The bill never stops
Monthly storage looks cheap until you add up the years. Miss a payment and you can lose access to your own memories.
SnapVault: back up iPhone photos to S3-compatible storage Back up forever.
Back up forever.
Pay once.
SnapVault copies your photos and videos to a cloud bucket you own. Ditch the monthly subscription that never ends, keep full control of your memories, and let it sync quietly in the background.
Download on the App Store Coming soon to Google Play
Your files. Your bucket. We never see your photos.
One tap
Two uploads at a time, straight to your own bucket, quietly in the background.
The appPay once
Your storageUSD 0.006/GB·mo
−60%vs monthly
What is SnapVault
What is SnapVault, the iPhone photo backup app?
SnapVault is a photo and video backup app for iPhone (App Store name "SnapVault: Backup to S3 Cloud") that copies your camera roll to an S3-compatible cloud storage bucket you own. Instead of renting space through a monthly subscription, you can pay once for the app with the lifetime option and pay your storage provider directly at wholesale rates, typically around USD 0.006 per GB per month. You connect your own bucket from any S3-compatible provider, including Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi or Amazon S3, using your own keys. Photos and videos upload straight from your phone to your bucket, so they never pass through SnapVault's servers and the company never sees them. Backups run in the background and skip files that are already uploaded, so nothing is duplicated. Because the storage account is yours, you keep full access to every file even if you stop using the app. SnapVault is available on iOS, with an Android version in development.
SnapVault is an independent iOS app published by Black Box Code LLC. It is not related to NetApp's SnapVault backup software.
Who is SnapVault for?
SnapVault is built for people who want their phone photos backed up off the device without signing up to a monthly cloud storage plan. Typical users include iPhone owners whose camera roll has outgrown a free tier, families who want one backup destination they control rather than several per-person subscriptions, and technical users who already have an AWS S3, Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi or MinIO account and want their phone to write into it directly. Because SnapVault only needs an S3-compatible endpoint, bucket name and access keys, it also works with self-hosted object storage on a home server or NAS. It is not a photo viewer or a sharing service: it is a background uploader that keeps a copy of every photo and video in a bucket you own, so your library stays yours even if you delete the app.
The subscription trap Renting space for your own
Renting space for your own
memories, forever.
You're locked in
Your library is stuck inside one company's app and account. Switching means migrating thousands of files, if it's even possible.
The free tier is too small
A few thousand photos and a handful of 4K videos blow past the free limit. The only way out they offer is a subscription.
How is SnapVault different from a monthly cloud storage plan?
Compared with a monthly cloud storage plan, SnapVault changes three things. First, pricing: the app can be a one-off lifetime purchase, leaving the storage itself as the only recurring cost, billed by your provider at roughly USD 0.006 per GB per month instead of a flat tier price. Second, ownership: your photos live in an S3-compatible bucket under your own account, so there is no lock-in, no risk of losing access if a payment fails, and nothing to migrate if you change apps. Third, privacy: uploads go directly from the phone to your bucket, and SnapVault has no server that stores or can read your files. The trade-off is setup. You create a bucket and paste access keys once, a five-minute task the app walks you through, and there is no built-in web gallery or sharing. For a backup that you fully own and pay for once, that trade-off is the point.
How it works
How does SnapVault back up your iPhone photos?
Three steps to a backup that keeps running without you thinking about it. Set it up once and forget about it for good.
- 01
Connect your bucket
Paste the keys for any S3-compatible provider: Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi or Amazon S3. It's yours, with your own billing.
- 02
Choose what to back up
Photos, videos or both. Choose Wi-Fi only and let SnapVault skip anything already uploaded so nothing is duplicated.
- 03
Let it run
Backups carry on in the background, even while you sleep. You get a quiet ping when a batch finishes, and that's it.
Do the maths How much does SnapVault
How much does SnapVault
save you?
SnapVault saves money by replacing a monthly cloud storage plan with a lifetime app purchase plus wholesale storage you rent directly. The lifetime option is priced in your local App Store and never renews; a weekly plan is there if you prefer it.
Storage for a 200 GB photo library on an S3-compatible provider such as Backblaze B2 costs about USD 1.20 per month at the provider's list price of USD 0.006 per GB per month (as of August 2026), or roughly USD 14 per year. A comparable 200 GB monthly cloud storage plan at USD 2.99 per month costs about USD 36 per year. Over five years that is about USD 179 for the monthly plan versus about USD 72 for your own bucket, a difference of roughly USD 107 in storage alone, before the one-off app purchase.
USD 107 kept over 5 years
at 200 GB
at 200 GB
Prices are provider list prices in US dollars and can change; egress and API fees vary by provider, and Cloudflare R2 and Backblaze B2 charge nothing to download your own files within their free limits.
Cloudflare R2Backblaze B2WasabiAmazon S3
| Year | Monthly cloud plan (USD 2.99/mo) | Your own bucket (200 GB at USD 0.006/GB) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | USD 36 | USD 14 |
| 2 | USD 72 | USD 29 |
| 3 | USD 108 | USD 43 |
| 4 | USD 144 | USD 58 |
| 5 | USD 179 | USD 72 |
Built to own, not to rent
Everything a backup should be.
Your bucket, your rules
Files live in a cloud account you own and control. No vendor lock-in, no hostage situation. Cancel the app and your library doesn't move an inch.
Set-and-forget sync
Backups keep running in the background while you sleep.
Privacy first
Photos upload straight from your phone to your bucket. We never see them.
No duplicates
Only new files upload. SnapVault remembers what's already safe.
Parallel uploads
Send several files at once to clear a big library fast.
Multiple buckets
Organise backups across more than one bucket or provider.
A look inside
Quiet, clear and in your control.
01
The app sits idle with your destination bucket, region and library counts in view. Nothing uploads until you tap.
02
Tap the power button and SnapVault copies the camera roll to your own S3 bucket, several files at a time, showing each one as it goes.
03
Keep a bucket per phone, per family member or per provider. Tap one to make it active, swipe to remove it.
04
Wi-Fi only so your mobile data stays untouched, uploads in parallel, videos on or off. You set the pace.
05
Paste an endpoint, region, bucket name and keys. SnapVault tests the connection before saving. Works with AWS S3, Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi, DigitalOcean Spaces, Vultr and MinIO.
Questions
Common questions about backing up iPhone photos with SnapVault
Can I really pay just once?
Yes. SnapVault Pro comes as a lifetime one-off purchase on the App Store, priced in your local currency, with nothing recurring to us. If you prefer, a weekly plan is also available and can be cancelled at any time in your App Store settings. Either way, the only other ongoing cost is the cloud storage itself, which your provider bills directly, typically a few dollars a month for a large library and often under US$2 a month for 200 GB at S3-compatible list prices. If you stop using SnapVault, you pay nothing extra and your files stay in your bucket.
What is an S3 bucket, in plain English?
An S3 bucket is a folder in the cloud that you rent directly from a storage company, such as Amazon S3, Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2 or Wasabi, at wholesale prices of roughly half a cent (US) per gigabyte per month. "S3-compatible" means the provider speaks the same API as Amazon S3, so any app that can talk to one can talk to all of them. SnapVault connects to your bucket with the access keys you create and copies your photos there. You hold the account and the keys, so you are always in control.
Which cloud storage providers can I use?
Any S3-compatible storage: Amazon S3, Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi and self-hosted MinIO all work. Cloudflare R2 and Backblaze B2 are popular choices because they are inexpensive and don't charge to download your own files within their free allowances. You can also connect more than one bucket or provider and split backups between them.
Do you ever see my photos?
No. Your photos and videos upload directly from your device to your own bucket. They never touch our servers, and we have no access to your storage account.
What if I stop using the app?
Your files stay exactly where they are, in the cloud account you own. Stopping the app never locks you out of your own memories.
Is it on Android?
SnapVault is live on iOS today. An Android version is on the way. Add yourself to the list and we'll let you know the moment it lands.
Start backing up forever.
One payment. Your own cloud. Memories that stay yours for good. Download SnapVault and connect your first bucket in minutes.
Download on the App Store Coming soon to Google Play