Recording Storage Cost Calculator

Why storage costs matter

Bat survey data is typically retained 6–10 years for audit and re-analysis purposes. There is no formal regulatory minimum in NL, UK, or DK — but client agreements and quality-management standards commonly require multi-year retention. We use 9 years as the calculator default. Most ecologists underestimate the cumulative cost because they think in terms of one season at a time rather than the full lifecycle.

Azure Blob Storage is reliable and widely used, but costs add up. At ~£0.17/GB/year (Hot tier), a consultancy with 500 GB per season is paying hundreds annually — and the bill grows every year as previous seasons' data accumulates.

Older seasons can be moved to Azure Cool tier (~£0.0095/GB/month, ~40% less than Hot) once they are rarely re-accessed. Most consultants keep everything in Hot for instant retrievability — but if your archive will sit untouched, Cool can roughly halve storage cost on aged data.

BioSonic includes 9 years of EU-hosted cloud storage as part of the analysis subscription. No marginal cost per GB stored. No infrastructure to manage. Your recordings are safe and accessible from any browser.

Where the GB estimates come from

The GB-per-night figures are based on typical field deployments and manufacturer specifications. Most bat detectors use triggering to record only when bat-like sounds are detected, producing far less data than continuous recording. AudioMoth can be configured for either triggered or continuous recording — continuous mode at 256 kHz × 10-hour night ≈ 17 GB; at 384 kHz × 10 hours ≈ 28 GB.

Actual volumes vary with bat activity, trigger sensitivity, recording duration, and sample rate. The defaults are representative mid-range estimates. Use the GB per night field to enter your own measured value if you know it.

Azure cost estimate based on Azure Blob Storage Hot tier pricing for UK South (~£0.0142/GB/month) as of April 2026. BioSonic storage is included in the per-GB analysis subscription. GB-per-night estimates are approximate and will vary by site and configuration.