At a look

Expert’s Rating

Pros

• Affordable
• Lots of house
• Extra household subscription will be utilised for backup

Cons

• Third celebration software program wanted to make use of for backup

Our Verdict

OneDrive, as a part of Microsoft 365, is probably the most reasonably priced cloud storage service in the marketplace, and with a little bit of tweaking you possibly can make the most of all six terabytes you get with the household plan. Sync isn’t fairly nearly as good as Dropbox, nevertheless it’ll do for many issues.

Price When Reviewed

$1.99 month (100GB) | $6.99 month (1TB) | $9.99 month (Family, 6x1TB)

Best Prices Today: Microsoft Office 365 Home

$1.99

$69.99

Microsoft’s cloud storage service is known as OneDrive, and if you happen to’re working Windows 10 or 11, you’ll have seen that the corporate may be very eager so that you can use it. It could be straightforward to assume that as a first-party program it could be finest in school on Windows, however that’s not essentially the case. In the fundamental features of syncing and sharing folders and recordsdata, Google Drive is nearly nearly as good, and Dropbox continues to be higher on a technical stage.

But OneDrive is sweet sufficient, and if you happen to’re one of many hundreds of thousands of people that wish to use Microsoft Office, it’s by far probably the most reasonably priced choice. In truth, if you happen to subscribe to Office, OneDrive can principally be counted as a part of the package deal.

Cheap, cheaper, OneDrive

Every OneDrive customers will get 15 GB of free storage, whereas premium accounts that supply 100 GB and 1 TB of cloud storage prices $1.99 and $6.99 per thirty days, respectively. That’s glorious pricing. A household subscription to Microsoft 365 prices $9.99 per thirty days and offers you as much as six accounts, every with a terabyte of house. What’s extra, there’s nothing to cease you from creating multiple account for your self and utilizing the additional accounts with third-party applications, reminiscent of backups. I personally have two accounts and use one solely for backing up my pc (I take advantage of the Arq Backup nevertheless it works simply as nicely with Duplicati or Duplicacy).

Should you continue to pay for Office, you get a number of terabytes of storage totally free, or it the opposite means spherical: For about the identical worth because the rivals, you get all of Office totally free alongside Microsoft’s cloud storage. Outstanding.

Smart sync

Similar to Dropbox however not like Google Drive and the Windows model of iCloud Drive, OneDrive makes use of so-called block-level copying. This implies that if you happen to make modifications to a big file, OneDrive solely must add the modified bits and never the entire file once more. Depending on how you utilize your pc, this could make a giant distinction in sync velocity — or hardly any.

OneDrive has a setting to cover and never sync chosen folders to a drive, which is helpful when you have a big folder on one pc that you just don’t want entry to on one other. Open OneDrive settings, choose Account on the left after which Select folders to set which of them will likely be accessible within the OneDrive folder.

On high of that, OneDrive also can offload folders and particular person recordsdata out of your pc in order that they’re solely saved within the cloud, however will be retrieved if you wish to entry the content material. In Windows Explorer, you possibly can see whether or not a folder or file is native or cloud-only through a small icon within the Status-column: Blue cloud for less than within the cloud, inexperienced tick for additionally saved regionally. Right-click and choose Always carry on this drive or Free up house to decide on whether or not or to not hold the merchandise in your pc for offline entry.

Right-clicking additionally brings up an OneDrive submenu the place you’ll discover choices for sharing, altering permissions, viewing model historical past and extra. You can obtain older variations immediately from the model historical past right here and don’t have to open OneDrive within the browser.

Facts:

Tested: 2023
Manufacturer: Microsoft
Platforms: Windows, Mac, Android, IOS
Free account house: 5 GB
Storage house: 5 GB, 100 GB, 1 TB, 6 x 1 TB
Monthly worth: Free, $1.99, $6.99, $9.99
Synchronization of non-obligatory recordsdata and folders: Yes
Family sharing: Family subscription gives a 1TB account every for as much as six members of the family
Backup operate: No, however can be utilized with third-party software program
File historical past: Yes (25 earlier variations, 30 days for deleted recordsdata)
Other options: Office purposes included in the identical subscription, Microsoft Defender for cell phones

This evaluation initially appeared on pcforallse and was translated from Swedish to English.