Tomorrow’s Tech Treepowered by Astra

Data Storage & Memory · Recorded milestone

Data written in glass

Recorded year2019

Microsoft's Project Silica stores a film in quartz glass with lasers.

Explore this milestone on the interactive map

Built on

LaserRecorded · 1960enables
Deep learning breakthroughRecorded · 2012enables

Led to

Thousand-year archivesRecorded · 2020enables
Glass archives in data centresForecast · ~2030enables
Holographic optical storageForecast · ~2034enables

Sources & evidence

Additional source

Dataset updated 2026-10-18. This individual record has not been separately re-reviewed.