Sia vs IPFS: Private Decentralized CDNs

Fixed-price contracts: Storage costs are locked in via on-chain smart contracts (~$2/TB/month). This matters for enterprise budgeting and applications requiring predictable, long-term storage costs without volatility.

Built-in redundancy: Data is automatically erasure-coded and distributed across a global network of hosts, providing durability guarantees without manual configuration.

Content-addressed caching: Files are fetched from the nearest peer, not a single server. This matters for global CDN use cases like serving website assets, videos, or NFT metadata with low-latency.

Massive ecosystem: Integrates with Pinata, Filebase, web3.storage, and frameworks like Fleek. The IPFS Gateway network provides immediate HTTP accessibility, crucial for web2 compatibility.

Higher integration overhead: Requires managing Siacoins (SC), wallet setup, and host selection. The native Sia-UI or renterd daemon is less plug-and-play than IPFS pinning services.

Slower initial retrieval: First-time file retrieval can be slower than IPFS due to on-chain contract formation and host negotiation, a trade-off for its economic model.

Persistence is not guaranteed: Data is cached, not stored. Long-term persistence requires a pinning service (e.g., Pinata), which introduces recurring, variable SaaS fees outside the protocol.

No native encryption: Content on the public IPFS network is accessible by hash. Private data requires application-layer encryption (e.g., using Lit Protocol or web3.storage's w3up), adding complexity.

Pay-for-storage model: Uses on-chain smart contracts and the native Siacoin token to create a cryptographically enforced SLA with hosts. This guarantees file availability for the contract duration (typically 90 days). This matters for archival data and enterprise backups where contractual uptime is non-negotiable.

Native revenue layer: Skynet's Skylinks and the Sia network have payment flows baked into the protocol. Developers can easily build paid applications, set revenue splits, or sell API access. This matters for commercial dApps and content creators who need a direct path from storage to monetization without building a separate payment stack.

CID-based immutability: Content is addressed by its hash (CID), making it inherently verifiable and portable across any IPFS node or compatible service (like Filecoin, Pinata, web3.storage). This matters for NFT metadata permanence, open data ecosystems, and developer tooling where vendor lock-in is a concern.

De facto standard: IPFS is the backbone for most major web3 storage projects (Filecoin, Polygon, Arbitrum) and has extensive libraries (js-ipfs, kubo) and infrastructure providers. This matters for protocols integrating storage (e.g., for DAO documents) and teams that prioritize ecosystem compatibility and developer familiarity.

Client-side encryption: All data uploaded to the Sia network is encrypted before leaving the user's machine. Only the data owner holds the keys. Skynet apps can leverage this for private user data. This matters for sensitive enterprise data, compliance-heavy industries, and applications where user privacy is a core feature.

Pinning services model: While IPFS itself is free to access, persistence is managed via pinning services (starting at ~$15/TB/month). This creates a clear, often lower-cost operational model for public, frequently accessed data like website assets, media files, or open datasets where long-term contractual guarantees are less critical.

Specific advantage: Contracts enforce 99.9%+ uptime with financial penalties (slashed collateral). This matters for mission-critical data like application binaries, legal documents, or backup archives where availability is non-negotiable.

Specific advantage: Fixed-price storage contracts (~$2/TB/month) with no egress fees for the host. This matters for high-volume, predictable workloads like video archives, scientific datasets, or blockchain snapshots where budget forecasting is essential.

Specific advantage: CID-based addressing ensures immutable, verifiable content and global deduplication. This matters for publicly referenced assets like NFT metadata, open-source packages (via IPFS-based package managers), or academic papers where integrity and global caching are key.

Specific advantage: Native support in Brave, Cloudflare's public gateway, and integrations with ENS, Filecoin, and Polygon. This matters for dApp frontends and public web3 applications requiring seamless user access without specialized clients or plugins.

Specific trade-off: Retrieval speed depends on specific host performance and contract terms, not a global CDN. This can be a challenge for low-latency web applications serving dynamic user content where consistent sub-100ms response times are required.

Specific trade-off: Data persistence requires active pinning services (Pinata, Infura, nft.storage) with recurring fees, creating vendor lock-in and unpredictable long-term costs. This is a risk for enterprise data retention policies mandating decade-long archives.