TWN Systems
Customer decision report
Report tool · photo storage
Immich cost and privacy calculator
A private company photo drive needs an operating owner
The cloud model is lower by $16,758 over 5 years before valuing the privacy and control gained.
Entered assumptions
- Use case
- Company photo drive
- Users or family members
- 8
- Current photo and video storage / TB
- 2
- Annual storage growth
- 20
- Current cloud photo cost / month
- $30.00
- Hardware or setup cost
- $1,200.00
- Storage expansion / month
- $25.00
- Off-site backup / month
- $35.00
- Operations hours / month
- 2
- Operations rate / hour
- $100.00
- Planning horizon
- 5
Company workflow checks
A shared photo library is also a business record. Decide who can upload, search, share, delete, export, and recover it.
- Roles, shared albums, client access, and deletion approvals
- Mobile upload, remote access, retention, and export
- Storage growth, database backup, file backup, and restore testing
- Support ownership when a device or account stops syncing
The privacy gain is real but conditional
A self-hosted library can reduce dependence on a consumer cloud provider and keep the library under your control. It does not remove risk. The server, backups, admin accounts, remote access, devices, and people with access still matter.
Recommended next step
Use the cloud total as the price of convenience, then decide whether control and privacy justify the extra operating cost.
Read the caveat
Immich backup guidance requires both the database and photo or video files. A database-only backup cannot restore the library.