Free cloud storage is easy to come by these day, but the best cloud storage providers give you more than just storage. They offer high availability, multi-platform support, security options and app integration. This week we’re going to look at five of the best cloud storage providers on the market today, thanks to your nominations.
Dropbox
Dropbox is a familiar favourite here at Lifehacker. We’ve covered Dropbox and services that support it extensively, and many of you have followed along with our tricks for getting as much space as you possibly can. Dropbox undeniably has a dominant position in the cloud storage market, but it isn’t just first-mover advantage that makes Dropbox special. . Support for virtually every operating system, both desktop and mobile, experimental and beta builds that add lots of useful features, and a vast third-party developer community taking advantage of its open APIs to build applications on top of it make Dropbox a great cloud storage service, whether you use it for your files and just sync with the desktop clients, or you have another favourite app that uses Dropbox to keep your files synced across devices. Dropbox has its issues (especially with regard to security), but it’s a stellar option — if it weren’t, people wouldn’t keep using it. Plans start with 2GB for free, but you can get way more than that via referrals, mobile app use, photo and video uploads. You can check out the paid plans here.
Google Drive
While it has only existed in its current form for a year, but has a longer legacy in the Google Docs and Picasa services whose storage it now incorporates. Within Drive, you can store all your pre-existing Docs files and 15GB of anything else (plus extra if you want to pay for it). If you’re already using those tools in your day to day work, it makes sense to use Google Drive for file storage as well, and the fact that it’s available for Windows, Mac, Android and iOS makes it useful at your desk or on the go. Plus, with the right plugins, it can be even more powerful than other services you may also use. You can go here to check out Google’s other plans (as well as see your current utilisation)
SkyDrive
SkyDrive was pretty clunky and difficult to use in its initial release, but Microsoft’s cloud storage service has come a long way since then. It’s tightly integrated with Windows now, especially Windows 8 for desktops and tablets, and if you use Office 2013 at all — either on the desktop or on the web — using SkyDrive as cloud storage for all of your files is quick and seamless. SkyDrive also has mobile apps for Windows Phone, iOS and Android, so you can stay up to date on changes to your files and access them on the go. Desktop clients for Windows and Mac make working with your saved documents and syncing them easy too. If you got in while the latest iteration of the service was still in beta, you could have a cool 25GB of storage, but even if you signed up today, you’ll still walk away with 7GB of storage, with the option to buy more storage if you need it. SkyDrive also has a third-party app ecosystem and open APIs, and a number of tools that tie nicely into it
SugarSync
SugarSync has been around for a long time, and is incredibly richly featured. It’s not as widely used as some of the other big names, but that’s no reflection on the options it offers. SugarSync has insanely detailed syncing options, and can back up or sync any files or folders you choose on your system, not just a single folder and all of its contents. SugarSync can work as a backup client, automatically backing up your files as you change them, or you can use it like a traditional syncing cloud service, complete with a drive on your system you drop files in. The service keeps an impressive revision history for each of your files, lets you share, lock down or password protect individual files on the web or on the desktop, and even makes streaming media to your mobile devices easy. While SugarSync doesn’t make its free plan particularly visible, you can get 5GB for free, and make use of the service’s wealth of features, along with the desktop apps for Windows and Mac and the mobile apps for iOS, Android and Windows Phone. If you need more storage, the pricing plans are pretty attractive.
Bitcasa Infinite Drive
Bitcasa is a less-familiar but welcome addition to the list . Aside from having virtually unlimited storage options ranging beyond the terabytes, Bitcasa has syncing clients for Windows and Mac, and mobile apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone (including tablet versions of all three). Bitcasa knows that you’ll probably use that wealth of space for photos, music and movies, and makes it easy to stream that content to your mobile devices when you’re on the go, or to your desktop when you want to use it. It even offers a Chrome extension that lets you use Bitcasa as your downloads folder. Bitcasa is free for 10GB, but if you’re willing to pay, you can get infinite storage for $US99/yearr. If storage is what you really need — not extra bells and whistles — and you’re willing to pay for it, Bitcasa is worth a look.
We have to give an honourable mention this week to everyone who suggested you Do It Yourself, using a NAS or other storage device at home packed with disks and any free software that lets you access them anywhere you go from any computer whether you’re on your home network or off of it. It’s easy to roll your own cloud storage solution with tools such OwnCloud, or simply by giving your NAS locked down access to the internet so you can get to your files when you’re away.
Another honourable mention this week goes out to Box (formerly Box.net), which barely missed the top five, and earned strong praise from many of you for offering up to 50GB of free space to new users. Box walks the line between being a consumer-friendly storage and syncing solution and an enterprise-level document management service.
Have something to say about one of the contenders? Want to make the case for your personal favourite, even if it wasn’t included in the list?
Comments
10 responses to “Five Best Cloud Storage Providers”
Another DIY option is using Amazon S3, which is what most of these services use in the back end anyway. Gives you a lot of flexibility as there’s plenty of tools out there for syncing with S3 (like goodsync), or even mounting S3 as a drive (like transmit).
Interestingly, looking at a cost comparison, once you move beyond the free tiers of other providers like dropbox, the cost savings of using S3 will fluctuate depending on your usage. The lowest premium dropbox plan is $9.99 for 100GB, which will actually cost you $9.95 in the cheapest zones on S3. The difference is with dropbox you’ll pay $9.99 if you’re using 100GB or 5GB, so if you’re needs are anywhere below 100GB S3 gets increasingly cheaper.
No mention of copy.com ? They match Dropbox feature for feature, offer more space (15GB) to start with (and are currently giving away 5GB for each referral) and the usage of shared files is deducted evenly from everyone sharing the file (12GB of files shared between 4 users will cost each user only 3GB)
Use my referral code to get 5GB extra when you sign up: https://copy.com?r=3kGgzL
I have been mostly happy with SkyDrive as i do use Windows 8 and Office 2013 so the integration is useful. My only complaint with the Desktop App is that you can’t choose which folders you want to sync. There is a work-around. Someone created a plug-in to allow this functionality but it isn’t perfect (can’t track sync progress properly). Hopefully this is resolved in the next release.
Do you mean the desktop app or the metro app? The desktop version of SkyDrive has had selective sync for a while now:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithmayer/archive/2012/11/20/try-out-the-new-skydrive-app-with-selective-sync.aspx
Although a little different than these, adeptCloud is the only truly private cloud storage option that actually let’s you share with anyone (even if they aren’t in your company!) And since it uses your hard drive locally instead of their servers, your storage is UNLIMITED! Check it out: https://adeptcloud.com
Well, I am a Dropbox fan, even using it as a backbone for a primitive – but hugely effective – family messaging system with AutoHotKey – but here’s a cautionary tale:
In a moment of madness I once used Dropbox to transfer a few photos of .. umm.. prurient interest..? And then of course, deleted them from Dropbox. ie. the Dropbox web site, so they were gone,gone,gone.
Or so I thought.
Like some Poe nightmare story, those pics kept reappearing in my Dropbox and just would not stay deleted.
It was only when I de-registered all seven of my Dropbox devices AND deleted them again from the Dropbox site did they actually finally disappear.
Be warned.
Also surprised that Box did not get higher billing. Seems to work pretty well, but it does have some non-intuitive edges, I guess…
Or keep tour days in Australia to ensure the axis of evil (America) has to put in 5 more minutes before the steal it all.
I use Backupthat.com for my cloud storage and it works great! It is all web based so it doesn’t slow down my computer and it gives me unlimited storage for free.
wut?
Edit, replying to wrong comment. my apologies.
I’d like something that can be used to both sync with a file server AND be accessible from apps like CloudOn on mobile devices (as DropBox/SkyDrive/GoogleDrive et al are). I don’t see where the overlap is there with turnkey solutions.
I’ve been using a combination of Goodsync pro for local syncing and Dropbox for a cloud solution. They work pretty well together.
I found that a new cloud storage webside called copy is providing a really great service. They have a great desktop client app as well as mobile apps for iOs and Android. Also, 15 GB of storage space is free!
If you like to check it out, sing in and receive 20 GB (instead of standard 15 GB) you can use the referral link:
https://copy.com?r=wK6EjL
For me, it has always been Google Drive for the win. This is because it provides a huge amount of data storage capacity and you can buy even more if you need at a very minimal price. It has also been very stable so far since the day I started using it until now. I can also drag and drop my files easily from my desktop and access it elsewhere anytime and anywhere.