A data library, data archive, or data repository is a collection of numeric and/or geospatial data sets for secondary use in research. A data library is normally part of a larger institution established for research data archiving and to serve the data users of that organisation.

Should you archive data?

The greatest benefit of archiving data is that it reduces the cost of primary storage. ... Archive storage also reduces the volume of data that must be backed up. Removing infrequently accessed data from the backup data set improves backup and restore performance, and lowers secondary storage costs.

What is an example of a data archive?

Amazon Glacier, for example, is designed for data archiving. This method is inexpensive, but requires an ongoing investment. In addition, costs can grow over time as more data is added to the storage cloud. Cloud providers usually store archived data on tape or slower, high-capacity hard disk drives.