The storage track has been dominated by two giants in recent years. Filecoin, with its massive storage capacity of 23 EiB and a dense network of miners, maintains a very stable position; Arweave has established itself in the NFT and data archive fields with its concept of permanent storage. However, since Walrus's mainnet launch in March this year, this situation has begun to shift.

Let's first look at the differences in storage technology. Filecoin's approach uses Reed-Solomon erasure coding combined with extensive redundancy, often copying data more than twenty-five times, and employs two layers of proof mechanisms—PoRep and PoSt—to ensure data is not lost. It sounds very reliable, but the cost is quite high. Arweave has chosen a more aggressive route—Blockweave technology—where data is replicated 100 to 1,000 times, aiming to achieve true permanent storage with a one-time payment for everlasting preservation.

Walrus takes a third approach. It uses 2D erasure coding (developed by the team as the Red Stuff protocol), splitting data into fragments four to five times smaller and dispersing them across multiple nodes. Even if two-thirds of the nodes go offline, the data can still be fully recovered. This solution guarantees fault tolerance while significantly reducing storage costs. According to official data, Walrus's storage prices are much lower than Filecoin's.

This difference reflects varying understandings of storage needs. Filecoin is suitable for scenarios that pursue absolute security and have no budget constraints; Arweave targets the niche but high-value market of permanent archiving; Walrus has carved out a new niche in between—offering sufficient security with controllable costs. For users accustomed to Filecoin's high fees, it is indeed a good alternative.

Since its mainnet launch just a few months ago, Walrus has also been active in ecosystem development. The team is actively expanding application scenarios, and many Web3 projects are beginning to experiment with using Walrus for data storage. If this trend continues, the competitive landscape of the storage track is definitely going to change further.