Which of the many solutions to use for a "better than" OneDrive replacement?
I'm having trouble deciding and finding a solution for one of my clients and I'd like to lean on the expertise of some of you guys. Following starting point: Beefy Hetzner Server already in place The Hetzner server runs two archival copies of…
I'm having trouble deciding and finding a solution for one of my clients and I'd like to lean on the expertise of some of you guys. Following starting point: Beefy Hetzner Server already in place The Hetzner server runs two archival copies of WooCommerce/WordPress via Plesk There is also some custom software running via Caddy reverse proxy on a specific subdomain Client used OneDrive and has some legacy files on iCloud as well, we want to consolidate all into one private solution Must have: Web client as close in experience to OneDrive Web client different user accounts and permissions (OneDrive used to be a single personal account so everyone had access to everything) Free for self hosted without losing features (for example Seafile community edition is missing folder permissions and full text search) Works with setup mentioned above, not something that takes over the whole machine Nice to have: Close to native integration and sync for MacOS (Windows as well but should be a given?) There might be some things I'm missing but these are the main requirements. I came across lots of different things, Nextcloud, Opencloud, File Browser Quantum etc and would like some reports of real world experience for a similar configuration. TLDR: OneDrive alternative needed, Linux Server that already runs a couple of other things, mainly Web + MacOS clients, should have user accounts and permissionss/access control and be free in the Community/FOSS version without price-gated or EE features
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Nextcloud is really the only game in town with a native client. Its not. I have just published last week delta sync upload and download on Filestash, and most other alternative have their clients as well, be it seafile, opencloud, etc...
It‘s just a meaningless AI bot account, which is why I didn‘t even bother responding
If macOS sync is a hard requirement, Nextcloud is really the only game in town with a native client. Filebrowser is great for web access but no sync agent. Seafile’s sync engine is more reliable technically but their macOS client hasn’t been updated in ages. For your stack I’d spin up Nextcloud in Docker behind Caddy and call it done.
what about opencloud on macOS
Thank you very much for the information. I am very interested in this
the "better than" part is where most of these go sideways, everyone lands on nextcloud and then spends a week tuning php and wondering why the web ui feels slow. if you mostly want sync + share links, syncthing for the sync plus seafile for the sharing is a lot less pain than one big app doing everything. nextcloud aio is fine tbh, just give it its own box and don't bolt it onto something you're already using daily. do you actually need the office/collab bits or is it really just files and a link you can send someone?
How beefy is their connection and will they have remote backups once they stop using Onedrive?
The Nextcloud in Docker behind your existing Caddy call above is the right instinct, the only thing I'd add is which image you use, because that's exactly where the "takes over the machine" fear comes true. Avoid the all-in-one (AIO) image. It wants to be the front door, grabs 80 and 443 and runs its own reverse proxy, so it'll fight Plesk and the standalone Caddy you've already got. Use the plain nextcloud (or fpm) image and slot it behind the Caddy you already run, on its own subdomain. Then it's just another container, not a landlord. For the same reason I'd actually put OpenCloud on the shortlist (to whoever asked about it up top). It's the oCIS lineage, a lot lighter than Nextcloud, and the permissions model is cleaner than wrestling Nextcloud's share dialogs. It does have a macOS client. Tradeoff is the ecosystem is younger, so if the client ever wants calendar/contacts/office bolted on, Nextcloud's kitchen sink wins. But if it's honestly just files, folders and who-can-see-what, OpenCloud fits your no-takeover requirement better than Nextcloud does. On your Seafile dealbreaker: Nextcloud does have proper folder permissions and full text search, but FTS isn't free, it needs an extra app plus a search backend, so budget some RAM for it before you promise the client search. Also, someone above asked about backups and that's the thing that'll bite later. Once OneDrive's gone you own the redundancy. Whatever you pick, back up the data directory and the database together, and dump the DB instead of copying it while it's running, or you'll eventually restore a half-torn snapshot and only find out the moment you actually need it. One honest question before you commit to any of them: does the client really need two-way sync with files living on the Macs, or is it mostly web access plus the odd download? Mac sync clients are the flakiest part of all of these, and if it's really the web-plus-download case you can dodge that whole headache and something like File Browser Quantum comes back into play.