
Backblaze, known for its regular reports on the [1]performance of its storage hardware , has now begun publishing a quarterly Network Stats report covering traffic movement into and across its infrastructure.
For Q4 2025, which is only the second period it has issued a network report, the firm observed a large amount of traffic between itself, neoclouds, and traditional hyperscalers from June through November.
[2]
Neocloud operators, or [3]GPU-as-a-service providers , specialize in offering AI training infrastructure and little else, while traditional hyperscalers such as AWS and Azure provide a range of services covering most workloads.
[4]
[5]
Backblaze tracks network traffic by type, differentiating between internet service provider (ISP) data and that associated with hyperscalers, for example.
[6]
Backblaze Q4 2025 network stats chart - Click to enlarge
It says that content delivery network (CDN), hosting, and ISP traffic all stayed largely within historical norms during Q4, but migration traffic and neocloud traffic both showed notable variation.
Migration traffic is data entering the Backblaze network over fiber connections used to transfer large amounts of data over private links, instead of traversing the public Internet, and this ramped up starting in August, before shrinking again after October.
Neocloud traffic, meanwhile, increased in July through November, peaking in October.
[7]
Backblaze says this is consistent with the AI lifecycle, where large datasets comprising images, videos, and metadata are ingested and consolidated, then exported for training and experimentation.
However, while the peaks in migration and neocloud traffic have now passed, it says the overall baseline level of traffic has shifted to a higher level.
Backblaze actually sees the most activity in its US-West region, where ISP regional traffic dominates, while the US-East region is where the neocloud activity is concentrated, such as in Northern Virginia where there is dense AI compute availability.
[8]Backblaze denies 'sham accounting' claims as short sellers circle
[9]Backblaze sees drive failure rates tick up, asks if AI can help
[10]Cloud computing has become so normal, it's invisible
[11]AWS's inevitable destiny: becoming the next Lumen
The difference is shown by the number of unique IP addresses Backblaze interacts with. In US-West, there are more unique addresses, while neocloud traffic centers around fewer endpoints, consistent with AI pipelines that make use of long-standing connections between storage and compute, the firm says.
This could herald a potential reshaping of network behavior by AI, according to Backblaze, as AI-driven traffic is concentrated and heavy and data gravity will tend to pull storage, compute, and network design into tighter alignment.
[12]
The firm says it will keep tracking these patterns as it gathers data on a quarterly basis to see if neocloud activity becomes cyclical. It also aims to explore trends like the ratio of IPv4 versus IPv6 traffic, and cross-cloud connectivity. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/06/backblaze_sees_drive_failure_rates/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/25/rentagpu_neoclouds_need_to_adapt/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://regmedia.co.uk/2026/01/30/backblaze-q4-2025-network-stats-chart.png
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/29/backblaze_sham_accounting_claims/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/06/backblaze_sees_drive_failure_rates/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/29/cloud_computing/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/26/aws_destiny_lumen_corey_quinn/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Backblaze, known for its regular reports on the [1]performance of its storage hardware , has now begun publishing a quarterly Network Stats report covering traffic movement into and across its infrastructure.
For Q4 2025, which is only the second period it has issued a network report, the firm observed a large amount of traffic between itself, neoclouds, and traditional hyperscalers from June through November.
[2]
Neocloud operators, or [3]GPU-as-a-service providers , specialize in offering AI training infrastructure and little else, while traditional hyperscalers such as AWS and Azure provide a range of services covering most workloads.
[4]
[5]
Backblaze tracks network traffic by type, differentiating between internet service provider (ISP) data and that associated with hyperscalers, for example.
[6]
Backblaze Q4 2025 network stats chart - Click to enlarge
It says that content delivery network (CDN), hosting, and ISP traffic all stayed largely within historical norms during Q4, but migration traffic and neocloud traffic both showed notable variation.
Migration traffic is data entering the Backblaze network over fiber connections used to transfer large amounts of data over private links, instead of traversing the public Internet, and this ramped up starting in August, before shrinking again after October.
Neocloud traffic, meanwhile, increased in July through November, peaking in October.
[7]
Backblaze says this is consistent with the AI lifecycle, where large datasets comprising images, videos, and metadata are ingested and consolidated, then exported for training and experimentation.
However, while the peaks in migration and neocloud traffic have now passed, it says the overall baseline level of traffic has shifted to a higher level.
Backblaze actually sees the most activity in its US-West region, where ISP regional traffic dominates, while the US-East region is where the neocloud activity is concentrated, such as in Northern Virginia where there is dense AI compute availability.
[8]Backblaze denies 'sham accounting' claims as short sellers circle
[9]Backblaze sees drive failure rates tick up, asks if AI can help
[10]Cloud computing has become so normal, it's invisible
[11]AWS's inevitable destiny: becoming the next Lumen
The difference is shown by the number of unique IP addresses Backblaze interacts with. In US-West, there are more unique addresses, while neocloud traffic centers around fewer endpoints, consistent with AI pipelines that make use of long-standing connections between storage and compute, the firm says.
This could herald a potential reshaping of network behavior by AI, according to Backblaze, as AI-driven traffic is concentrated and heavy and data gravity will tend to pull storage, compute, and network design into tighter alignment.
[12]
The firm says it will keep tracking these patterns as it gathers data on a quarterly basis to see if neocloud activity becomes cyclical. It also aims to explore trends like the ratio of IPv4 versus IPv6 traffic, and cross-cloud connectivity. ®
Get our [13]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/06/backblaze_sees_drive_failure_rates/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/25/rentagpu_neoclouds_need_to_adapt/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://regmedia.co.uk/2026/01/30/backblaze-q4-2025-network-stats-chart.png
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/29/backblaze_sham_accounting_claims/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/06/backblaze_sees_drive_failure_rates/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/29/cloud_computing/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/26/aws_destiny_lumen_corey_quinn/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aXzju-QwGnFUsOJROnj7sQAAAAM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/