Object Storage Ledger 2026
Ledger
Object Storage Ledger 2026
IBM Storage Ceph: Object Storage Ledger 2026 Scorecard
IBM's supported Ceph: the upstream RGW object store plus 24x7 support, Glacier tiering and a published support policy, sold per TiB with no list price.
Edition October 16, 20268 min read
Where IBM Storage Ceph put its effort, 2016 to 2026
Each square is one capability area in one year. The brighter it is, the more the area gained in the Object Storage Ledger that year; 1, 2 and 3 mark that year's biggest pushes.
| ’16 | ’17 | ’18 | ’19 | ’20 | ’21 | ’22 | ’23 | ’24 | ’25 | ’26 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S3 API fidelity | 3 | 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| Immutability and compliance | 1 | 1 | |||||||||
| Durability and resilience | 1 | 2 | |||||||||
| Performance and scale | 1 | ||||||||||
| Deployment freedom | 3 | 1 | |||||||||
| Security and multi-tenancy | 3 | 2 | 1 | ||||||||
| Operations | |||||||||||
| Protocols beyond S3 | 2 | 2 | |||||||||
| Lifecycle and tiering | 2 | 2 | 3 | ||||||||
| Ecosystem and openness |
no change+0.5+1+1.5 or moreScores out of 5 per area.
Biggest pushes overall: Immutability and compliance (+3.5), Lifecycle and tiering (+3.5), S3 API fidelity (+2). Already strong in 2015: Durability and resilience, Ecosystem and openness, Performance and scale.
Top focus each year: 2016 Durability and resilience; 2018 Performance and scale; 2020 Immutability and compliance; 2021 S3 API fidelity; 2023 Immutability and compliance; 2024 S3 API fidelity; 2025 Deployment freedom; 2026 Security and multi-tenancy. 3 of 11 years show no gain in any area.
Part of the Object Storage Ledger (edition 2026-10-16). How the scores work: methodology.
Snapshot
- Type: product
- Owner: IBM (public, USA). Red Hat's Ceph and ODF teams moved to IBM with a 2023-01-01 target; Red Hat, also IBM-owned, still lists Red Hat Ceph Storage 8 and 9 in its lifecycle table
- Engine: Ceph RGW (upstream Ceph) on Red Hat Enterprise Linux hosts; the upstream release inside 9.0 and 9.9.1 is not stated
- Licence: Subscription under the IBM International Program License Agreement, capacity metric in TiB; editions Pro, Premium, Edge and Developer; 60 day trial of Storage Ceph Pro; IBM Storage Ceph as a Service from USD 0.026 per GB per month (list price of standard configurations); software list prices not published
- Latest release: 9.9.1 (GA announced 2026-06-25) with fix updates 9.9.1.1 and 9.9.1.2; 9.0 GA 2026-01-27
- Support lifecycle: IBM policy for 8.1 and later: two years of support, one year of critical fixes, three years of access to existing fixes; Extended and Sustained tiers cost extra; upgrades between consecutive majors only
- Next milestone: none published
- Object lock: S3 Object Lock through RGW, named on the IBM product page; 7.0 carried a WORM certification with object lock (2023-12-08); Cohasset Associates assessed upstream RGW Object Lock in October 2023 (Ceph blog). Lock modes and legal hold were not re-read in IBM documentation; no Veeam, Commvault or Rubrik validation found in sources read
- Tier: Commercial software
- Archetype: Dependable builder
- Evidence grade: B. The IBM product page (editions, trial, as-a-service price) was read directly. The 9.0 content comes from a StorageNewsletter summary of IBM material (grade B). Release dates for 6.1 to 9.9.1, the support policy, the editions and the 7.0 WORM certification follow the Virtualization Storage Ledger's reading of IBM Community posts, IBM Support pages and the Red Hat lifecycle table. IBM documentation pages rendered empty for this pass, so no IBM release note was read in full. Steps from 2015 to 2022 track the upstream engine through Red Hat Ceph Storage versions and are grade C.
Scorecard
| Dimension | Score | Direction |
|---|---|---|
| Capability today | 81.2 / 100 | higher is better |
| Momentum since end of 2022 | +8.3 points (2015 to 2022: +27.4) | higher is better |
| Credibility | 16.5 / 25 | higher is better |
| Commercial risk | 11.5 / 25 | lower is better |
| Technical lock-in | 10.5 / 25 | lower is better |
| Integrator fit | 13.0 / 20 | higher is better |
| AI leverage | 3.0 / 20 | higher is better |
| Ledger Index | 62.9 / 100 | balanced weights; see the methodology |
Capability by domain, 2015 to today
Scores 0 to 5 against fixed anchors; total is weighted to 100.
| Domain (weight) | 2015 | 2019 | 2022 | Today |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| S3 API fidelity (15) | 2.5 | 2.5 | 4 | 4.5 |
| Immutability and compliance (12) | 0 | 0 | 2.5 | 3.5 |
| Durability and resilience (12) | 3.5 | 4.5 | 5 | 5 |
| Performance and scale (12) | 3 | 4 | 4 | 4 |
| Deployment freedom (10) | 2.5 | 2.5 | 3 | 3.5 |
| Security and multi-tenancy (10) | 2 | 2.5 | 3 | 4 |
| Operations (10) | 2.5 | 2.5 | 4 | 4 |
| Protocols beyond S3 (7) | 3 | 3.5 | 3.5 | 4 |
| Lifecycle and tiering (7) | 0.5 | 1.5 | 3.5 | 4 |
| Ecosystem and openness (5) | 3.5 | 3.5 | 3.5 | 3.5 |
| Total / 100 | 45.5 | 53.4 | 72.9 | 81.2 |
Year by year: 2015: 45.5 · 2016: 50.3 · 2017: 50.3 · 2018: 53.4 · 2019: 53.4 · 2020: 67.5 · 2021: 72.9 · 2022: 72.9 · 2023: 75.3 · 2024: 77.8 · 2025: 78.8 · 2026: 81.2
What moved the score
| Year | Domain | Change | Points | Trigger |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Durability and resilience | 3.5 → 4.5 | +2.4 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 2 (Jewel base): active-active multisite zones and per-bucket placement (grade C) |
| 2016 | Lifecycle and tiering | 0.5 → 1.5 | +1.4 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 2 (Jewel base): lifecycle expiration (grade C) |
| 2016 | Security and multi-tenancy | 2 → 2.5 | +1.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 2 (Jewel base): tenants and LDAP authentication (grade C) |
| 2018 | Performance and scale | 3 → 4 | +2.4 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 3 (Luminous base): dynamic bucket resharding and BlueStore (grade C); no S3 over RDMA or GPUDirect and no independent benchmark found |
| 2018 | Protocols beyond S3 | 3 → 3.5 | +0.7 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 3: NFS-Ganesha export supported; block and file from the same cluster (grade C) |
| 2020 | Immutability and compliance | 0 → 2.5 | +6.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 4 (Nautilus base): Object Lock in governance and compliance modes (grade C); no backup vendor validation |
| 2020 | Lifecycle and tiering | 1.5 → 3 | +2.1 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 4 (Nautilus base): storage classes with lifecycle transition (grade C) |
| 2020 | Operations | 2.5 → 3.5 | +2.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 4: dashboard with RGW management, Prometheus, ceph-ansible (grade C) |
| 2020 | S3 API fidelity | 2.5 → 3.5 | +3.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 4 (Nautilus base): bucket policies, notifications, lifecycle and SSE with an external KMS (grade C) |
| 2020 | Security and multi-tenancy | 2.5 → 3 | +1.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 4 (Nautilus base): STS, SSE with an external KMS, MFA delete (grade C) |
| 2021 | Deployment freedom | 2.5 → 3 | +1.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 5: cephadm containerised deployment on RHEL hosts (grade C) |
| 2021 | Durability and resilience | 4.5 → 5 | +1.2 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 5 (Pacific base): stretch clusters across two sites with a tiebreaker (grade C); no published rebuild tests |
| 2021 | Lifecycle and tiering | 3 → 3.5 | +0.7 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 5 (Pacific base): transition to a remote S3 cloud tier (grade C) |
| 2021 | Operations | 3.5 → 4 | +1.0 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 5: cephadm with rolling upgrades and 24x7 vendor support (grade C); no fleet manager or Terraform provider found |
| 2021 | S3 API fidelity | 3.5 → 4 | +1.5 | Red Hat Ceph Storage 5 (Pacific base): STS with web identity and S3 Select (grade C) |
| 2023 | Immutability and compliance | 2.5 → 3.5 | +2.4 | 7.0 (2023-12-08): WORM certification with object lock, after the October 2023 Cohasset assessment of RGW Object Lock; no backup vendor validation found, so 3.5 and no higher |
| 2024 | S3 API fidelity | 4 → 4.5 | +1.5 | 8.0 (2024-11): RGW IAM accounts for multi-tenancy; vendor describes high fidelity to the AWS S3 API including Object Lock |
| 2024 | Security and multi-tenancy | 3 → 3.5 | +1.0 | 8.0 (2024-11): RGW IAM multi-tenancy; FIPS mode through RHEL since Red Hat Ceph Storage 6 and IBM Storage Ceph 6.1 |
| 2025 | Deployment freedom | 3 → 3.5 | +1.0 | 8.1 (2025-06): Arm nodes; Storage Ceph as a Service (2025-03), Storage Ready Nodes and the Fusion CS1 appliance as optional forms; RHEL hosts required and no Kubernetes operator in the product itself |
| 2026 | Lifecycle and tiering | 3.5 → 4 | +0.7 | 9.0 (2026-01-27): Glacier S3 tier retrieval improvements and Glacier storage class management in lifecycle; per-user and per-bucket usage in the Prometheus dashboard for chargeback |
| 2026 | Protocols beyond S3 | 3.5 → 4 | +0.7 | 9.0 (2026-01-27): SMB Multichannel and multi-active NFS gateways after NFS v3, v4.1 and v4.2 in 8.0; SMB GA date not confirmed; NFS over TLS a technology preview; no Iceberg catalog, Azure Blob or GCS API |
| 2026 | Security and multi-tenancy | 3.5 → 4 | +1.0 | 9.9.1 (2026-06-25): RGW Public Access Block and certificate management in the dashboard; NFS over TLS still a technology preview; whether the 2026-08-19 CephX fixes (CVE-2025-30156 and others) reached the 9.9.1.1 or 9.9.1.2 fix updates is not confirmed |
Direction, 2023 to 2026
Each release item carries one theme and one driver (V vision, C customer need, M market window, U upstream, P portfolio).
| Date | Item | Theme | Driver |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-01 | Red Hat's Ceph and ODF teams move to IBM Storage; the product keeps a Red Hat-branded twin | Packaging | P |
| 2023-08 | 6.1: first IBM-branded release (GA 2023-08-18) | Packaging | P |
| 2023-12 | 7.0: WORM certification with object lock | Immutability | C |
| 2024-11 | 8.0: RGW IAM multi-tenancy; NFS v3, v4.1 and v4.2; SMB technology preview | Security | C |
| 2024-11 | 8.0: IBM Storage Ready Nodes | Deployment | P |
| 2025-03 | IBM Storage Ceph as a Service, a managed on-premises offering | Packaging | P |
| 2025-06 | 8.1: Arm nodes and stretch clusters with Arm | Deployment | C |
| 2025-06 | 8.1: Project Espial ransomware prevention and recovery | Security | V |
| 2026-01 | 9.0: dynamic single-bucket resharding without write pauses | Performance | C |
| 2026-01 | 9.0: Glacier tier retrieval and Glacier storage class management in lifecycle; per-user and per-bucket usage dashboards | Lifecycle | C |
| 2026-01 | 9.0: EC profiles 5+2 and 6+2, OSD and NVMe/TCP gateway failover under 5 seconds | Durability | C |
| 2026-01 | 9.0: SMB Multichannel, multi-active NFS gateways; NFS over TLS technology preview | Protocols | C |
| 2026-06 | 9.9.1: RGW Public Access Block, dashboard certificate management, BYOK-encrypted NVMe/TCP namespaces | Security | C |
| 2026-06 | 9.9.1: version numbering moves to V.R.M.F, so 9.0 is followed by 9.9.1 | Packaging | P |
- Centre of gravity: Packaging (4), Security (3), Deployment (2)
- Blind spots (no items): S3 API, Operations, Ecosystem, Licensing, AI
- Driver mix: Vision 7%, Customer need 57%, Market window 0%, Upstream 0%, Portfolio 36%
- Idea-to-need index: 0.11 (0 = demand-pulled, 1 = thesis-pushed)
Credibility: 16.5 / 25
| Criterion | Score | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Cadence | 4 | Two releases a year kept since 2024: 7.1 (2024-06), 8.0 (2024-11), 8.1 (2025-06), 9.0 (2026-01), 9.9.1 (2026-06), each with fix updates |
| Roadmap transparency | 2.5 | Release posts and documentation are public; no public roadmap or tracker for the IBM product; the upstream tracker is open |
| Say-do | 3.5 | Technology previews are labelled and some reach GA within a release or two; NFS over TLS (since 9.0) and SMB GA timing remain unconfirmed |
| Velocity | 3.5 | One or two object items per release: IAM accounts in 8.0, resharding without write pauses and Glacier retrieval in 9.0, Public Access Block in 9.9.1 |
| Lifecycle stability | 3 | The two plus one plus three year policy is long, but the owner transfer, two brand names for one lineage, the V.R.M.F renumbering and consecutive-major-only upgrades add churn |
Commercial risk: 11.5 / 25 (lower is better)
| Criterion | Score | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Price and licence volatility | 2.5 | No list price published; metric is TiB; no change in terms found since 2023, which cannot be confirmed without the price list |
| Purchase constraints | 2.5 | Subscription only in four editions; Pro needs a separate RHEL licence; a 60 day trial and an as-a-service option exist |
| Channel and access | 2 | IBM direct, Business Partners and resellers; downloads need an IBM entitlement |
| Owner stability | 2 | Large public owner; the storage business moved from Red Hat to IBM in 2023 and the Ceph and ODF portfolio was merged into one IBM group |
| Cost of staying supported | 2.5 | Two years standard plus one year of critical fixes per release; Extended and Sustained tiers cost extra; upgrades only between consecutive majors |
Technical lock-in: 10.5 / 25 (lower is better)
| Criterion | Score | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Formats | 2.5 | Objects striped into RADOS on BlueStore, the same layout as upstream; not readable as plain files |
| Export path | 1.5 | S3 and Swift reads and multisite sync; a crossgrade between Red Hat and IBM builds is documented; moving to community Ceph is the same engine but outside supported paths |
| Stack coupling | 3 | Whole Ceph cluster on Red Hat Enterprise Linux hosts |
| Hardware / cloud coupling | 1 | Any x86 or Arm server on the RHEL compatibility list; Ready Nodes, the CS1 appliance and Call Home are optional |
| Skills and tooling coupling | 2.5 | Ceph skills plus IBM tooling such as Call Home and cephadm-ansible |
Integrator fit: 13.0 / 20
| Criterion | Score | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Partner programme openness | 3 | IBM Business Partner route and resellers; programme terms not read |
| Multi-tenancy and self-service | 3.5 | RGW IAM accounts since 8.0, tenants, quotas and per-user usage dashboards; no self-service portal or metering product |
| API and infrastructure-as-code | 3.5 | Admin Ops and REST APIs, cephadm-ansible modules; no Terraform provider found |
| Skills and certification | 3 | IBM training, Redbooks and technical webcasts; no exam-based certification found |
AI leverage: 3.0 / 20
How the product uses AI, scored per year like capability. Only GA counts.
| Criterion | 2019 | 2022 | Today | Latest step |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AI workload support | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2015: S3 store for AI and analytics data, S3A as a replacement for HDFS; positioned for watsonx.data lakehouse workloads; no GPU data path or S3 over RDMA |
| AI platform stack | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2015: None; a Redbook on IBM Storage Ceph as a data lakehouse is guidance, not a product feature |
| AI-assisted operations | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2015: None; Call Home to IBM Storage Insights is telemetry |
| Agent openness | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2015: S3, Admin Ops and REST APIs that agents can drive; no MCP server found |
Year by year: 2015: 3 · 2016: 3 · 2017: 3 · 2018: 3 · 2019: 3 · 2020: 3 · 2021: 3 · 2022: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2024: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2026: 3
AI say-do, 2023 to 2026: 0 AI items announced; 0 GA, 0 still preview, 0 pending, 0 dropped. IBM's AI statements for Storage Ceph are positioning (storage for watsonx.data, analytics and lakehouses); no dated AI feature was announced from 2023 to 2026.
IBM sells Storage Ceph as the data layer under its AI and analytics products and has put no AI inside it. Operators get APIs and Call Home telemetry, and there is no agent interface.
Reading
IBM Storage Ceph matches the upstream engine on the S3 surface, durability and multisite, and adds what an enterprise buyer pays for: 24x7 support, a published two plus one year support policy, FIPS through RHEL, Glacier tiering in 9.0 and a WORM certification since 7.0. That puts its capability level with upstream RGW and its immutability at the same 3.5, because no backup vendor validation was found for either. The costs are commercial: subscription per TiB with no public price, RHEL hosts only, and one lineage sold under two brands after the 2023 transfer from Red Hat. Before buying it as a backup target, ask IBM for the WORM certification document, the supported Object Lock modes and any Veeam or Commvault listing, and check whether the 2026-08-19 CephX fixes are in the fix update you will install.
Open questions and items to re-score
- IBM list prices per TiB and the differences between the Pro, Premium, Edge and Developer editions were not found.
- Calendar end-of-support dates for 7.x, 8.x and 9.x were not read; only the policy text was.
- The upstream Ceph release inside 9.0 and 9.9.1 is not stated on the pages read.
- Whether the 9.9.1.1 or 9.9.1.2 fix updates carry the 2026-08-19 CephX fixes is unconfirmed.
- The scope of the 7.0 WORM certification and who issued it; Veeam Ready, Commvault and Rubrik status.
- SMB GA date and Project Espial GA status.
- Whether Red Hat still sells Red Hat Ceph Storage separately (an IBM-hosted PDF is titled Red Hat Ceph Storage 9.0 Release Notes).
- Red Hat Ceph Storage 1.3 to 5 steps (2015 to 2021) are dated from the upstream base of each release, not from release notes read.
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