Proton Drive: Cloud Storage

It could be better! One thing i like is how its integrated with apples files app so you can upload files either with the proton drive app or the files app. Uploading is a breeze. Options to allow files to be available offline and sharing is all within the app. Although i did find creating a share link for a file a bit confusing and wasn’t sure if i had even created a link at all. But there is a seperate tab to check what files are being shared One think that is a pain is if you upload a modified file with the same name. The app doesn’t ask if you want to replace the old one or keep both (like apples iCloud does) so you can end up with multiple files with a number at the end of the file name. This needs to be address with an update. Also sorting files seems hit and miss. Sorting by Last Modified can sort the latest files to the top but if you have created folders (for files) its sorted in reverse to that thats been selected for the files? This is far better than Apples iCloud Drive where i have had numerous times when files will not sync across devices - some devices even show old files that have been overwritten days before and will just not sync.

The big weakness, on the mobile iOS app, is the 10 photo limit per transfer. So moving hundreds of photos will be a pain.

The app seems zippy enough when you don’t have anything downloaded and kept locally, but when you have a lot of files kept on-device (available offline), the app slows to a crawl. The app has to “think” every time I tap into another folder. Tapping folders and files often doesn’t even register… or the tap is so painfully delayed that you assume the app is not paying attention, until it suddenly registers. The entire interface behaves this way: Tap something and wait several seconds to see if it worked or not. And forget object permanence. If you leave the app and return, it has to go through the same “thinking” all over again. Downloading files requires you to stay in the app, and not let your iPad or iPhone fall asleep, lest the downloads fail. Then you have to start all over again. The Make Available Offline will often fail. If the downloading of files inside a folder marked available offline is ever interrupted (see above!), the app gives up and the files remain offline, forever “Downloading.” You can try to start all over again, or mark each sub-folder in turn as available offline, or manually download each file individually. Ugh. Sadly, a truly miserable experience. I really hope they can improve this down the road!

I love the services that Proton provides, but the photo syncing needs work- I wanted this to replace apps like Google Photos or iCloud, but it’s not functioning at that level yet. Please keep working on it and reach that level of functionality!

Syncing is great between iOS and macOS. Good looking app and easy to use. Uploads speeds are usable when using Proton vpn on both devices. Would highly recommend over big tech cloud services.

I love the E2E encryption, but syncing is still rough. I was excited to sync photos, but it is not in operational form yet. Loads of errors syncong, certain photos won't display and painfully slow sync times. I'd recommend holding off use of Proton Drive until it's been stabilized.

I highly recommend this app, I understand some bugs are still being ironed out however you can't dismiss the fact that it's a cloud service that uses strong encryption methods that ensure protection over your files. I put complete trust in this app due to the zero knowledge encryption and other strong encryption methods. 10/10 recommend even though it's still under heavy development.

Need a SEARCH or FIND function to locate the file(s) so badly…

File management is good. Photo backup needs developed more. Look at PhotoSync for inspiration. To backup photos on iOS means backing up potentially 5 files+. Photo, edited version, live .mov, edited live .mov, and the AEE file which’s I believe tracks the changes. On top of that there needs to be delta detection to backup edits and metadata changes that happen after upload. Maybe Proton and PhotoSync can collaborate to add Proton drive support into Proton photo backup.

Switched to this from Google drive. After spending the better part of a day backing up all my photos the app is trying to backup all 4400 photos again??