In 2013 Backblaze saw ~14% avg failure rate at 3 years 3 months. Drive useful life: 4 years, roughly.

In 2021, Backblaze saw ~14% failure rate at 7 years 9 months. Drive useful life: about 6 years.

That gave us what was a stable-seeming, old "replace drives at 5 years, or you're getting risky" rule of thumb (unless you prefer to replace on failure, of course).

In 2025, Backblaze saw ~5% failure rate at 10 years 3 months. Drive useful life: ~10 years, roughly!

Thanks for all the HDD improvements, industry!