If you are a free OneDrive user and want to keep your storage, do this

Martin Brinkmann
Dec 11, 2015
Updated • Jan 4, 2018
Companies, Microsoft
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28

Microsoft announced back in November 2015 that it would downgrade storage on its cloud hosting service OneDrive for nearly any customer of the service.

Paying customers, those subscribed to Office 365 would be limited to 1 Terabyte of storage and no longer be able to take advantage of the unlimited storage offer the company made available in the same yaer.

OneDrive customers who upgraded their storage by 100 or 200 Gigabyte would see a reduction to 50 Gigabyte instead, and free users would see their storage decreased from 15 Gigabyte to 5 Gigabyte.

In addition, the 15 Gigabyte camera roll bonus would be removed as well.

The only reason Microsoft provided for the move was that some unlimited customers abused the offer.

The explanation did not add up considering that there was no need to "punish" free users and OneDrive users who upgraded their storage quota to 100 or 200 Gigabyte for the actions of some.

The reaction to the announcement was negative and it is likely that Microsoft lost customers after the announcement made the rounds. OneDrive alternatives were in high demand.

Today, Microsoft Group Program Manager Douglas Pearce announced a surprising turn of events. While Microsoft won't change its overall plans, it made the decision to make things more pleasant for free users of the service.

onedrive storage

Instead of limiting users to 5 Gigabyte of free storage with no recourse, it now allows existing users to keep some of the free storage.

In particular, free users can keep the existing 15 Gigabyte of storage and the 15 Gigabyte camera roll bonus, but only if they "sign up to keep the storage".

onedrive keep your free storage

The link points to a Microsoft OneDrive website where free users can opt-in to keep the 15 Gigabyte of storage and the 15 Gigabyte camera roll bonus.

The caveat? Users have to agree to "receive promotional emails from OneDrive" which they can unsubscribe from at any time. There is no link on that page though to do that.

Uncheck the promotional offer option before you hit "Keep your free storage".

Still, if you are a OneDrive user you may want to sign up to keep the free storage, and unsubscribe from promotional emails as soon as you receive one. The offer is valid until the end of January after which it expires.

Summary
If you are a free OneDrive user and want to keep your storage, do this
Article Name
If you are a free OneDrive user and want to keep your storage, do this
Description
Microsoft announced today that existing free OneDrive customers can sign-up to keep their free storage quota so that it won't be reduced in the near future.
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Comments

  1. The Dark Lady said on July 9, 2023 at 11:19 am
    Reply

    Martin, I would appreciate that you do not censor this post, as it’s informative writing.

    Onur, there is a misleading statement “[…] GIFs are animated images …”. No, obviously you don’t seem to have take much notice of what you were told back in March regarding; Graphics Interchange Format (GIF).

    For example, https://www.ghacks.net/2023/03/31/whats-gif-explanation-and-how-to-use-it/#comment-4562919 (if you had read my replies within that thread, you might have learnt something useful). I even mentioned, “GIF intrinsically supports animated images (GIF89a)”.

    You linked to said article, [Related: …] within this article, but have somehow failed to take onboard what support you were given by several more knowledgeable people.

    If you used AI to help write this article, it has failed miserably.

  2. KeZa said on August 17, 2023 at 5:58 pm
    Reply

    AI is stupid, and it will not get any better if we really know how this all works. Prove me wrong.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IYl1sTIOHI

  3. Database failure said on August 18, 2023 at 5:21 pm
    Reply

    Martin, [#comment-4569908] is only meant to be in: [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/07/09/how-to-send-gifs-on-iphone-two-different-ways/]. Whereas it appears duplicated in several recent random low-quality non relevant articles.

    Obviously it [#comment-4569908] was posted: 9 July 2023. Long before this thread even existed… your database is falling over. Those comments are supposed to have unique ID values. It shouldn’t be possible to duplicate the post ID, if the database had referential integrity.

  4. Howard Pearce said on August 25, 2023 at 12:24 pm
    Reply

    Don’t tell me!

    Ghacks wants the state to step in for STATE-MANDATED associations to save jobs!!!

    Bring in the dictatorship!!!

    And screw Rreedom of Association – too radical for Ghacks maybe

  5. Howard Allan Pearce said on September 7, 2023 at 9:13 am
    Reply

    GateKeeper ?

    That’s called “appointing” businesses to do the state’s dirty work!!!!!

    But the article says itself that those appointed were not happy – implying they had not choice!!!!!!

  6. owl said on September 7, 2023 at 9:50 am
    Reply

    @The Dark Lady,
    @KeZa,
    @Database failure,
    @Howard Pearce,
    @Howard Allan Pearce,

    Note: I replaced the quoted URI scheme: https:// with “>>” and posted.

    The current ghacks.net is owned by “Softonic International S.A.” (sold by Martin in October 2019), and due to the fate of M&A, ghacks.net has changed in quality.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/02/microsoft-is-removing-wordpad-from-windows/#comment-4573130
    Many Authors of bloggers and advertisers certified by Softonic have joined the site, and the site is full of articles aimed at advertising and clickbait.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/08/31/in-windows-11-the-line-between-legitimate-and-adware-becomes-increasingly-blurred/#comment-4573117
    As it stands, except for articles by Martin Brinkmann, Mike Turcotte, and Ashwin, they are low quality, unhelpful, and even vicious. It is better not to read those articles.
    How to display only articles by a specific author:
    Added line to My filters in uBlock Origin: ghacks.net##.hentry,.home-posts,.home-category-post:not(:has-text(/Martin Brinkmann|Mike Turcotte|Ashwin/))
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/01/windows-11-development-overview-of-the-august-2023-changes/#comment-4573033

    By the way, if you use an RSS reader, you can track exactly where your comments are (I’m an iPad user, so I use “Feedly Classic”, but for Windows I prefer the desktop app “RSS Guard”).
    RSS Guard: Feed reader which supports RSS/ATOM/JSON and many web-based feed services.
    >> github.com/martinrotter/rssguard#readme

  7. Anonymous said on September 14, 2023 at 6:41 pm
    Reply

    We all live in digital surveillance glass houses under scrutiny of evil people because of people like Musk. It’s only fair that he takes his turn.

  8. Anonymous said on September 18, 2023 at 1:31 pm
    Reply

    “Operating systems will be required to let the user choose the browser, virtual assistant and search engine of their choice. Microsoft cannot force users to use Bing or Edge. Apple will have to open up its iOS operating system to allow third-party app stores, aka allow sideloading of apps. Google, on the other hand, will need to provide users with the ability to uninstall preloaded apps (bloatware) from Android devices. Online services will need to allow users to unsubscribe from their platform easily. Gatekeepers need to provide interoperability with third-parties that offer similar services.”

    Wonderful ! Let’s hope they’ll comply with that law more than they are doing with the GDPR.

  9. sean conner said on September 27, 2023 at 6:21 am
    Reply

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