File sharing can be intimidating, especially if your email provider or online chat app flashes up a warning about the file-size limit whenever you try to upload your latest piece of work or favorite photo album. If this has happened to you, read on and learn how to share files online.
Last Updated: 04 Sep'24 2024-09-04T07:13:21+00:00
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Key Takeaways: The Best Secure File Sharing ToolsFacts & Expert Analysis: How to Share Files Online Using Cloud Storage
Online file sharing apps have been a massive boon to workplace collaboration, allowing a whole team to access and edit documents, even if they aren’t in the office. However, individuals can also make use of these features and tools to easily share files with their friends and family. In this article, we’ll go through how to share files online and the best file-sharing software to use.
In the past, file-sharing options were fairly limited, especially for individuals. You could physically transfer data by mailing a hard drive or floppy disk, or you could send files attached to an email. However, now you can use modern cloud storage services and dedicated transfer services to share large files between accounts.
The downside of using third-party file-sharing services is that not every organization or business is secure or a good value. Because of this, we’ve compiled a list of the best file-sharing software, so you can work out which one you want to use before you start transferring files.
Meet the expertsSapphire Fox ( Editor )
Sapphire Fox, a cloud storage and backup expert at Cloudwards, combines her engineering background with extensive software knowledge to excel in data security, cloud infrastructure and SaaS. With nearly four years of experience, she expertly navigates data management, encryption and cloud computing trends, delivering content that resonates with both tech professionals and enthusiasts. Her diverse skill set, honed in roles from editor to publisher, positions her as a leading voice in cloud storage solutions and emerging technologies.
Jackie Leavitt ( Co-Chief Editor )
Jackie Leavitt is an authority in cloud storage solutions, holding the position of co-chief editor at Cloudwards. With a rich background in editing spanning over a decade and significant expertise acquired over five years in the tech industry, she excels in guiding users through the complexities of cloud storage. Armed with a Master’s in Strategic Communications and Bachelor’s degrees in Journalism and European Culture Studies, Jackie combines her educational prowess with practical experience. She is committed to demystifying cloud storage options, focusing on how users can leverage these solutions for efficiency and data security.
There are four main parts to a good file-sharing service. The platform should support large files, have good security tools, be easy to use and have plenty of options for sharing and collaborating on files. Because of this, we chose these services as our top five suggestions:
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Sync.com and pCloud are our first two choices for the security and range of settings offered. On the other hand, Google Drive and Dropbox don’t have great security options but come with more collaboration tools. Finally, unlike the other cloud storage services, WeTransfer doesn’t let you store any files for free; instead, it offers quick and easy transfers without an account.
With a range of secure file-sharing services and ones that are more collaboration-friendly, this list should have something for you. However, if none of these options suit you, check out our full list of the best cloud storage providers, most of which have some sharing features.
More details about Sync.com:
There are two ways to share with Sync.com: links and team folders. The team-shared folders are great for collaboration and have some decent permissions, such as limiting users to view-only mode or stopping them from seeing who has access to the folder. The free plan lets you own three of these folders with some options, but this is unlimited for more premium plans.
Similar to team folders, Sync.com limits sharing links to a maximum of three on the free plan. The links also can’t go over 5GB, or 500MB, if you enable end-to-end encryption. However, once created, you can easily share these via email or any chat app and secure them with an array of security features.
Not only does Sync.com come with zero-knowledge encryption for all of your files, but its sharing features are second to none in terms of security. Even on the free plan, you can add password protection and “enhanced security” — Sync.com’s name for end-to-end encryption — to the download link.
There are even more options with a paid plan. You can add an expiry date, download limit, preview-only mode and email notifications for any activity on your links. After spending some time getting used to the settings and permissions you can alter, Sync.com is easily one of the most secure ways to transfer a file.
Sync.com is one of the best value services on our list, at only $8 per month for 2TB of storage. The Basic plan will also give you access to helpful features like the advanced sharing tools, making it even better value. If you want to learn more, read our full Sync.com review.
Free FREE Pro Solo Basic 1-year plan $96 billed every year Pro Solo Professional 1-month plan 1-month plan 1-year plan $240 billed every year More plans Pro Teams Standard
More details about pCloud:
Much like Sync.com, pCloud has two main ways to share files. The first is the “invite to folder” option, where you can select users who can access and edit these folders. There are no limits on how many of these you create, but remember that only pCloud business accounts can share encrypted folders.
You can also create a sharing link and send that to people. They can download the content without an account, and you can view traffic stats on the “link stats” page. There are also options for password protection and expiry dates if you’re using one of the premium plans. These options are a little limited, but if you want to learn more, read our full pCloud review.
Not only does pCloud have some nice sharing features on its main platform, but it also hosts pCloud Transfer. This lets you send files of up to 5GB to up to 10 recipients. You can also encrypt the files with a password to keep them safe from prying eyes. It will only hold files for seven days, but you don’t need an account and can send as many transfers as you want.
pCloud is a pretty decent deal, only $7.99 for 2TB of storage when purchased yearly. However, you’ll have to consider the extra $3.99 you’ll have to pay for pCloud Crypto if you want zero-knowledge encryption.
Free FREE Premium 500GB 1-month plan, 1-year plan 1-month plan 1-year plan $49.99 billed every year Lifetime plan $199 one time payment, Monthly price for 3 years of use Premium Plus 2TB 1-month plan, 1-year plan 1-month plan 1-year plan $99.99 billed every year Lifetime plan $399 one time payment, Monthly price for 3 years of use More plans Ultra 10TB Lifetime plan $1190 one time payment, Monthly price for 3 years of use Family 2TB Lifetime
More details about Google Drive:
Google Drive gives you less freedom than some other providers when sharing files, with only three permission levels available: viewing, commenting or editing. Read our guide to learn how to share files with Google Drive. There are no passwords, expiry dates, end-to-end encryption or download limits, and everyone who has access sees any updates to the document in real time.
However, while Google Drive lacks in privacy and sharing options, it has plenty of collaboration features. You can send invites to people without Google accounts, and they can access the files as anonymous users. Plus, other collaborators don’t have to take up space on their own hard drive or cloud storage to hold on to the files. Learn more by reading our Google Drive review.
The biggest feature that aids collaboration is Google Docs. This free online office software is great for working with others. You can make comments and suggestions, edit the page directly and use the full history to see what people have changed. It even lets up to 100 people work on a single document simultaneously, with everything kept in sync.
At just $1.67 per month for 100GB, Google Drive corners the lower end of the market for people who don’t need much storage. However, at $8.33 per month, the 2TB plan isn’t a bad offer either.
15GB
More details about WeTransfer:
WeTransfer is a dedicated transfer platform, so rather than sharing files stored in your account, you go to the website, add files and immediately send a link to the recipients. However, this means that you’ll need WeTransfer’s other services, like Collect and Paste, in order to get the other collaboration features that cloud storage providers would normally give you.
You can also choose to purchase a WeTransfer Pro account, which allows up to 20GB per transfer and extra security options like adding a password or expiry date. It also comes with 1TB of cloud storage and the ability to create a team for easier sharing. We have a full guide on how to use WeTransfer, if you’re ready to use it.
Although the limited security options and permissions aren’t always ideal, it makes each individual file transfer as easy as possible. Even other online transfer providers often have many intimidating fields. However, with WeTransfer, simply upload the files, and you can generate a link. There are no extra questions to answer or boxes to fill (you don’t even need an email address).
Although the unlimited free transfers of up to 2GB is great, WeTransfer also offers 1TB of storage, access to Paste and Collect, extra file transfer settings and many more features for just $10 per month.
| Free | Pro |
|---|---|
| Transfers: 2GB | Transfers: 20GB |
| $0.00 | $12 per month $120 per year ($10/month) |
More details about Dropbox:
Along with 2GB of storage space, Dropbox’s free plan gives you the option to create a link so that others can view files or share the folders if they need editing permission. There are more settings with the professional plans — specifically passwords, expiry dates and download limitations — but these are still fairly limited.
However, Dropbox is fairly easy to use for file sharing, as it only takes one click to generate a link on the website, and the desktop app gives you access to all of these features. You can even send files through Dropbox Transfer, a service that lets you send files without an account, although it’s limited to 200MB for free. We have a comprehensive guide on how to share files on Dropbox.
One edge Dropbox has over its competitors is the level of integration with third-party apps. Whether you want to send files over Slack or access your technical drawings in Autodesk directly off the cloud, Dropbox will let you do it.
You can also create and edit Microsoft Office documents and Google Docs files on the Dropbox website. As Dropbox’s block-level syncing makes even large files upload quickly after small edits, you won’t even have to worry about the time it normally takes for a storage service to sync your edits. To learn more about these benefits, read our full Dropbox review.
Dropbox’s 2GB free plan isn’t the most generous, but it does serve as a decent free trial to see if you’re willing to pay $9.99 per month for 2TB of storage. This isn’t as good a value as other services, but the slightly higher cost can be worth it if you need the extra collaboration features.
Free FREE Dropbox Plus 1-month plan 1-month plan 1-year plan $119.88 billed every year Dropbox Family 1-month plan 1-month plan 1-year plan $203.88 billed every year More plans Dropbox Essentials (aka Professional for professionals)If you prefer to use a cloud storage service to make a transfer — perhaps to share them more securely — you’ll need to follow these four steps. We’ll use the desktop app for Sync.com, but you can also do this on the web or with other providers without the steps changing much.
In Windows file explorer, open your Sync.com folder and find the files you want to share. If the files are elsewhere on your hard drive, simply drag and drop them into this folder.
Open the Dropdown Menu
Select the files and folders you want to share and right-click on them to open a dropdown menu.
Select to Create a Link
In the dropdown menu, choose either the “create a link” or “create an enhanced privacy link” option.
Share Your Files
An alert will appear in the bottom-right of your screen saying that the sharing link has been copied to your clipboard. Now you can simply paste it in any email or chat app and send it to the recipient.
If you just need a service that lets you send large files and don’t want to mess around with security tools, you should use a site like WeTransfer. With these three simple steps, you can transfer files from any device — mobile or desktop — without even leaving your web browser.
Either drag and drop your documents or click the blue plus sign and browse your local storage to upload files and folders.
Enter Email Addresses
To send the link via email, enter both your and your recipient’s email addresses. You can also click the three dots and choose to just generate a link.
Click “Transfer”
Once you’ve added the files and email addresses, click the “transfer” button, and it’ll ask you to verify your email address.
Enter Your Verification Code
Type in the six-digit code sent to your email address and wait for the upload to finish. Your recipient will receive an email from the service that they can use to view and download the documents.
Modern file-sharing apps can handle a wide range of permissions, an unlimited file size, integration with third-party software and various security settings. You just need to find the right provider for your needs and learn how to use it to share files online. It can be especially useful if you combine this with electronic document signing software such as these DocuSign plans for different price points.
If you want to learn more about using cloud services to transfer files, you can check out our full breakdown of the best cloud storage providers for file sharing. You might also want to read our guide on encrypting data for cloud storage, which can protect your shared files, as long as you trust the recipients with the encryption key.
Do you need to share files online? Have you used any of these file-sharing services? Were there any good options that we missed? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below. Thanks for reading.
If you want a quick one-off transfer but the file size is too large for a simple email, you should use a file-sharing service like WeTransfer that doesn’t require an account. However, for users who’ll share files regularly, a cloud storage service like Sync.com or pCloud is often a better choice.
Basically all cloud storage services that offer a free plan have some kind of sharing feature. You could also use a platform like pCloud Transfer or WeTransfer to send your documents, videos or other files for free.
For sharing files securely, Sync.com and pCloud are our top picks. However, providers like Google Drive and Dropbox are better if you need plenty of collaboration tools.
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With a handful of A-levels completed, Sapphire followed her passions for learning and informing others, finding a place among the Cloudwards.net team. Between writing about software and creating fantasy worlds, she’s either losing games of Civilisation or darting about the UK in search of inspiring views and learning about each area’s history.
Last published on Cloudwards:Jackie is the co-chief editor of Cloudwards.net. After earning her bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of New Hampshire, she has held various editing roles with international news organizations, annual magazine publications, book publishing and more. She earned her master's in strategic communications from National University. When she’s not editing Cloudwards.net articles, she’s either putting pen to paper with creative nonfiction writing, going for an ocean swim or planning her next travel adventure.
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