The iCloud Drive, Apple's upgrade to its cloud storage platform iCloud, has been released by the Cupertino-based company for Microsoft's Windows operating system ahead of the company's own OS X Yosemite.

Designed to compete with other cloud storage services such as Google Drive, Dropbox and OneDrive, the iCloud Drive is built into iOS 8.

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To avail of the new feature, one must first download and install iCloud for Windows from Apple's support page. After restarting the computer, a user should see an option to enable iCloud Drive by ticking a check box on the iCloud's control panel.

After checking the box, the user should see a new entry for the iCloud Drive under "Favorites" in File Explorer, identical to other cloud storage platforms.

The default setting of the iCloud Drive has three specific folders for the Numbers, Pages and Keynote apps. The user should be able to create folders and drag-and-drop files just like on other cloud storage services.

Apple's smart devices should first run on the iOS 8, which will be released Wednesday, to use the iCloud Drive.

The company's response to Dropbox was initially introduced in Apple's annual Worldwide Developers conference last June.

Users with Windows-based computers will be the first to receive full support for iCloud Drive, while Mac users will have to wait for the company to release OS X Yosemite sometime in the fall.

Meanwhile, Microsoft's OneDrive, a rival to Apple's iCloud service, has also received an upgrade.

Tech giant Microsoft recently announced a promo that increases the amount of data one can store in its OneDrive cloud storage platform for Android, iPhone and Windows Phone users.

Group program manager for OneDrive, Douglas Pearce discussed the offer and what it could mean in a blog post on the app's website.

"All you have to do is sign up for OneDrive and activate the auto upload feature for your camera roll sometime between now and the end of September, and you will get 30 GB of free OneDrive storage moving forward (15 GB base and 15 GB camera roll bonus)," Pearce wrote.

Although the privately owned Dropbox and Box have attempted to boost their storage capacities as well, both companies are still lagging behind Microsoft.

TagsiCloud, iCloud Drive, Cloud storage, Cloud, Mac, iOS8, iOS 8, Apple iOS 8, OneDrive