What does Persistent Disk provide in Google Cloud?

Persistent Disk in Google Cloud provides durable and high-performance block storage specifically designed for virtual machine (VM) instances. This type of storage is essential for running applications that demand consistent performance and reliability, such as databases and other transactional systems.

Persistent Disks are designed to remain intact and retain data even when the associated VM is stopped or deleted, ensuring data durability. They support snapshots, enabling users to create backups of the data and quickly restore from those backups when necessary. This feature adds a significant layer of data protection, making Persistent Disks particularly valuable for applications requiring high availability and robustness.

Compared to other storage options, Persistent Disks offer flexibility in terms of the size and performance characteristics that can be adjusted according to specific workload requirements, making them a go-to solution for developers and administrators leveraging Google Cloud.

Temporary storage would not meet the same durability needs and is intended for ephemeral data storage during the lifetime of a VM instance, while a caching layer primarily serves as a fast-access memory area and is not a persistent data storage solution. Additionally, while Cloud Storage is ideal for storing unstructured data such as images, videos, and backups, it does not serve the same purpose as block storage for VMs, which Persistent Disk effectively addresses.