On this page
On this page
- What Is Storage Gateway
- Gateway Types — Deep Dive
- S3 File Gateway
- FSx File Gateway
- Volume Gateway
- Tape Gateway
- Gateway Types — Full Comparison
- Architecture Patterns
- Hybrid File Share (S3 File Gateway)
- Disaster Recovery with Volume Gateway (Stored)
- Tape Backup Migration
- Key API Operations
- Security and Networking
- Storage Gateway vs Direct S3 Access
- Key Exam Scenarios
- CloudWatch Integration
- Automatically Published (AWS/StorageGateway namespace — every 5 minutes)
- Requires Setup
Storage Gateway
Storage Gateway is a hybrid cloud storage service that connects your on-premises environment to AWS storage. It runs as a virtual appliance (or hardware appliance) in your data center and exposes familiar storage interfaces — file shares, block storage volumes, tape drives — while actually storing data in AWS (S3, EBS, or Glacier) transparently.
The Hybrid Cloud Storage Problem
Organizations don't migrate to the cloud overnight. Most have years of data on-premises, applications that can't easily be moved, and compliance requirements that mandate keeping certain data on local infrastructure. At the same time, they want cloud economics — pay for what you use, no hardware refreshes, automatic durability.
Storage Gateway bridges this gap. Your applications see standard storage (NFS, SMB, iSCSI, virtual tape). Behind the scenes, the gateway caches frequently accessed data locally for low-latency performance and asynchronously syncs everything to AWS. You get cloud durability and scale without rewriting your applications or changing how they access storage.
The Three Modes
S3 File Gateway — exposes an NFS or SMB file share to on-premises clients. Files written to the share are stored as objects in S3. Use this to share files between on-premises systems and cloud workloads, or as a staging area for data migration to S3.
Volume Gateway — exposes iSCSI block storage volumes. Your servers see it as local disks. Volumes are backed by S3 and can be mounted by any iSCSI client. Good for backup and disaster recovery: you keep hot data locally and the full volume is backed up in the cloud.
Tape Gateway — presents itself as a virtual tape library (VTL) to your existing backup software (Veeam, Veritas, etc.). Virtual tapes are stored in S3 and can be archived to Glacier. This lets organizations eliminate physical tape infrastructure while keeping their existing backup workflows unchanged.
Caching and Bandwidth
Storage Gateway caches the most recently accessed data locally, so reads are served from the local cache (low latency) while writes go to the cloud asynchronously. You configure the cache size based on your working set. Network bandwidth usage can be throttled and scheduled so the gateway doesn't saturate your internet connection during business hours.