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There is no reliable one-size-fits-all NAS size for photos, videos, and backups. Add up the data you will actually keep, estimate how quickly it will grow, then account for the space used by drive protection, system overhead, snapshots, backup versions, and free-space headroom. The capacity printed on your drives is not the capacity available for files.
Start with the data you plan to keep
Measure your own collection rather than relying on a generic estimate such as “one terabyte holds a certain number of photos.” RAW and compressed images vary in size, as do videos recorded at different resolutions, frame rates, quality settings, bitrates, and codecs. Adobe’s export settings guidance explains how output settings affect file size and lets you check an estimated output size; it does not establish a universal average for phone or camera recordings.
- Choose what belongs on the NAS. Inventory the folders, phones, cameras, and computers you intend to include. Do not count temporary caches or duplicate exports unless you plan to retain them.
- Measure what you already have. Sum the sizes of the folders you will move, or sample representative photos and clips from each device and format. For video, record resolution, frame rate, codec, and bitrate where available; for exported video, use the export tool’s estimated size.
- Estimate your annual additions. Use your own recent capture history to estimate net new data per year, including any changes in how often or how you record.
- Choose a planning horizon. Multiply annual additions by the number of years you want the NAS to cover, then add that projection to the current collection. Synology’s 2026 enterprise planning guide uses a 3–5 year source-data projection; that is a useful example, not a required horizon for a home NAS.
For a rough scenario, if your measured collection is 3 TB and you expect to add 1 TB each year, a five-year source-data plan is 8 TB before RAID protection, system reservations, snapshots, backup versions, or free-space headroom. Those deductions must be addressed separately; the arithmetic is not a recommendation to buy a particular drive configuration.
Translate your data target into usable NAS capacity
Drive labels show raw capacity, not the amount available for your files. RAID protection uses part of the drive pool, and the NAS filesystem and system may reserve additional space. The result depends on the NAS, filesystem, RAID layout, drive sizes, and configuration.
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Use the manufacturer’s calculator to compare the drive count and protection layout you are considering. Synology’s RAID calculator is specific to Synology configurations; verify the actual available capacity in the storage manager after creating your pool and volume. Do not assume that the sum of drive labels equals usable file space.
Compare candidate layouts by usable capacity after protection, number of bays, tolerated drive failures, expansion options, and whether the arrangement can accommodate your drive sizes. A layout that meets today’s file total may not leave enough room for growth or version history. RAID protection is also not an independent backup: it can help keep a system available after certain drive failures, but it does not protect against every cause of data loss.
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- Better Way to Store Than External Drives: NAS offers centralized storage, automatic backups, remote access, and a wide range of RAID options for easy data recovery even if a drive fails. Massive Storage Capacity: Never worry about storage limits again. With up 144TB capacity, you can store 50 million 1MB photos or 98K 1.5GB movies，5 million 30MB songs! *Hard Drives not included.
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Budget separately for snapshots, versions, and operating headroom
Snapshots and versioned backups retain older states or copies, so they can consume more space than a single current copy. The amount depends on how often data changes, snapshot frequency, retention duration, compression, and deduplication. Estimate these needs based on your own policy rather than treating a fixed percentage as universal.
Synology’s 2026 enterprise guide for the PAS7700 planning context suggests a 5% snapshot reserve, a 4% metadata allowance, and 20% free-space reserve for performance, rebuilding or rebalancing, and background services. These are scoped examples from enterprise planning guidance, not blanket requirements for every home NAS or filesystem. Treat free space as operating room and future capacity, rather than planning to fill a volume to its advertised limit.
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Keep backups independent of the NAS
Decide whether the NAS is your primary archive, a working copy, or both, and plan other copies separately. Synology’s backup guidance describes the 3-2-1 approach: three copies, on two types of media, with one copy off-site. A USB drive beside the NAS can provide another local copy, but it does not address a fire, natural disaster, or theft affecting the whole site. Version retention also means the backup destination may need more capacity than one copy of the current files.
Drive redundancy and backup solve different problems. Synology’s Knowledge Center warns that RAID crashes and hard-drive failures can still cause data loss. Keep at least one independent copy away from the NAS, and keep an off-site copy for irreplaceable files.
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Check the workflow as well as the capacity
If you only upload or archive photos and videos, capacity and a dependable backup plan may be the main concerns. If you plan to edit large image or video files directly from the NAS, network throughput is also relevant. Synology recommends 10GbE or faster for that creator workflow; this is a workflow-specific vendor recommendation, not a minimum for ordinary photo backup.
- Archive or backup use: Size for the collection, projected growth, protection layout, version retention, and independent backup destination.
- Direct editing: Consider network speed alongside usable capacity, and check that the NAS, network equipment, and client devices support the intended connection.
Why photo-count estimates can mislead
Seagate’s 2015 SMB guide gives an arithmetic illustration of 50,000 RAW photos per 1 TB using an assumed 20 MB per photo. That is not a current universal RAW-photo average: actual file sizes depend on the camera, image settings, and format. Use your own representative files for planning instead of treating that example as a guarantee.
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- Enterprise-Grade Data Security & Privacy: Provides multiple RAID configuration options (0, 1, 5, 10) for flexibility between capacity, speed, and protection. Features granular user permission controls (supporting up to 2048 accounts). The Data Vault offers an extra layer of security by hiding and encrypting sensitive files. Certified for strong privacy and data protection by TV SD (ETSI EN 303 645) and TRUSTe
No authoritative cross-device average establishes how much space every consumer photo or video will use. Your measured files and actual recording or export settings are more useful than a generic “photos per terabyte” figure.
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