Global Scale Out NAS Market Assessment, By Interface [Fibre Channel, Ethernet, InfiniBand], By Deployment [On-premises, Cloud, Hybrid], By Application [High-Performance Computing, Big Data Analytics, Media and Entertainment, Cloud Computing, Others], Region, Opportunities and Forecast, 2018-2032F

Global scale out NAS market is projected to witness a CAGR of 15.58% during the forecast period 2025-2032, growing from USD 45.09 billion in 2024 to USD 143.56 billion in 2032. The global scale out NAS market is experiencing significant growth, driven by the increasing need for high-capacity, scalable storage solutions to manage unstructured data and AI-driven workloads. With rising adoption across industries such as BFSI, healthcare, and media and entertainment, scale-out NAS is becoming a critical component of modern data infrastructure.

Report Attribute	Details
Base Year	2024
Forecast Period	2025-2032F
Historical Period	2018-2023
Projected Growth Rate	CAGR of 15.58% between 2024 and 2032
Revenue Forecast in 2032	USD 143.56 billion

Since digital changes are faster in industries, enterprises require scalable, high-performance, and cost-effective storage solutions that can be easily adapted to accommodate increasing dynamic charge and data volume. Unlike traditional storage systems, the scale-out enables NAS organizations to expand the storage capacity by adding nodes without disrupting operations. This architecture is significant for AI, Analytics, and high-demonstration computing environments where agility, speed, and real-time data access are essential. Businesses are also adopting hybrid and multi-cloud strategies, which increases the demand for NAS systems that offer seamless integration with public cloud platforms. As global data manufacturing continues to grow rapidly, scale-out NAS is ready to become the backbone of modern enterprise storage strategies, which ensure agility, scalability, and operating flexibility in the data-operated world.

Rising AI and Machine Learning Workloads Driving the Need for High-Performance, Scalable Storage

As an increasing number of companies worldwide add machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) applications, scale-out NAS devices have been in greater demand. Such intelligent apps tend to demand the processing of large quantities of data at tremendous rates, which requires storage systems that provide scalability, concurrent data access, and low-latency performance. Scale-out NAS is a preferred solution since it encompasses elements of horizontal scaling and data distribution, among others. Scale-out NAS is advantaged by the fact that it is simple to scale out through the addition of nodes without downtime, ensuring maximum sustained availability and performance. This feature is especially relevant in industries such as autonomous driving, life sciences, media and entertainment, and high-end research, where huge-scale-out real-time data processing is standard. The provision of sophisticated features such as intelligent tiering, distributed metadata management, and hybrid cloud support further contributes to overall use in AI environments.

For instance, in June 2024, IBM delivered FlashSystem OS levels 8.6–8.7, such as real-time multi-layer ransomware detection and enhanced scale-out grid capabilities. These deliveries continue to support IBM's emphasis on secure, scale-out AI-ready storage infrastructure. As expanding businesses make AI investments to compete, intelligent and scalable NAS solutions will be vital to delivering the performance, agility, and resiliency needed to tackle complex, data-intensive AI workloads.

Proliferation of High-Resolution Content and Unstructured Data Across Enterprises Drives Market

With digital data in the form of videos, images, IoT log data, and documents growing exponentially, organizations are suddenly confronted with a surge of unstructured data. In contrast to structured data, which comfortably fits into databases, unstructured data requires scalable, distributed storage media that add capacity as needed, while maintaining rapid access times and centralized control. Scale-out NAS designs are designed specifically to manage this onslaught of data by providing storage platforms with the ability to scale out instead of scaling up, thereby meeting capacity and performance needs with precision.

Content creators, broadcasting media companies, surveillance agencies, and research institutions are among the industries that produce high-definition content daily. Those kinds of files typically occupy terabytes of capacity and must be kept safe, accessed quickly, and processed in real-time. Scale-out NAS systems provide ease of use for such workloads, offering features such as parallel data access, automatic load balancing, and integration with content management systems. Additionally, their compatibility with cloud infrastructure enables hybrid deployments, which are also responsible for providing global content and facilitating remote collaboration among teams. For example, in September 2024, Ugreen launched its AI-based NASync series at IFA 2024, comprising the NASync IDX6011 and IDX6012. Both devices incorporate Large Language Models (LLMs) and 10GbE high-speed networks. This is an excellent illustration of how scale-out NAS solutions are evolving to support high-volume content, in addition to intelligent data management, making them extremely vital to digital businesses today. As the volume of unstructured data continues to grow, scale out NAS systems will increasingly rely on them to keep pace with such dynamic environments.

Cloud Segment Dominates the Global Scale Out NAS Market Share

The cloud segment now leads the worldwide scale-out NAS market due to its unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and affordability. As businesses shift towards hybrid and remote work patterns, cloud-based storage capabilities have become a key driver for enabling smooth access to mission-critical data in dispersed environments. In contrast to the conventional on-premises approach, which requires significant capital expenditure on hardware and maintenance, cloud NAS enables organizations to follow a pay-as-you-use strategy, keeping initial costs low and facilitating dynamic growth scaling based on data expansion. Additionally, cloud-integrated scale-out NAS implementations offer superior disaster recovery, ease of data backup, and exceptional security, all of which are critical in today's data-driven operations. The ability to integrate proficiently with artificial intelligence (AI), big data analytics, and DevOps workflows is also driving the further adoption of cloud NAS in industries such as media & entertainment, healthcare, research, and financial services.

For example, NetApp, Inc. awarded the 2025 Google Cloud Infrastructure Modernization Partner of the Year for Storage in April 2025. This award recognizes the increased partnership between storage vendors and cloud providers in providing scalable and intelligent storage architecture. NetApp's collaboration with Google Cloud through NetApp Volumes enables businesses to modernize workloads effectively with greater agility and security. As companies continue to place greater importance on agility, performance, and centralized management, the cloud segment is poised to remain the market leader for the near-term global scale out NAS market.             

North America Leads the Global Scale Out NAS Market

North America is at the forefront of the total worldwide NAS market due to the region's early adoption of pioneering technologies, its strong presence of top vendors, and increasing cloud infrastructure. The United States has numerous data centers fueled by IBM's big data and AI research labs, as well as entities in mass-scale sectors such as banking, medicine, media, and government, all of which require top-shelf, scale-out storage.

North American companies are increasingly leveraging AI, machine learning, and big data analytics in their operations, which require robust storage infrastructure with the capacity to process large amounts of data at a rapid pace. The favorable government policies towards digitalization and cybersecurity also drive demand for innovative and secure NAS solutions.

For instance, in September 2024, US-based technology leader NetApp, Inc. launched a next-gen iteration of its ONTAP software, dedicated to AI workloads and hybrid cloud integration. The launch signifies the region's proactive approach to adopting next-generation data infrastructure support and aligning with the tech lead. With an established IT infrastructure and ongoing investments in smart infrastructure, North America is likely to lead the global scale-out NAS market throughout the forecast period.

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Impact of U.S. Tariffs on Global Scale Out NAS Market

The U.S. tariffs imposed on imported technology components, especially from nations such as China, have brought cost pressures on the global scale-out NAS market. NAS systems primarily use hardware components such as memory modules, processors, and storage drives manufactured or assembled in tariff Zones. These tariffs have increased manufacturing costs for American and multinational NAS vendors, resulting in higher end-user costs or profit margin limitations. Furthermore, supply chain disruptions from the trade war have led companies to diversify their suppliers and local production, slowing down the release of products and making logistics more challenging. While large competitors such as NetApp and Dell have been accommodated through global sourcing strategies, their smaller counterparts are more exposed, which impacts competition and innovation. Therefore, U.S. tariffs have a direct impact on the pricing dynamics and supply agility of the scale out NAS market.

Report Scope

“Global Scale Out NAS Market Assessment, Opportunities and Forecast, 2018-2032F”, is a comprehensive report by Markets and Data, providing in-depth analysis and qualitative and quantitative assessment of the current state of global scale out NAS market, industry dynamics, and challenges. The report includes market size, segmental shares, growth trends, opportunities, and forecasts between 2025 and 2032. Additionally, the report profiles the leading players in the industry, mentioning their respective market share, business models, competitive intelligence, etc.

Report Attribute	Details
Segments Covered	Interface, Deployment, Application
Regions Covered	North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, South America, Middle East and Africa
Key Companies Profiled	IBM Corporation, Dell Technologies Inc., NetApp, Inc., Pure Storage, Inc., Fujitsu Limited, Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Quantum Corporation, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company, Infortrend Technology, Inc., Acceleron Labs
Customization Scope	15% free report customization with purchase
Pricing and Purchase Options	Avail the customized purchase options to fulfill your precise research needs
Delivery Format	PDF and Excel through email (subject to the license purchased)

In the report, the global scale out NAS market has been segmented into the following categories: 

• By Drone Type
  • Fibre Channel
  • Ethernet
  • InfiniBand
• By Deployment
  • On-premises
  • Cloud
  • Hybrid
• By Application
  • High-Performance Computing  
  • Big Data Analytics
  • Media and Entertainment
  • Cloud Computing
  • Others
• By Region
  • North America
  • Europe
  • Asia-Pacific
  • South America
  • Middle East and Africa

Key Players Landscape and Outlook

The worldwide scale-out NAS (Network-Attached Storage) market is relatively fragmented, with several prominent players competing to provide high-performance, scale-out storage systems optimized for various enterprise workloads, including AI, big data analytics, and hybrid cloud. Key players in the market are NetApp, Inc., Dell Technologies Inc., Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., IBM Corporation, Seagate Technology LLC, QNAP Systems Inc., and Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company, among others. Such firms are significantly oriented towards product innovation, strategic alliances, and cloud incorporation to achieve a competitive advantage. For example, in October 2024, Dell Technologies Inc. unveiled improvements to its PowerScale storage systems as part of its AI Factory architecture. These include liquid-cooled racks as well as enhanced performance capabilities that help address the increasing data needs of AI workloads, further solidifying Dell's positioning in the high-performance storage segment.

These strategic product upgrades are part of a broader trend: businesses today need storage that is scalable, secure, and AI-optimized. Competitors are not only enhancing hardware capabilities but also incorporating software-defined aspects and high-end analytics to improve storage efficiency and manageability. As data increases from IoT, edge computing, and hybrid work patterns, demand for smart, flexible storage will increase manifold. From now on, the industry is expected to witness substantial growth, particularly in areas such as healthcare, BFSI, media and entertainment, and research. Customers should prioritize vendors that provide modular upgrades, multi-cloud compatibility, and AI-based automation, as these elements are essential in addressing the changing needs of IT infrastructure in this era. With increasing competition, user-centric innovation would continue to be the differentiator in this fast-paced environment.

Key Players Operating in Global Scale Out NAS Market are:

• IBM Corporation
• Dell Technologies Inc.
• NetApp, Inc.
• Pure Storage, Inc.
• Fujitsu Limited
• Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.
• Quantum Corporation
• Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company
• Infortrend Technology, Inc.
• Acceleron Labs

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