Understanding the pricing model

Datto SaaS Protection offers a number of subscription options that provide billing flexibility. The pricing model varies by subscription type. This article describes the Datto SaaS Protection pricing model for each subscription type:

NOTE  Effective December 2025, Kaseya is ending its high-watermark pricing policy for Datto SaaS Protection and will transition to a committed minimum quantity and variable consumption policy. For details, see Committed minimum quantity billing FAQs.

To check your subscription type:

  1. Log in to Datto SaaS Protection as an administrator. (Refer to Logging in for the first time for details.)

  2. The Partner Portal Home page displays. Click Manage under Datto SaaS Protection.

  3. You are logged in to SaaS Protection and the SaaS Protection Status page displays.

  4. Click the Licenses tab. Check the table below to see which subscription type you are using. Examples of each subscription type are shown in this example:

The following topics describe how SaaS Protection storage and license consumption work with your Kaseya 365 User subscription:

See these topics to learn how storage consumption is calculated and how overages are handled for Datto SaaS Protection:

Backup storage consumption is determined by this simple calculation:

Total stored size divided by total number of purchased licenses, where:

  • 1 TB = 1024 GB
  • total stored size is how much storage is consumed by your data on the Datto SaaS Protection side, after compression and deduplication
  • total number of purchased licenses includes all pooled SaaS Protection licenses across all of your Google Workspace domains

Example:

A customer is currently storing 10 TB of combined data in SaaS Protection for all of their Google Workspace domains and:

  • the total number of purchased licenses is 200
  • the total stored size is 10 TB * 1024 = 10,240 GB
  • the storage used per license is 10,240 GB / 200 licenses = 51.2 GB / license

If this per-license usage is larger than the fair use limit in the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use policy, then the customer may incur the overage terms described in that policy.

For details about SaaS Protection terms of use, see How can I view my SaaS Backup terms of use policy?

Datto SaaS Protection has fair use limits that define how much storage you can consume before reaching an overage threshold and describe the overage policy that may be applied upon exceeding this threshold.

For Datto SaaS Protection, fair use limits are described in the product's terms of use. To view these terms:

  1. Go to the Kaseya Master Agreement, scroll down to section 1.a.i and click the Datto SaaS Protection and SaaS Defense product link.

  2. In the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use, view the fair use limits for Storage Entitlement For SaaS Protection.

If you're using too much storage, you can do any of the following to decrease your per-license storage usage:

  • Buy additional storage
  • Buy additional seats
  • Reduce retention
  • Unprotect seats
  • Delete some customers completely

Your Kaseya 365 User subscription includes one of these SaaS Backup modules: Datto SaaS Protection or Spanning Backup. The SaaS Protection pricing model is based on billable usage, as described in the topics below.

Commitment means the minimum length of time you agree to pay for the Kaseya 365 User subscription that provides the SaaS Protection service to your clients.

Your Kaseya 365 User subscription's commitment terms apply to all organizations being protected by SaaS Protection. Your subscription is set up for auto-renewal, meaning that all billable licenses will be automatically renewed for another term. The renewal term matches that of the original commitment (e.g., one year).

When you add an organization to an existing Kaseya 365 User subscription, referred to as adding the organization to the same pool, the terms apply to all organizations within that subscription. For example, in a subscription with a one-year commitment, the subscription's end date is the same for all licenses regardless of when the organization's licenses were added to the subscription.

EXAMPLE  
MSP A's subscription has a one-year commitment that began in March. By the end of March, MSP A has added three organizations to the subscription.
Throughout the rest of the calendar year (April — February), MSP A continues to add organizations to this same subscription.
At the end of February, the subscription and the licenses for all of its organizations are automatically renewed for another one-year commitment.

Retention refers to the length of time the client's backed-up data is stored in the Kaseya cloud before it is removed. SaaS Protection provides Infinite cloud retention (ICR), where backup snapshots are retained in the Kaseya cloud for the retention period you select and:

  • three daily backups are taken of each end user's service data and retained for 30 days.
  • one of the three daily backups is retained for 90 days.
  • after 90 days, one weekly backup is retained for 90 days, then retained on a rolling basis for up to one year.
  • after one year, one monthly backup is retained for one year, after which each is stored for the selected retention period.

SaaS Protection bills for user seats that are considered protected seats. A user's seat is a protected seat if it is in one of the following statuses:

  • Active or Standard: The seat exists in the organization and is actively backed up.
  • Paused or Inactive: The seat exists in the organization; backups were enabled but are currently paused.
  • Archived: The seat no longer exists in the organization, but backups are still accessible.

NOTE  Archived seats do not impact your subscription's committed license amount. Archived seats are in a separate pool and are billed separately, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale. Active and Paused seats will increase the subscription's committed license amount if there is an overage.

For your Kaseya 365 User subscription, usage equals the number of protected seats in Active, Standard, Paused, or Inactive status. Usage is measured near the end of each month when a snapshot is taken of the number of protected seats per pool. Licenses are billed based on usage. Your monthly subscription charge includes your billable usage and the subscription options selected.

Archived seats are billed separately.

Non-billable seat

A seat status of Unprotected means the seat exists in the organization but backups are not enabled. An unprotected seat is not a billable seat and therefore, a license fee is not charged for the seat.

The following graphic illustrates the SaaS Protection seat types. A dollar sign indicates a seat for which a monthly license fee is charged.

Your subscription's committed amount is determined by the number of standard user licenses. Archived licenses are not included in the committed amount. Your subscription's committed amount may increase as the number of protected users (users protected with a standard license) increases.

The total number of protected users you have at the end of each month is your "usage" for the month. This is the number on which your subscription charge for the following month is based and is known as the committed amount.

You can add and remove organizations anytime during the commitment term. At the end of any month, if the number of protected users is greater than the committed amount, the committed amount increases to and remains at that greater amount, referred to as the high-water mark.

NOTE  If your committed amount increases due to an overage in users protected by SaaS Protection, Kaseya 365 User licenses are automatically purchased to satisfy the new committed amount. Each Kaseya 365 User license includes a new seat for SaaS Protection and a new seat for each of the other modules in your subscription.

You are responsible for paying the committed amount, regardless of whether you’re using all of the committed amount. However, you can redeploy unused licenses to new organizations that you add during the commitment term.

EXAMPLE  
MSP B currently has a one-year commitment with three organizations. The subscription has 72 protected end users.
In May, MSP B adds 7 organizations that includes 180 protected end users to the same subscription. At the end of May, the committed amount is recalculated to 252 (180 + 72).
In June, two of the organization accounts in this subscription are canceled. The accounts include 40 protected seats, therefore, lowering the total number of protected seats in the subscription to 212 (252 - 40). However, the committed amount remains at 252, the high-water mark and MSP B is still charged for 252 licenses each month. MSP B now has 40 unused licenses it can redeploy within its commitment term.

An archived license enables you to stop running backups for a user but retain their existing backups according to your subscription's retention policy.

If additional archived licenses are needed, you must purchase them separately. Unlike standard user licenses, the archived licenses you purchase do not change the number of Kaseya 365 User licenses in your subscription.

Depending on the options selected when purchasing Kaseya 365 User, your subscription either:

  • had no existing archived licenses at time of purchase. To archive a seat, simply apply an archived license. Any archived licenses are billed separately, month-to-month, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale.
  • had a committed number of archived licenses at time of purchase and:
    • you are responsible for paying the committed amount, regardless of whether you’re using all of the committed amount. However, you can redeploy unused licenses to new organizations that you add during the commitment term.
    • to archive a seat, simply apply an archived license. For any archived license overage, those licenses are billed separately, month-to-month, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale.

EXAMPLE  
MSP B's subscription has an archived license commitment of 50 licenses.
In November, all 50 licenses are in use.
In December, MSP B applies archived licenses to another 6 users.
At the end of December, MSP B is billed for 56 licenses.
In January, MSP B removes archived licenses from 16 users, decreasing their usage to 40 licenses.
At the end of January, MSP B is billed for 50 licenses (their subscription's high-water mark for archived licenses).

For Datto SaaS Protection, fair use limits are described in the product's terms of use. To view these terms:

  1. Go to the Kaseya Master Agreement, scroll down to section 1.a.i and click the Datto SaaS Protection and SaaS Defense product link.

  2. In the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use, view the fair use limits for Storage Entitlement For SaaS Protection.

The following topics describe how SaaS Protection storage and license consumption work with your standalone SaaS Protection subscription:

See these topics to learn how storage consumption is calculated and how overages are handled for Datto SaaS Protection:

Backup storage consumption is determined by this simple calculation:

Total stored size divided by total number of purchased licenses, where:

  • 1 TB = 1024 GB
  • total stored size is how much storage is consumed by your data on the Datto SaaS Protection side, after compression and deduplication
  • total number of purchased licenses includes all pooled SaaS Protection licenses across all of your Google Workspace domains

Example:

A customer is currently storing 10 TB of combined data in SaaS Protection for all of their Google Workspace domains and:

  • the total number of purchased licenses is 200
  • the total stored size is 10 TB * 1024 = 10,240 GB
  • the storage used per license is 10,240 GB / 200 licenses = 51.2 GB / license

If this per-license usage is larger than the fair use limit in the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use policy, then the customer may incur the overage terms described in that policy.

For details about SaaS Protection terms of use, see How can I view my SaaS Backup terms of use policy?

Datto SaaS Protection has fair use limits that define how much storage you can consume before reaching an overage threshold and describe the overage policy that may be applied upon exceeding this threshold.

For Datto SaaS Protection, fair use limits are described in the product's terms of use. To view these terms:

  1. Go to the Kaseya Master Agreement, scroll down to section 1.a.i and click the Datto SaaS Protection and SaaS Defense product link.

  2. In the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use, view the fair use limits for Storage Entitlement For SaaS Protection.

If you're using too much storage, you can do any of the following to decrease your per-license storage usage:

  • Buy additional storage
  • Buy additional seats
  • Reduce retention
  • Unprotect seats
  • Delete some customers completely

The SaaS Protection pricing model is based on billable usage, as described in the topics below.

Commitment means the minimum length of time you agree to pay for the standalone SaaS Protection subscription that provides the SaaS Protection service to your clients.

Your subscription's commitment terms apply to all organizations being protected by SaaS Protection. Your subscription is set up for auto-renewal, meaning that all billable licenses will be automatically renewed for another term. The renewal term matches that of the original commitment (e.g., one year).

When you add an organization to an existing subscription, referred to as adding the organization to the same pool, the terms apply to all organizations within that subscription. For example, in a subscription with a one-year commitment, the subscription's end date is the same for all licenses regardless of when the organization's licenses were added to the subscription.

EXAMPLE  
MSP A's subscription has a one-year commitment that began in March. By the end of March, MSP A has added three organizations to the subscription.
Throughout the rest of the calendar year (April — February), MSP A continues to add organizations to this same subscription.
At the end of February, the subscription and the licenses for all of its organizations are automatically renewed for another one-year commitment.

Retention refers to the length of time the client's backed-up data is stored in the Kaseya cloud before it is removed. SaaS Protection provides Infinite cloud retention (ICR), where backup snapshots are retained in the Kaseya cloud for the retention period you select and:

  • three daily backups are taken of each end user's service data and retained for 30 days.
  • one of the three daily backups is retained for 90 days.
  • after 90 days, one weekly backup is retained for 90 days, then retained on a rolling basis for up to one year.
  • after one year, one monthly backup is retained for one year, after which each is stored for the selected retention period.

SaaS Protection bills for user seats that are considered protected seats. A user's seat is a protected seat if it is in one of the following statuses:

  • Active or Standard: The seat exists in the organization and is actively backed up.
  • Paused or Inactive: The seat exists in the organization; backups were enabled but are currently paused.
  • Archived: The seat no longer exists in the organization, but backups are still accessible.

NOTE  Archived seats do not impact your subscription's committed license amount. Archived seats are in a separate pool and are billed separately, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale. Active and Paused seats will increase the subscription's committed license amount if there is an overage.

For your SaaS Protection subscription, usage equals the number of protected seats in Active, Standard, Paused, or Inactive status. Usage is measured near the end of each month when a snapshot is taken of the number of protected seats per pool. Licenses are billed based on usage. Your monthly subscription charge includes your billable usage and the subscription options selected.

Archived seats are billed separately.

Non-billable seat

A seat status of Unprotected means the seat exists in the organization but backups are not enabled. An unprotected seat is not a billable seat and therefore, a license fee is not charged for the seat.

Each SharePoint site and each Team requires a seat but the seat is not billable. Each licensed user has access to their company's SharePoint sites and Teams. Backups of SharePoint sites and Teams are complimentary.

The following graphic illustrates the SaaS Protection seat types. A dollar sign indicates a seat for which a monthly license fee is charged.

Your subscription's committed amount is determined by the number of standard user licenses. Archived licenses are not included in the committed amount. Your subscription's committed amount may increase as the number of protected users (users protected with a standard license) increases.

The total number of protected users you have at the end of each month is your "usage" for the month. This is the number on which your subscription charge for the following month is based and is known as the committed amount.

You can add and remove organizations anytime during the commitment term. At the end of any month, if the number of protected users is greater than the committed amount, the committed amount increases to and remains at that greater amount, referred to as the high-water mark.

NOTE  If your committed amount increases due to an overage in users protected by SaaS Protection, licenses are automatically purchased to satisfy the new committed amount.

You are responsible for paying the committed amount, regardless of whether you’re using all of the committed amount. However, you can redeploy unused licenses to new organizations that you add during the commitment term.

EXAMPLE  
MSP B currently has a one-year commitment with three organizations. The subscription has 72 protected end users.
In May, MSP B adds 7 organizations that includes 180 protected end users to the same subscription. At the end of May, the committed amount is recalculated to 252 (180 + 72).
In June, two of the organization accounts in this subscription are canceled. The accounts include 40 protected seats, therefore, lowering the total number of protected seats in the subscription to 212 (252 - 40). However, the committed amount remains at 252, the high-water mark and MSP B is still charged for 252 licenses each month. MSP B now has 40 unused licenses it can redeploy within its commitment term.

An archived license enables you to stop running backups for a user but retain their existing backups according to your subscription's retention policy.

If additional archived licenses are needed, you must purchase them separately. Unlike standard user licenses, the archived licenses you purchase do not change the number of user licenses in your subscription.

Depending on the options selected when purchasing SaaS Protection, your subscription either:

  • had no existing archived licenses at time of purchase. To archive a seat, simply apply an archived license. Any archived licenses are billed separately, month-to-month, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale.
  • had a committed number of archived licenses at time of purchase and:
    • you are responsible for paying the committed amount, regardless of whether you’re using all of the committed amount. However, you can redeploy unused licenses to new organizations that you add during the commitment term.
    • to archive a seat, simply apply an archived license. For any archived license overage, those licenses are billed separately, month-to-month, at list price or the price agreed upon at the time of initial sale.

EXAMPLE  
MSP B's subscription has an archived license commitment of 50 licenses.
In November, all 50 licenses are in use.
In December, MSP B applies archived licenses to another 6 users.
At the end of December, MSP B is billed for 56 licenses.
In January, MSP B removes archived licenses from 16 users, decreasing their usage to 40 licenses.
At the end of January, MSP B is billed for 50 licenses (their subscription's high-water mark for archived licenses).

For Datto SaaS Protection, fair use limits are described in the product's terms of use. To view these terms:

  1. Go to the Kaseya Master Agreement, scroll down to section 1.a.i and click the Datto SaaS Protection and SaaS Defense product link.

  2. In the Datto SaaS Protection terms of use, view the fair use limits for Storage Entitlement For SaaS Protection.

For legacy subscriptions, Datto SaaS Protection's pricing model is based on commitment, retention, and billable usage.

Commitment

Commitment means the minimum length of time you agree to pay for the Datto SaaS Protection service on behalf of your clients. The options are:

  • Three-year: A three-year commitment is for 36 consecutive months, or three calendar years. At the end of the commitment term you can switch to a one-year commitment, cancel the agreement, or do nothing and the three-year commitment automatically renews as a new three-year commitment.
  • One-year: A one-year commitment is for 12 consecutive months, or one calendar year. At the end of the commitment term you can cancel the agreement, or do nothing, and the one-year commitment will automatically renew with a new one-year commitment.
  • Month-to-month: With the month-to-month option, you have the flexibility to add or remove licenses on demand, and the next monthly billing cycle will reflect those changes.
    You will be billed for the Datto SaaS Protection service at the beginning of the month, for that month. Towards the end of each month, we take a billable usage snapshot that determines what your bill will be for the following month.

IMPORTANT  The month-to-month option is not available for MSPs that became a partner on January 22, 2023, or at a later date.

Retention

Retention refers to the length of time the client's backed-up data is stored in the Datto cloud before it is removed. The retention types are:

  • Time-based retention (TBR): Backup snapshots are retained in the Datto cloud for the retention period you select with a maximum of one year. 
    • Three daily backups are taken of each end user's service data and retained for 30 days.
    • The last snapshot of the day is retained for 90 days.
    • After 90 days, one weekly backup is retained for 90 days, then retained on a rolling basis for up to one year.
  • Infinite cloud retention (ICR): Backup snapshots are retained in the Datto cloud for the retention period you select. The ICR retention type retains data until the subscription is canceled.
    • Three daily backups are taken of each end user's service data and retained for 30 days.
    • The last snapshot of the day is retained for 90 days.
    • After 90 days, one weekly backup is retained for 90 days, then retained on a rolling basis for up to one year.
    • After one year, one monthly backup is retained for one year, after which each is stored for the selected retention period.

Subscription

Your Datto SaaS Protection subscription consists of the commitment and retention type options you select.

  • One-year commitment — infinite cloud retention
  • One-year commitment — time-based retention
  • Three-year commitment — infinite cloud retention
  • Three-year commitment — time-based retention
  • Month-to-month commitment — infinite cloud retention
  • Month-to-month commitment — time-based retention

IMPORTANT  The month-to-month option is not available for an MSP that becomes a partner on January 22, 2023 or on a later date.

You can have multiple subscriptions based on your organizations' needs. When you add a organization to an existing subscription, referred to as adding the organization to the same pool, the terms apply to all organizations within the same subscription. For example, in a subscription with a one-year commitment, the subscription's end date is the same for all organization licenses billed regardless of when the organization licenses were added to the subscription.

EXAMPLE  
MSP A currently has a one-year commitment — infinite cloud retention subscription that began in March. By the end of March, MSP A has added three organizations to the subscription.
Throughout the rest of the calendar year (April — February), MSP A continues to add organizations to the same one-year commitment — infinite cloud retention subscription.
At the end of February, the commitment terms are automatically renewed (unless another option is implemented) and apply to all the organization licenses included in the subscription.
MSP A also has a month-to-month commitment — time-based retention subscription that includes 12 organizations and a month-to-month commitment — infinite cloud retention subscription that includes 15 organizations. Both month-to-month commitment subscriptions automatically renew at the end of each month (unless another option is implemented).

NOTE  While in a current subscription, you can change a organization from a month-to-month commitment to a one-year or three-year commitment. However, you cannot change a organization from a one-year or three-year commitment to a month-to-month commitment. The retention type can be changed anytime during a current subscription regardless of commitment type. See the article Changing subscription terms.

Billable usage

Datto SaaS Protection bills for user seats that are considered protected seats. When a user's seat status is one of the following, it is a protected seat:

  • Active: The seat exists in the organization and is actively backed up.
  • Paused: The seat exists in the organization; backups were enabled but are currently paused.
  • Archived: The seat no longer exists in the organization, but backups are still accessible.

Usage equals the number of protected seats. Usage is measured near the end of each month when a snapshot is taken of the number of protected seats per pool. Licenses are billed based on usage. Your monthly subscription charge includes your billable usage and the subscription options selected.

Non-billable seat

A seat status of Unprotected means the seat exists in the organization but backups are not enabled. An unprotected seat is not a billable seat and therefore, a license fee is not charged for the seat.

Each SharePoint site and each Team requires a seat but the seat is not billable. Each licensed user has access to their company's SharePoint sites and Teams. Backups of SharePoint sites and Teams are complimentary.

The following graphic illustrates the Datto SaaS Protection seat types. A dollar sign indicates a seat for which a monthly license fee is charged.


Pricing tiers

The number of licenses for which you are charged determines the cost per-license for each pricing tier. The cost per-license decreases at each tier as the number of licenses increases.

Tiers:

  • 1-99 seats
  • 100-499 seats
  • 500+ seats

One-year and three-year commitment requirements

A one-year or three-year TBR and ICR subscription includes requirements that do not apply to a month-to-month subscription.

Committed amount

The total number of protected organization end users you have at the end of each month in a one-year or three-year TBR or ICR subscription is your "usage" for the month. This is the number on which your subscription charge for the following month is based and is known as the committed amount.

You can add and remove organizations anytime during the one-year or three-year commitment term. At the end of any month, if the number of protected organization end users is greater than the committed amount, the committed amount increases to and remains at that greater amount, referred to as the high-water mark.

You are responsible for paying the committed amount, regardless of whether you’re using all of the committed amount. However, you can redeploy unused licenses to new organizations that you add during the commitment term.

EXAMPLE  
MSP B currently has a one-year commitment — time-based retention subscription with three organizations. The subscription has 72 protected end users.
In May, MSP B adds 7 organizations that includes 180 protected end users to the same subscription. At the end of May, the committed amount is recalculated to 252 (180 + 72).
In June, two of the organization accounts in this subscription are canceled. The accounts include 40 protected seats, therefore, lowering the total number of protected seats in the subscription to 212 (252 - 40). However, the committed amount remains at 252, the high-water mark and MSP B is still charged for 252 licenses each month. MSP B now has 40 unused licenses it can redeploy within its commitment term.