Files.com is the #1-rated managed file transfer platform in Gartner Peer Insights. It’s cloud-native, and we run and patch it for you, so you’re live in days. Kiteworks ships you a hardened appliance to deploy and patch yourself. 4,000+ companies, including Equifax, Cognizant, and Banner Health, secure their file exchange on Files.com.
Files.com is the modern, cloud-native platform for secure file exchange — #1 in Gartner Peer Insights for managed file transfer, run and patched by us, and live in days on a self-serve trial. Your team logs in and the file transfer works.
Kiteworks does the secure-exchange job as a hardened virtual appliance you deploy, harden, size, and keep patched yourself. That model is a procurement-gated project to stand up, something you re-architect as volume grows, and a patch window your team owns forever.
It also stops at the transfer. Files.com is built to be operated by AI, connects 50+ tools and clouds out of the box, and drives every action through a REST API and SDKs — the modern platform surface, not just a secure box files pass through.
#1 across every G2 rating in the category, with 4,000-plus organizations and 15-plus years of operation. Kiteworks is a security-appliance vendor; Files.com is the rated leader in the file-transfer category itself.
Kiteworks ships you a hardened appliance to deploy, harden, size, and keep patched. Files.com is cloud-native and run by us: we patch it centrally, scale it without you sizing anything, and keep it secure. Nothing to stand up, nothing to upgrade.
Files.com ships an AI assistant and API agents and a hosted MCP server that operate the platform from Claude, Cursor, or any MCP client. Kiteworks frames AI as a data-security problem to contain — not a way to run the product.
Files.com connects the 50+ clouds, identity providers, SIEMs, and tools you already run — storage backends mounted as remote servers, SSO and SCIM, event streaming to your SIEM — out of the box.
A self-serve trial lets your team validate the platform today, and Files.com publishes its pricing. A Kiteworks appliance is a procurement-gated deployment project before the first file moves.
Virus and malware scanning runs on inbound files inside the platform, and the on-premise Agent reaches your internal servers over an outbound-only connection — no inbound firewall rule, no appliance exposed to the internet.
When you run the appliance, keeping it current is your job. You size it, you harden it, and every time Kiteworks ships an update you schedule a maintenance window and apply it yourself.
Files.com works the other way. We run it and update it centrally, for every customer at once. There’s no appliance of yours to size, harden, or keep current — your team logs in and it works.
“Our previous solution was on-prem, so we had to allow a third-party vendor onto the entirety of our network. What’s great with Files.com is that this isn’t the case. Everything is being handled at the cloud-based level, whether it’s inbound or outbound on our network.”
What buyers ask most when comparing Files.com to Kiteworks.
If you do federal or classified work that needs a FedRAMP authorization, a FIPS 140-3 module, or an air-gapped install, choose Kiteworks — it holds what Files.com doesn’t.
Otherwise, choose Files.com. You run secure file exchange on the #1-rated MFT platform — cloud-native, patched and scaled by us, connected to the tools you already use, priced transparently, live in days. The appliance is just overhead: a thing to stand up, harden, and patch forever, for capabilities the platform already runs for you.
4,000+ organizations run secure, governed file exchange on Files.com instead of a self-run appliance. Talk to our team or validate the platform on a free trial.
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