cloudmounter alternatives for mac
by sumit paul · last updated
the main cloudmounter alternatives on a mac are expandrive and mountain duck (finder apps that mount many clouds and servers), rclone (free, command line, the most providers), cyberduck (a free file browser rather than a drive), the official google drive and dropbox apps, and feather drive (google drive and dropbox only, streaming on macos 26). which one fits depends on how many services you need, if you also use windows, and if files should stream or sync.
what cloudmounter does, for comparison
cloudmounter, from electronic team, mounts cloud accounts as drives in finder on mac and in explorer on windows. its site lists google drive, dropbox, box, amazon s3, mega, pcloud, backblaze, webdav, sftp and ftp among its connections, with client-side aes-256 encryption and offline access on mac (offline is listed as coming soon on windows). it supports macos 12.4 and later. so a good alternative has to match some of that, or do one part of it better.
the alternatives at a glance
| app | services | platforms | approach |
|---|---|---|---|
| expandrive | google drive, dropbox, box, s3, backblaze b2, wasabi, nextcloud, sharepoint, sftp, ftp, webdav and more | mac, windows; linux via server edition | apple's file provider api on mac, streams on demand, offline cache |
| mountain duck | google drive, dropbox, box, s3, azure, backblaze b2, nextcloud, sftp, ftp, webdav, smb and more | mac, windows | network volume or synced folder, your choice; cryptomator vaults |
| rclone | dozens of providers | mac, windows, linux | command line; mounts through nfs or fuse; also copies and syncs |
| cyberduck | google drive, dropbox, s3, sftp, ftp, webdav and more | mac, windows (cli on linux) | a file browser window, not a mounted drive |
| google drive for desktop / dropbox app | their own service only | mac, windows | sync client; online-only files download in full when opened |
| feather drive | google drive, dropbox | mac (macos 26 or later) | file system extension; streams the byte ranges an app reads |
expandrive
the closest like-for-like swap. expandrive uses apple's file provider api on mac, so its site says there's no kernel extension and drives show up in finder and in ~/Library/CloudStorage. files stream on demand and are cached for re-opening, and you can keep selected files in an offline cache. it adds things cloudmounter doesn't advertise: a scriptable cli (exfs), a server edition for windows server and linux, and an admin console for teams. its site also says it's free for personal use.
pick it if you want a polished finder drive for many services, or you manage drives for a team.
mountain duck
mountain duck is built on cyberduck's open-source code, so it speaks a long list of protocols. its docs describe three connect modes: online (a network volume, changes upload as soon as an app saves), smart synchronization (files cached locally, usable offline) and integrated (apple's file provider on mac, cloud files on windows, needs mountain duck 5). it opens cryptomator vaults for client-side encryption.
pick it if you want to choose per connection between a live network drive and an offline-capable synced folder, or you already use cryptomator.
rclone
free, open source and supports far more providers than any app here. on a mac, rclone nfsmount mounts a remote with nothing extra installed, and rclone mount works with macfuse or fuse-t. with --vfs-cache-mode full it fetches only the parts of a file an app reads. the price is terminal setup, and for google drive you now need your own api client id. our rclone tutorial covers it step by step.
pick it if you're comfortable in terminal, need an unusual provider, or want scripted copies between clouds.
cyberduck
cyberduck is a free, gpl-licensed file browser for mac and windows. it doesn't mount anything in finder; you browse, upload and download in its own window. its site says it reaches google drive and dropbox without syncing them to your disk, and it supports cryptomator vaults.
pick it if you mostly move files around and don't need other apps to open them in place.
google drive for desktop and the dropbox app
free with your account and they show everything in your drive. both keep files online-only until you open them, then download the whole file and keep the copy. that's fine for documents and painful for big video. they only do their own service.
feather drive
feather drive is much narrower than cloudmounter on purpose. it puts google drive and dropbox in finder and, when an app reads a file, fetches only the byte ranges it asks for, so big videos and archives open in about a second and take no space on the mac. in a side-by-side test, a 1.22 GB video opened in 1.7 s, against 1 min 44 s in google drive for desktop, which downloaded all of it first. it has optional end-to-end encryption (aes-256-gcm, details here).
the limits: macos 26 or later only, google drive and dropbox only, and it only sees files you put in it (google's drive.file permission and a dropbox app folder), not your whole drive. opening files needs a connection, and it's a paid app with a 3-day free trial. if you need s3, sftp, windows or offline sync, the apps above do more.
how to choose
- many services, finder drive: expandrive or mountain duck.
- windows too: expandrive, mountain duck or rclone.
- free and scriptable: rclone.
- offline work on the same files: mountain duck's smart sync, expandrive's offline cache, or the official sync apps.
- big video or raw files from google drive or dropbox on a recent mac, without filling the disk: feather drive.
related
- expandrive vs mountain duck vs cloudmounter
- how to mount google drive on a mac with rclone
- google drive for desktop alternatives on mac
- how to open any file from the cloud on a mac without downloading it
common questions
is there a free alternative to cloudmounter?
yes. rclone and cyberduck are free and open source, and expandrive's site says it is free for personal use. google drive for desktop and the dropbox app are free with your account but only cover their own service.
which cloudmounter alternative works on windows?
expandrive, mountain duck, rclone and cyberduck all run on windows as well as macos. rclone also runs on linux, and expandrive offers a server edition for linux.
which alternative supports the most services?
rclone, by a wide margin. among the finder apps, expandrive and mountain duck both cover the big consumer clouds plus s3-style storage, sftp, ftp and webdav.
can i encrypt files before they reach the cloud?
cloudmounter has client-side aes-256 encryption on mac. mountain duck and cyberduck support cryptomator vaults, rclone has a crypt remote, and feather drive has optional end-to-end encryption for google drive and dropbox.