rclone

Name: rclone
Author: rclone project (Nick Craig-Wood)

by rclone project (Nick Craig-Wood) · CLI tool

Command-line program to sync, copy, mount and serve files across dozens of cloud storage providers and protocols, with optional client-side encryption

MIT licenseOpen sourceFreeLocalSelf-hostable

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Checked Nov 2, 2026

Overview

rclone is an open-source command-line tool, written in Go and licensed under MIT, often described as rsync for cloud storage. It speaks to a long list of backends, among them Amazon S3 and S3-compatible stores, Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, Backblaze B2, Azure Blob, SFTP, WebDAV, FTP and local disks, through a uniform set of commands: copy, sync, move, check, ls and mount. Remotes are configured interactively or via environment variables, and overlay remotes add client-side encryption (crypt), compression, chunking or unions of several stores.

Beyond transfers it can mount a remote as a filesystem, serve one over HTTP, WebDAV, SFTP, S3 or DLNA, and perform two-way bisync. It is widely used to mirror directories to object storage, migrate between providers, and as a backend for restic.

rclone is a transfer and sync tool, not a versioned backup program: sync makes the destination match the source and deletes extras unless a backup directory is configured, so snapshot-style history requires pairing with restic, Borg or provider-side versioning.

Capabilities

Copy, sync, move and verify files between dozens of storage backends
Client-side encryption, compression and chunking overlays
Mount remotes as a filesystem and serve them over HTTP, WebDAV, SFTP or S3
Bidirectional sync (bisync)
Bandwidth limits, filtering rules and checksum verification
Remote control API and web GUI

Typical workflows

Mirror a data directory to S3-compatible storage nightly
Migrate files between two cloud providers
Mount a cloud bucket on a workstation
Provide an encrypted remote as a restic backend

Strengths

Very broad backend coverage with one command set
Single static binary for every major OS
Permissive MIT license

Limitations

Not a snapshotting backup tool on its own
Provider API quirks and rate limits surface in configuration
Large configuration surface for advanced features

Prerequisites

Credentials for the storage providers in use

Who it is for

System administrators and data engineers
Individuals managing files across cloud accounts

Alternatives & comparison

restic and BorgBackup produce encrypted, deduplicated snapshots and keep history; rclone moves and mirrors current files and is frequently the transport layer under restic. MinIO/AIStor is a storage server that rclone can talk to rather than a competing client.

BorgBackup
Deduplicating backup archiver with compression and authenticated encryption that stores repositories on local disks or remote hosts over SSH
Open sourceOpen source
MinIO (AIStor)
S3-compatible object storage server; the AGPL community edition was archived in April 2026 and succeeded by MinIO's AIStor Free and AIStor Enterprise editions
MixedFree
restic
Encrypted, deduplicating backup program written in Go that stores snapshots in local, SFTP, S3-compatible and many cloud backends
Open sourceOpen source

Compare rclone with its alternatives →

Sources & verification

Primary sources consulted for this record. Claims are tied to the fields each source supports; the automated link checker re-verifies every URL on a schedule.

License
rclone COPYING (MIT)
https://github.com/rclone/rclone/blob/master/COPYING
Supports: license_spdx, source_model
checked Nov 1, 2026
Official documentation
rclone documentation
https://rclone.org/docs
Supports: capabilities, integrations, workflows
checked Nov 1, 2026
Official site
Rclone
https://rclone.org/
Supports: name, summary, capabilities
checked Nov 1, 2026

Confidence: High
Reviewed: Nov 1, 2026
Links: Broken · Nov 2, 2026