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Continuous innovation keeps tape relevant
With each generation, tape gains density, stronger security and practical improvements to support long-term backup and archive strategies.
Skyrocketing data volumes, intensifying ransomware threats and long-term retention costs are forcing enterprises to re-evaluate where cold data belongs.
HDDs and cloud systems can store massive amounts of data, but they also entail costs, environmental trade-offs, and security trade-offs. For IT and data leaders, the issue is not if tape is outdated, but whether recent advancements have made it a more practical option for long-term backup and archive usage. Tape remains relevant for enterprise data protection for several reasons.
How tape capacity is growing
Higher cartridge density remains a clear selling point for tape. Worldwide data generation continues to rise, driven in part by AI workloads. Demandsage predicts that worldwide data volumes will reach 221 zettabytes (221 billion TB) by the end of 2026 -- a 22.09% increase from the previous year. That's 402.74 million TB generated every day, according to Exploding Topics.
As organizations expand their archive tiers to keep pace with analytics, AI and compliance, storage density becomes even more important. Over the past decade, tape capacity has increased by 400%. The current LTO-10 generation, introduced in 2025, delivers up to 40 TB native cartridges -- a 122% boost over LTO-9's 18 TB capacity released just four years prior -- and 100 TB compressed.
The long-term roadmap is another point in favor of tape. LTO Ultrium extends through LTO-14 and aims to double capacity with each generation. By then, tape is expected to have 365 TB native and 913 TB compressed capacity per cartridge. These predictions give organizations some assurance of how the format might scale to plan long-term backup strategies.
How tape improves cyber resilience
Tape is already a widely used secure backup technology. Since its inception, tape has provided strong ransomware protection through an air gap courtesy of offline storage. Vigilance is still key, however. While ransomware can't reach tape if it's offline, organizations can still unknowingly write compromised data to tape backups if the threat wasn't completely neutralized. LTO-3 introduced WORM and LTO-4 added hardware-based encryption to help prevent threat actors from tampering with data.
These capabilities support cyber resilience and can help organizations meet retention and recovery requirements, such as those in the 3-2-1-1-0 rule. Offline and immutable backups are widely recommended and may be required in some regulated environments. However, these capabilities are no longer enough to protect data.
As the computing world moves forward, so does ransomware. Tomorrow's ransomware capabilities will be different from today's as they try to outpace security measures. One longer-term area of concern is quantum computing.
Quantum computing is no longer theoretical. A report from McKinsey states that over 300 global organizations are working with quantum technology companies to solve business challenges and move from quantum pilots to applications. Quantum computing has the potential to solve some problems beyond today's technology. According to the report, quantum computing could generate up to $2.7 trillion in economic value by 2035. That same potential also makes it a prime target for bad actors to exploit.
While quantum computing can be used to strengthen security for enterprises, bad actors can use it to defeat current cryptographic protections. Threat actors can use quantum to break public-key encryption, harvest data now and decrypt it later and expose historical backups that aren't secure against quantum attacks.
LTO-10 is the first generation of tape to consider quantum readiness. It supports post-quantum cryptography key exchange, which can help protect data as computing power evolves. For organizations required to retain data for decades, this means historical data may be less vulnerable to quantum attacks.
Increased efficiency comes with tradeoffs
Compared to other backup methods, tape can help organizations reach lower TCO and gain a significant ROI in some long-term use cases. While tape has always had an edge in sustainability, it has never quite matched other methods in write and restore speed.
Energy and sustainability
It's no secret that tape offers significant sustainability advantages for enterprises. When offline, tape consumes near-zero power -- great for organizations looking to reduce energy consumption. Temperature control is the primary factor in tape's energy costs, especially in long-term storage environments.
To maintain tape's integrity, previous generations generally recommended storage conditions between 59 and 77 degrees Fahrenheit with 20% to 50% humidity. LTO-10 increases the recommended operating range to 95 degrees Fahrenheit and 80% humidity.
Write and restore time
Tape has also prioritized saving organizations' time during the read and restore process. LTO-5 first introduced partitioning to improve file location and retrieval. Prior to LTO-5, organizations had to read the entire tape to find specific files, but partitions enabled users to locate specific files more efficiently. LTO-10 has improved speed on the other end, eliminating the need for initialization, so tapes are ready for use the moment they're inserted. This reduces delays anywhere from 40 to 120 minutes.
However, this improvement came with a tradeoff. LTO-10 does not support earlier generations due to its redesigned head architecture. The return of backward compatibility depends on customer feedback and market requirements.
Nicole Viera is an associate site editor for Informa TechTarget's Data Technologies site. She joined the company as an editor and writer in 2024.
