Google today announced their next initiative, Google Drive, and in the process put to bed one of the internet’s long held rumors.  In a post from Sundar Pichai, SVP, Chrome & Apps, we learn that Google Docs has evolved to become Google Drive and that everyone gets 5GB of storage to start.

Much like Google Docs already provides, Drive will give users cloud-hosted storage with access to images, PDF’s, videos, and other files.  Similarly, if you want to share content or access, the process is the same as before.  And, thanks to the power of Google, there’s a universal search built-in which even recognizes OCR from scanned documents.

Features of Google Drive, as outlined by Google:

• Create and collaborate. Google Docs is built right into Google Drive, so you can work with others in real time on documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Once you choose to share content with others, you can add and reply to comments on anything (PDF, image, video file, etc.) and receive notifications when other people comment on shared items.
• Store everything safely and access it anywhere (especially while on the go). All your stuff is just… there. You can access your stuff from anywhere—on the web, in your home, at the office, while running errands and from all of your devices.
• Search everything. Search by keyword and filter by file type, owner and more. Drive can even recognize text in scanned documents using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology. This technology is still in its early stages, and we expect it to get better over time.

What happens if you need more than 5GB of storage?  Google is providing a number of larger options, each with its respective pricing.  For only $2.49/month, users can upgrade to 25GB of storage, or five times the free bucket.  Need even more?  Why not pick up 100GB of storage at $4.99/month or go all out with 1TB of storage for $49.99/month.  Whatever storage option you upgrade to, Google will bump your Gmail account up to 25GB of storage in the process!

Google Drive (Google Play Store)