File Storage & Backup · ranked shortlist
Best File Storage & Backup software for Freelancers in 2026
17 approved file storage & backup listings, ordered by published rating with the method stated below rather than assumed. Freelancers are buying one seat, so per-seat pricing works in their favour and the free tiers are worth taking seriously. Read the bottom of every price ladder on this page first.
- Tools ranked
- 17
- Entry price range
- $4-$250
- Publish a $0 plan
- 2 of 17
How this ranking is derived
The sort key
Published rating, highest first. Ties break on the number of ratings behind the score, then on product name so the order never depends on what the API happened to return first. That is the whole rule, there is no weighting, no score of our own, and nothing paid: no sponsored slot runs on these pages.
Where the ratings come from
No listing in this set carries a rating, so the order falls back to name. Those scores are aggregated from public sources rather than collected here, Softwr hosts no reviews of its own, which is also why no rating on this page is marked up as ours in structured data.
What the pool is
Approved file storage & backup listings, capped at 20 per page; 17 came back for this one. It is not the whole market, and a tool being absent means we hold no record of it rather than that it failed a test. The unranked full set is on the file storage & backup category page.
The ranking
Each entry lists why it sits where it sits, drawn from its own published rating and pricing.
- #1
Arq Backup
Highest rated hereMac and Windows backup to your own cloud storage
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $50 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- subscription
- Published tiers
- 1 tier
- Tags
- personal, byos, encrypted, automatic
- #2
Backblaze
Unlimited cloud backup at an affordable price
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $6 a month, with no free plan.
- 2 published tiers, topping out at $9.
- Billing
- Model not published
- Published tiers
- 2 tiers
- Tags
- unlimited-backup, affordable, personal, simple
- #3
Barracuda Backup
Complete backup solution with built-in ransomware protection
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- subscription
- Tags
- appliance, ransomware-protection, unlimited-storage, liveboot
- #4
Box
Cloud content management for the enterprise
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- subscription
- #5
Carbonite
Simple and reliable cloud backup for businesses
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $6 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- subscription
- Published tiers
- 1 tier
- Tags
- cloud-backup, smb, automatic-backup, simple
- #6
CrashPlan
Endpoint backup designed for work-from-anywhere
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $8 a month, with no free plan.
- 3 published tiers, topping out at $158.
- Billing
- Model not published
- Published tiers
- 3 tiers
- Tags
- endpoint-backup, Remote Work, legal-hold, unlimited
- #7
Duplicati
Free open-source backup with encryption
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- Model not published
- Tags
- Free, Open Source, encrypted, cloud-backup
- #8
IDrive
Affordable online backup with multiple device support
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $4 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- subscription
- Published tiers
- 1 tier
- Tags
- affordable, multi-device, express-transfer, archiving
- #9
Microsoft OneDrive
Cloud storage that comes with Microsoft 365
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- subscription
- #10
Nextcloud
Self-hosted file sync, sharing and collaboration platform
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Publishes a $0 plan, with paid tiers from $71.29 a month.
- 4 published tiers, topping out at $204.75.
- Billing
- freemium
- Published tiers
- 4 tiers
- #11
pCloud
Prices are final. No setup fees or other hidden charges
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- one-time
- #12
Sync.com
Cloud storage, backup and sharing with end-to-end encryption
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- subscription
- #13
Tresorit
Store, sync, and share sensitive files with end-to-end encryption and zero-knowledge
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Billing
- subscription
- #14
TrueNAS
Open-source ZFS storage operating system for network-attached storage
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
- Billing
- open-source
- #15
Veeam Backup & Replication
Modern data protection for enterprise workloads
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $250 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- Model not published
- Tags
- enterprise-backup, disaster-recovery, ransomware-protection, vm-backup
- #16
Veritas NetBackup
Scalable enterprise backup and recovery
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $100 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- subscription
- Published tiers
- 1 tier
- Tags
- enterprise-backup, heterogeneous, multi-cloud, scalable
- #17
Zerto
Continuous data protection with near-zero RPO
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $5 a month, with no free plan.
- Billing
- subscription
- Published tiers
- 1 tier
- Tags
- continuous-protection, disaster-recovery, multi-cloud, journal-based
What file storage & backup software costs
Counted from the published pricing of the 17 listings on this page. A tool counts as free only where it publishes a $0 plan, an open-source licence or a starting price of zero.
- Cheapest paid plan
- $4IDrive
- Median entry price
- $8across 9 priced
- Dearest entry price
- $250Veeam Backup & Replication
- Publish a $0 plan
- 2of 17
Paid file storage & backup plans in this set start anywhere from $4 a month for IDrive to $250 for Veeam Backup & Replication. The median entry price across the 9 tools that publish one is $8, half of them start below that figure and half above it.
2 of 17 publish a $0 plan, and 1 of those charge nothing at all. 8 tools have no free tier of any kind.
IDrive pricingVeeam Backup & Replication pricingVeeam Backup & Replication plans
How these vendors bill
The billing model each of the 17 file storage & backup listings publishes, counted. Two tools at the same headline price are not the same purchase if one of them charges per seat.
- subscription
- 10
- freemium
- 1
- one-time
- 1
- open-source
- 1
What “File Storage & Backup” covers in practice
The subject tags that recur across these 17 listings, with the number of tools carrying each. A category label is a filing decision; this is the closer read of what is actually filed under it.
- affordable2
- cloud-backup2
- disaster-recovery2
- encrypted2
- enterprise-backup2
- multi-cloud2
- personal2
- ransomware-protection2
- simple2
Carried by a single tool: appliance, automatic, continuous-protection, Free, legal-hold, multi-device, scalable, unlimited-backup. If one of those is the reason you are here, the category page is the wrong lens, go straight to that product.
How to choose between them
Four things the numbers above should change about your shortlist.
Start with the free tiers if there are enough of them
2 of 17 file storage & backup tools here publish a $0 plan, which is enough to run a real trial without a purchase order. A free tier is worth more than a free trial when you are evaluating: a trial expires on the vendor's schedule, a free plan expires when you outgrow it. The thing to check before you commit is which of the capabilities below sit above the free line.
Read the spread before you read the features
$4 to $250 is a $246 spread on entry price alone, and a spread that wide is never about polish, it is about who the vendor built for. Tools at the bottom of this ladder are priced for one person or a small team; tools near $250 are priced for a department with a procurement process. Decide which of those you are before you compare capability, or you will shortlist four tools that were never competing for the same buyer.
Check which tier you actually land on
2 of 17 tools here publish three or more tiers, and the median vendor in this category ships 1 of them. The advertised price is the first rung. Price your shortlist at the tier that contains what you need, not at the tier on the pricing page's left edge.
The billing model matters more than the headline number
This category splits across 4 billing models: subscription on 10 listings, freemium on 1, and 2 other arrangements across the rest. A per-user price and a flat subscription at the same headline figure are not the same purchase, the first one grows with headcount and the second does not. Multiply by your real team size before you compare two numbers side by side.
Questions people ask about file storage & backup software
Answered from the listings on this page, and nowhere else.
- How is this file storage & backup ranking decided?
- Mechanically. The 17 approved file storage & backup listings on this page are sorted by their published rating, highest first, with the number of ratings behind each score as the tie-break and the product name as a final tie-break so the order is stable. Those ratings are aggregated from public sources, not collected from Softwr readers, this site hosts no reviews, so the order is a summary of what is already published elsewhere, not a verdict of our own. Nothing on this page is paid placement.
- Is this list re-ordered for freelancers?
- No, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise. The catalogue records no data about which team sizes or roles each tool suits, so the ranking is the same published-rating order as the unsegmented list. What the freelancers framing changes is which of the figures below matter most. Freelancers are buying one seat, so per-seat pricing works in their favour and the free tiers are worth taking seriously. Read the bottom of every price ladder on this page first.
- How much does file storage & backup software cost?
- Across the 17 file storage & backup tools listed here, paid plans start between $4 and $250 a month, with a median entry price of $8. The most expensive single tier published in the category is $250 a month (Veeam Backup & Replication). 2 of 17 also publish a $0 plan.
- What is the cheapest file storage & backup software?
- 1 of the 17 tools listed here cost nothing at all. Among the ones that charge, IDrive has the lowest published entry price at $4 a month. Cheapest and best value are different questions: check which tier the capability you need actually appears in before you compare starting prices.
- Is there free file storage & backup software?
- Yes, 2 of 17 tools in this category publish a plan priced at $0. 1 of them are free outright, with no paid tier above. A tool is only counted as free here when it publishes a $0 plan, an open-source licence, or a starting price of zero, a free trial does not count.
- How is file storage & backup software usually billed?
- subscription (10), freemium (1), one-time (1), open-source (1), counted across the 17 listings on this page. The distinction that costs money is per-seat versus flat: a per-user plan at the same headline price scales with your headcount and a flat subscription does not.
- What does file storage & backup software actually cover?
- The 17 tools on this page do not describe themselves the same way. The subject tags they carry most often are affordable (2), cloud-backup (2), disaster-recovery (2), encrypted (2), enterprise-backup (2). That spread is the honest answer to what the category means in practice: it is not one product shape, and two tools filed under file storage & backup may overlap on very little.
- How many pricing tiers do file storage & backup tools offer?
- 8 of 17 tools here publish a plan breakdown, and the median one has 1 tiers. 2 of 17 publish three or more. More tiers is not generosity, it usually means the capability you are buying for sits two rungs above the advertised price, so price your shortlist at the tier that contains it.
- How many file storage & backup tools are listed on Softwr?
- 17 approved file storage & backup listings appear on this page, including Arq Backup, Backblaze, Barracuda Backup, Box. Each links to a full breakdown with its pricing tiers and plan detail, and the category can be filtered by price and sorted by rating above. You can also read the shortlist view at /best/file-storage-backup, which ranks the same set by published rating.
Keep reading
More on File Storage & Backup
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Adjacent in the same taxonomy, not a ranking.