# Disk Used Trend

**Purpose:** Cloud storage consumption over time, across every collected cloud platform on one chart. A focused trend screen for the capacity dimension of cloud rather than the cost dimension.

![Disk Used Trend by All Cloud Platforms line chart with chart type and metric type selectors](https://visualoneintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/voi-docs-cloud-disk-used-trend.png)

## When to use it

- Establish the cloud storage growth rate for forecasting
- Confirm whether a cleanup or migration actually reduced consumption
- Compare consumption across cloud platforms on a single axis
- Distinguish a genuine trend from a step change caused by onboarding

## Key areas and metrics

- **Chart Type.** A dropdown scoping the chart, for example `All Cloud Platforms`, which plots one series per collected platform.
- **Metric Type.** A second dropdown choosing what is plotted, for example `Disk Used`. The chart title and y-axis label follow the selection.
- **Chart.** One line per platform with data labels on the points, zoom presets, explicit date pickers, a save control, an export menu, and a range brush beneath.

Because both selectors drive the same chart, the screen covers a matrix of questions rather than one. Change the metric to move from storage to another dimension; change the chart type to narrow from all platforms to one.

## Reading a sustained decline

A long smooth downward curve is unusual in cloud storage and worth understanding rather than celebrating. Genuine reduction from a cleanup programme looks like a series of steps, because deletions happen in batches. A smooth continuous decline more often reflects retention policy expiring old data at a steady rate, or a workload being drained ahead of a migration.

The distinction matters for forecasting. Retention expiry will flatten once the backlog clears; a migration will stop when the move completes. Neither continues indefinitely, so extending the observed slope will understate future consumption.

## Common actions

- **Use All for the baseline, then a shorter preset for the current rate.** The two together separate long-run trend from what is happening now.
- **Save the view** so the same window is used each review rather than a different one each time.
- **Read this beside the cost trend.** Storage consumption falling while storage cost holds steady points at a tier or redundancy change rather than a genuine saving.

## Tips

> A single series on an all-platforms chart means only one cloud platform is being collected. That is a collection-coverage fact, not a chart limitation.

## Related screens

[Storage by Device Type](https://visualoneintelligence.com/docs/cloud-storage-by-device-type/) gives the same storage question as a point-in-time split. [Cloud Growth Overview](https://visualoneintelligence.com/docs/cloud-growth-overview/) attaches cost to the resources behind the consumption. [Storage Trends](https://visualoneintelligence.com/docs/storage-trends/) is the on-premises equivalent.

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Source: https://visualoneintelligence.com/docs/cloud-disk-used-trend/