# External storage for social network **URL:** \ **Category:** Get Help\ **Created:** [August 10, 2020, 4:47pm UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160 "2020-08-10T16:47:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Tay](https://forum.adalo.com/u/Tay)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2020, 4:47pm UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/1 "2020-08-10T16:47:03Z")
Hello, I have a doubt, I’m new to the area. Can someone explain something to me. I want to make a social network and I had a question. Users will post many photos and I will need a lot of storage. How do I prevent user data from consuming Adalo data but elsewhere, would that be possible in firebase? ---
**Author:** ![karimoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ad7895/32.png) [@karimoo](https://forum.adalo.com/u/karimoo)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2020, 8:24pm UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/2 "2020-08-10T20:24:20Z")
If you are looking for external storage of images, search the forum for _Cloudinary_ or _Imgix_. ---
**Author:** ![sebastas](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.adalo.com/sebastas/32/3447_2.png) [@sebastas](https://forum.adalo.com/u/sebastas)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2020, 9:53pm UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/3 "2020-08-10T21:53:01Z")
Check out also Wasabi, simple S3 storage but good price. If you want to provide images with CDN then Cloudinary or Imgix like Karimoo mentioned are better options. ---
**Author:** ![Tay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Tay](https://forum.adalo.com/u/Tay)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2020, 10:13pm UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/4 "2020-08-10T22:13:34Z")
I believe I have not explained myself very well. The doubt would be this: If it is possible for user data not to consume the memory of the Adalo database, but of the farebase. Or is that not possible? It will not be for storing images, but everything, like photos that users post and videos. From what I realized everything a user posts in my app is in Adalo’s database, right? So I would like to know if you can do so that you do not consume the data I have at Adalo, but from an external database. ---
**Author:** ![karimoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ad7895/32.png) [@karimoo](https://forum.adalo.com/u/karimoo)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2020, 4:32am UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/5 "2020-08-11T04:32:27Z")
You can use external collections to connect to other databases, CMS as long as they offer a REST API. GraphQL is currently not supported. You can also (and will need to do) a lot with _Custom Actions_. But you need to consider the downsides based on your requirements, such as latency, performance, paging (=how many records will be available in a response from REST API). To get an impression of these topics, search the forum for _Airtable_ which is commonly used. There are many threads discussing the ups and downs. ---
**Author:** ![anon78309838](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@anon78309838](https://forum.adalo.com/u/anon78309838)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2020, 7:51am UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/6 "2020-08-11T07:51:13Z")
I would advise against storing all data outside of the Adalo platform merely for the reason stated above about performance. We cannot guarantee any certain level of performance for your apps if the data is all stored by third party(s). ---
**Author:** ![system](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.adalo.com/system/32/40401_2.png) [@system](https://forum.adalo.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2020, 7:51am UTC](https://forum.adalo.com/t/external-storage-for-social-network/3160/7 "2020-08-21T07:51:17Z")
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