feather drive vs google drive for desktop
by sumit paul · last updated
google drive for desktop is google's free app: it shows your whole drive in finder and downloads a file in full when you open it. feather drive is a paid mac app that streams files instead, so an app reads only the part it needs, big files open in about a second, and they never take up their full size on your disk. google's app is the better choice for your whole drive and offline work; feather drive is better for large files on a mac that's short on space.
in this test, the same 1.22 GB video took 1 min 44 s to open from google drive for desktop, which downloaded all of it first, and 1.7 s from feather drive, where it still takes zero bytes on disk.
| feather drive | google drive for desktop | |
|---|---|---|
| opening a file | streams only the part the app reads | downloads the whole file first (stream mode) |
| a 92 GB file on a mac with 10 GB free | opens | needs room for the whole file |
| after you open a file | pieces sit in a capped cache, oldest cleared first | a full copy stays on your mac until removed |
| what it shows | files you put in it | your whole drive, shared drives included |
| offline | needs a connection to open files | files you've opened or marked offline work offline |
| end-to-end encryption | optional (AES-256-GCM) | no |
| dropbox | yes, alongside google drive | no |
| requirements | macos 26 or later | macos and windows |
| price | $19.99 lifetime (3 macs) or $4.99 for a month (1 mac), 3-day free trial | free |
when google drive for desktop is the better choice
- you want every file in your drive in finder, including shared drives and files others shared with you.
- you work offline often.
- you don't want to pay for another app.
when feather drive is the better choice
- you keep big videos, raw photos, audio projects or archives in the cloud and want them to open instantly.
- your mac is short on space and you can't download files to open them.
- you want google (or dropbox) to store only encrypted data.
many people run both: google drive for desktop for everyday documents, feather drive for the large files.