# A question about the G-mail sign in page
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 12, 2007, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729 "2007-12-12T11:56:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/1 "2007-12-12T11:56:28Z")
I notice that on the left side of the gmail sign on page is a paragraph that reads
> [@](#):
>
> ```
> Lots of space
>
> ```
>
> Over 5669.492018 megabytes (and counting) of free storage so you’ll never need to delete another message.
The numbers are counting upwards all the time. How can this be? How can gmail be offering more and more free storage space in an ever-expanding amount? Is it just b.s. or are they somehow increasing the space they offer? Or, have they set a huge amount that nobody knows about and they are slowly counting up to that amount in a visible manner?
Everything else about gmail seems on the ball and well done. This one bit- on their front page no less- smacks of b.s. and showmanship. What’s the straight dope here?
Cartooniverse
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### Author:  [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/2 "2007-12-12T12:03:32Z")
Each email provider was trying to outdo the others in terms of how much space they offered. Google came up with this little trick to stay ahead of the competition - constantly increasing space.
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### Author:  [@Illuminatiprimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Illuminatiprimus)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/3 "2007-12-12T12:04:38Z")
Well I don’t know if the amount of space is ticking up exactly as it is displayed on the front page, but within my account the amount of free space I have has increased continuously in the two and a half years I’ve had it (I can’t remember when but at one point it jumped from 2gb to over 5gb, so it’s definitely going up).
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### Author:  [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/4 "2007-12-12T12:48:54Z")
[QUOTE=Cartooniverse]
I notice that on the left side of the gmail sign on page is a paragraph that reads
The numbers are counting upwards all the time. How can this be? How can gmail be offering more and more free storage space in an ever-expanding amount? Is it just b.s. or are they somehow increasing the space they offer? Or, have they set a huge amount that nobody knows about and they are slowly counting up to that amount in a visible manner?
Everything else about gmail seems on the ball and well done. This one bit- on their front page no less- smacks of b.s. and showmanship. What’s the straight dope here?
Cartooniverse
[/QUOTE]
I took it to mean that they have an ever increasing amount of storage space available for your email. I believe it is possible to offer this because most people will never approach the upper limits and maybe it is estimable how much the average user needs/uses. They could well have a large set of space set aside that they are gimmickly (is that a word?) counting up to, as you say.
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### Author:  [@yoyodyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yoyodyne)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/5 "2007-12-12T13:35:35Z")
I believe the counter is fairly accurate. Google has approximately 1/2 million servers, and possibly a million hard drives. Servers with failed drives must almost continously be taken offline and re-added with larger replacement drives. The counter probably has a smoothing function but I bet it tracks the actual amount of storage pretty closely.
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### Author:  [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/6 "2007-12-12T13:41:53Z")
I’ve wondered about this too. Would I be right in assuming the counter is only counting while you’re at that page, giving the impression it’s always increasing _at that rate_ while not actually doing so (but still increasing)?
In any event, I love my Gmail, and if they are fudging a bit with the figures, it’s still very generous.
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### Author:  [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/7 "2007-12-12T13:53:28Z")
I always thought that was mildly diverting to see the MB go up and up, I suppose its a better attraction than a once in a while upgrade from Hotmail.
Doesn’t Google have a huge complex of servers altogether at their headquarters, it doesn’t surprise me that they add storage constantly.
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### Author:  [@yoyodyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yoyodyne)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/8 "2007-12-12T14:02:19Z")
[QUOTE=TheLoadedDog]
I’ve wondered about this too. Would I be right in assuming the counter is only counting while you’re at that page, giving the impression it’s always increasing _at that rate_ while not actually doing so (but still increasing)?
[/QUOTE]
It’s surely just total storage / number of users, and so the same for everyone and always increasing.
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### Author:  [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/9 "2007-12-12T14:08:44Z")
[QUOTE=yoyodyne]
It’s surely just total storage / number of users, and so the same for everyone and always increasing.
[/QUOTE]
On reflection, a quick application of Occam’s Razor makes your theory much more plausible than mine.
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### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/10 "2007-12-12T15:06:01Z")
This probably works the same way “population” or “Nation Debt” counters work - It’s just an accurate estimate at any given time.
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### Author:  [@Illuminatiprimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Illuminatiprimus)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/11 "2007-12-12T19:17:10Z")
What I’d like to know is who the hell needs 5gb of email storage space anyway, it seems massively excessive.
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### Author:  [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/12 "2007-12-12T19:23:45Z")
[QUOTE=Illuminatiprimus]
What I’d like to know is who the hell needs 5gb of email storage space anyway, it seems massively excessive.
[/QUOTE]
Lotsa people take advantage of this and use their Gmail account like a backup drive, emailing important documents to their self.
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### Author:  [@gazpacho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gazpacho)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/13 "2007-12-12T19:26:20Z")
[QUOTE=Illuminatiprimus]
What I’d like to know is who the hell needs 5gb of email storage space anyway, it seems massively excessive.
[/QUOTE]
If you have attachments it is not very excessive. If you like sending photos and movie clips to your friends and they do the same you can easily run out of space.
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### Author:  [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2007, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-question-about-the-g-mail-sign-in-page/429729/14 "2007-12-12T21:53:59Z")
[QUOTE=yoyodyne]
It’s surely just total storage / number of users…
[/QUOTE]
I don’t think so, they can’t possibly have 5GB of actual free disk space for every user - if they did, most of their hard drives would be empty, because most of us don’t come close to filling up the mailbox.
The number is just a quota, an upper limit set by Google. It only affects those few users who would use \>5 GB if it weren’t for the quota. It’s probably calculated by estimating the number of such people and weighing it against their available storage space. If they raise the quota by 1%, that doesn’t mean they actually need 1% more storage space, because most people won’t immediately fill their mailbox up to the new quota.