Google Cloud Managed Lustre
Google Cloud Managed Lustre is a fully managed parallel file system for AI and high-performance computing workloads.
What Google Cloud Managed Lustre is
Google Cloud Managed Lustre is a fully managed parallel file system for AI and high-performance computing workloads. Documented uses include HPC simulations, modeling and analysis, and machine-learning training and inference. It supports throughput up to 10 TBps and storage capacity up to 84,016,000 GiB (80.1 PiB). POSIX compliance is intended to support existing applications, tools, and workflows. Instances can be mounted to Compute Engine VMs and Google Kubernetes Engine clusters. The service imports data from and exports it to Cloud Storage, including incremental transfers of new or changed files. Each instance can run only one transfer operation at a time. Data is encrypted at rest and in transit to and within Google Cloud, and per-instance policies allow maintenance windows and exclusion periods. A file can be no larger than 0.5 PiB, and a project can have up to 20 instances.
Good
- Throughput supports up to 10 TBps.
- Storage capacity reaches 80.1 PiB.
- POSIX compliance supports existing workflows.
- Incremental Cloud Storage transfers copy changed files.
- Data is encrypted at rest and in transit.
Watch out
- No free plan or free trial is listed.
- Unused provisioned capacity is billed.
- Only one transfer can run per instance.
- Projects are limited to 20 instances.
Who it suits
It suits teams running HPC simulations, modeling and analysis, or machine-learning workloads that need a parallel file system. It is designed for users who can provision capacity and mount instances to Google Cloud compute services.
Verdict
Managed Lustre combines high-throughput parallel storage with Cloud Storage transfers and compute integrations. Capacity is provisioned and billed even when unused, with file-size and instance-count limits to consider.
Plans and prices
From Google Cloud Managed Lustre's own pricing page, checked 4 Oct 2026.
| Plan | Price | What it gives you |
|---|---|---|
| Dynamic (25 MB/s/TB) | Free | Provisioned capacity is billed, including unused capacity · Throughput and IOPS included · Hourly pricing varies by month; monthly pricing is hourly price multiplied by hours in the month. |
| Dynamic (25 MB/s/TiB) | $0.06 a month | Block-level caching · hot/cold unified namespace · cacheable workloads · starting per GiB per month |
| 125 MB/s/TiB | $0.15 a month | Capacity-focused parallel workloads · starting per GiB per month |
| 250 MB/s/TiB | $0.21 a month | General-purpose HPC · AI inference · preprocessing · starting per GiB per month |
| 500 MB/s/TiB | $0.34 a month | High-performance balance · demanding AI/HPC · starting per GiB per month |
| 1000 MB/s/TiB | $0.60 a month | AI/ML training tier · throughput critical · starting per GiB per month |
The facts
Each one read from Google Cloud Managed Lustre's own pages, with the date it was checked.
What it does
- API surface
- Google publishes a v1 REST API with location, instance and operation resources and a lustre.googleapis.com endpoint.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Authentication
- Programmatic access uses Google Cloud authentication and IAM authorization, with workload identity federation recommended outside Google Cloud.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Availability target
- The Managed Lustre SLA specifies at least 99.9% monthly uptime for an instance.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Capacity
- The documentation lists capacity from 9,000 GiB to 12,240,000 GiB and maximum file size of 0.5 PiB.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Capacity limits
- The maximum file size is 0.5 PiB, and the maximum number of instances per project is 20.checked 4 Oct 2026
- Client operating systems
- The Compute Engine guide supports HPC Rocky Linux 8, Rocky Linux 9, RHEL 9, Ubuntu 22.04 and Ubuntu 24.04, with Ubuntu 24.04 limited to Arm VMs.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Client requirement
- Lustre client packages are kernel-version specific on Ubuntu, so kernel upgrades can require reinstalling matching packages.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Cloud Storage integration
- Managed Lustre provides managed high-speed transfers into and out of Cloud Storage.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Compatibility
- POSIX compliance supports compatibility with existing applications, tools, and workflows.checked 4 Oct 2026
- Compute integrations
- Instances can be mounted by Compute Engine virtual machines and Google Kubernetes Engine applications.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Developer tooling
- Documentation links REST, gcloud lustre commands, Terraform resources and a Cluster Toolkit module.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Dynamic tier
- The Dynamic tier adds scalable capacity, a caching layer and cache monitoring for cacheable workloads.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Independent technology announcement
- DDN describes Managed Lustre as a zonal service with petabyte-scale capacity, sub-millisecond latency, millions of IOPS and up to 1 TB/s throughput in its 2025 announcement.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Intended workloads
- The documentation identifies HPC simulations, modeling and analysis, and machine-learning training and inference as use cases.checked 4 Oct 2026
- IOPS
- Published limits reach 5,800 read IOPS and 5,600 write IOPS per TiB.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Licence: Lustre
- The community Lustre filesystem is open source; its kernel modules use GPL-2.0 with the Linux syscall exception and other components use compatible per-file licences.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Limit: project quota
- The quotas page documents a maximum of 20 Managed Lustre instances per project and 20,000 client connections per instance.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Limit: zonal placement
- The product is provisioned in an individual zone and the documentation recommends locating it in the same zone as client VMs or GKE clusters.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Maintenance
- Per-instance maintenance policies let customers specify maintenance windows and exclusion periods.checked 4 Oct 2026
- Maintenance behavior
- Planned maintenance can temporarily stop I/O responses, with typical downtime documented as two to 25 minutes.checked 15 Oct 2026
The company
- Company founded
- Gartner’s company details list Google as founded in 1998 and headquartered in Mountain View, California.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Company headquarters and size
- Google’s LinkedIn profile lists Mountain View, California headquarters and 10,001-plus employees.checked 15 Oct 2026
- Company legal name
- Crunchbase identifies the maker as Google LLC and lists it as a subsidiary of Alphabet.checked 15 Oct 2026
Money
- Limit: Google Cloud billing complexity
- The same Gartner review said billing complexity causes headaches despite positive overall experience.checked 15 Oct 2026
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