Files.com vs. SolarWinds Serv-U

Retire The Server Without Re-Onboarding A Single Partner

The reason a Serv-U server outlives the decision to replace it is that every partner, script, and instrument in the field is pointed at it. Files.com keeps the hostname, credentials, and SSH host key those systems already trust, so the endpoint answers exactly as before while the server behind it goes away. You get the same protocols as a managed platform, plus the automation, partner onboarding, and audit trail a transfer server never carried. 4,000+ organizations run their file transfer on Files.com, the #1 platform in Gartner Peer Insights for managed file transfer.

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Real companies. Real file flows. Real results.

What Serv-U Is, And What It Leaves You Holding

SolarWinds Serv-U is file transfer server software you deploy in your own data center. It speaks SFTP, FTPS, FTP, and HTTPS, ships in a standard and an MFT edition, and offers Serv-U Gateway as a separate component for DMZ deployments. As a transfer endpoint it works, which is why so many have been running quietly for a decade or more.

What it leaves you holding is everything around the transfer. The server is yours to host, patch, and keep available. Accounts for outside counterparties are built and cleaned up by hand. Nothing fires when a file arrives, so a person watches for it and does the next step. And because it serves the disk attached to it, the data sits apart from the cloud storage the rest of the business already runs on.

The bill for a bare transfer server is not the license. It is the headcount standing behind it. Files.com serves the same protocols as a managed platform with nothing to patch, and adds automation, partner onboarding, sharing, and a tamper-proof audit log, with an Agent that still reaches the systems staying in your data center.

Where Files.com Wins

The Host Keys And Passwords Come With You

A cutover usually dies on the details: the host key a partner pinned years ago, the password a device has stored since it shipped. Files.com imports your existing SSH host key in any format (RSA, DSA, ECDSA, Ed25519) and imports password hashes exactly as your old server stored them, so no partner re-pins a key and nobody resets a credential. One instrument maker cut over hundreds of field instruments deployed for up to two decades without touching one of them.

Nothing To Patch When The Next Advisory Lands

Serv-U runs on a server you own and faces the public internet, so its security is your job, and the public record shows what that job costs. Three Serv-U flaws sit in CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. CVE-2021-35211 is a remote-code-execution flaw exploited as a zero-day; CVE-2024-28995 is an unauthenticated path traversal added in 2024; CVE-2026-28318 was added in June 2026 while under active attack. Files.com is patched by us, so beating that clock stops being something you staff for.

The Work Around The Transfer

Serv-U moves a file and stops, which is why a person ends up doing everything on either side of it. Files.com runs the rest: automation that fires on arrival, partner onboarding that doesn’t route through IT, and a tamper-proof audit log. One investment manager now runs file exchange across nine institutional platforms with one IT leader, because the platform absorbed the work a person was absorbing.

Accounts That Provision Themselves

On Serv-U, every outside account is created and maintained by hand, so onboarding a counterparty is a ticket and offboarding one is a thing somebody has to remember. Files.com provisions your own users from your directory and gives each outside partner scoped, expiring access, so a departed vendor cannot keep a login nobody revoked.

One Layer Over The Storage You Already Pay For

A Serv-U box serves the disk attached to it. Files.com mounts Amazon S3, Azure Blob Storage, and your on-prem shares as one namespace, so data lands where it is already governed. One asset manager kept hundreds of batch jobs running against existing SMB paths while feeds landed natively in Azure for Databricks to read.

A Migration You Can Run At Your Own Speed

Files.com runs alongside Serv-U for as long as you need, so every counterparty moves on its own schedule and no date has to hold. One software company moved 460 customer companies off a twenty-year-old server with customer work running throughout, and one city retired its Serv-U server in a day.

Customers Who Replaced SolarWinds Serv-U

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One Platform To Replace Your Whole File Stack

Every capability legacy MFT licenses as a module, plus the ones it never had — on one platform, with published pricing.

Cloud SFTP, FTP & MFT Server

Dedicated, fully managed SFTP, FTPS, and FTP endpoints, with every protocol your partners already use. No servers to patch and no DMZ to maintain.Replaces IBM Sterling, GoAnywhere, MOVEit, Axway, AWS Transfer Family

See Cloud SFTP Server

File Sharing & Collaboration

Branded portals, secure share links, and request inboxes, plus co-editing for Office documents. Partners and customers get access with no account and nothing to install.Replaces Box, Dropbox, ShareFile, Egnyte

See Collaboration

Fast File Transfer & Acceleration

Move files up to 5 TB at full speed over any distance, with chunked, resumable transfers on standard protocols and custom UDP acceleration in the Agent.Replaces IBM Aspera, Signiant

See Fast Transfers

Automation & Workflows

Trigger on a file arriving, a schedule, or an event, then route, convert, and notify, with retries and alerts built in. The reliable replacement for the scripts and cron jobs nobody wants to own.Replaces fragile custom scripts and cron jobs

See Automations

Data Transformation & Format Conversion

Reshape files inline as they move: convert formats and pull fields out of EDI, HL7, XML, JSON, and CSV, so downstream systems get exactly what they expect.Replaces hand-built parsing and conversion scripts

See Transform & Extract

Desktop Drive & File Server Replacement

Native apps for Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android mount your cloud storage as a local drive, so you can retire aging file servers and NAS without changing how people work.Replaces NetApp, Nasuni, aging NAS, Windows file servers

See File Server Replacement

Every capability runs on one platform — SOC 2 Type II certified, HIPAA BAA available, with a complete audit trail on every action.

The Price That Makes The Decision Easy

Files.com Starter is $199/month with SFTP, FTPS, FTP, and WebDAV all included — no per-protocol surcharge, no quote to get a number. When you outgrow the included counts, the overages are cheap, not a forced upgrade.

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Security And Compliance, Built In

Files.com has run for 15+ years with zero breaches. The controls your auditors ask about are standard here, not add-ons.

SOC 2 Type II

Independently audited, every year.

FedRAMP Certified

Certified under FedRAMP 20x at Class A, with Class B in progress.

HIPAA & GDPR

BAA and DPA available, with EU and regional data residency.

Encrypted End To End

AES-256 at rest, TLS 1.2 and 1.3 in transit.

SSO, SCIM & MFA

SAML SSO, SCIM provisioning, MFA, and granular role-based access.

Complete Audit Trail

Every action logged immutably and streamed to your SIEM.

See Our Compliance Center

Every Support Request Reaches A Senior Engineer

No Level 1 runaround, no script, no callback queue. When something breaks, you reach a seasoned file transfer expert who can actually fix it.

All-Engineer Support Desk

Talk to file transfer experts who understand how you work.

Replies in under an hour
Talk straight to engineers
We watch for problems
We own the escalation

See How Support Works

Onboarding Services

A dedicated Customer Engineer and a step-by-step plan — most teams are live within five business days.

Migration planning
Help on go-live day
Workflow tuning
Training for your team

See How Onboarding Works

Resources & Training

Clear documentation, training materials, and how-to guides.

API documentation
Video tutorials
How-to guides
Yearly in-person customer events

View Our Documentation

“Files.com's strengths are simplicity, ease of use, and the cloud connectors. We don't have to invent custom infrastructure for every partner.”

Tommy Chapley

Senior Software Engineer, Equifax

“Files.com is versatile — it can manage many different situations from a single platform. We've consolidated multiple tools onto it.”

Regis Litre

Chief Information Officer, Rag & Bone

“Files.com is robust and scales to a large enterprise. We get multiple files per minute, per second — and we're a 24/7 organization, so everything has to always be up.”

Nelson Miranda

Sr. Systems Engineer, Spirit Airlines

Files.com Vs. SolarWinds Serv-U FAQ

What buyers ask most when comparing Files.com to SolarWinds Serv-U.

SolarWinds Serv-U is file transfer server software you install and run in your own data center, supporting SFTP, FTPS, FTP, and HTTPS. Files.com is a managed File Orchestration Platform that serves the same protocols with nothing for you to host or patch, and adds automation, partner onboarding, sharing, and a tamper-proof audit log that a transfer server does not carry.

Yes. Files.com preserves the hostname, credentials, and SSH host key your counterparties already trust, so systems coded against your Serv-U endpoint keep working unchanged — whether that’s a handful of vendors or hundreds of automated counterparties built up over decades.

Three Serv-U vulnerabilities appear in CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog: CVE-2021-35211, a remote-code-execution flaw exploited as a zero-day; CVE-2024-28995, an unauthenticated directory-traversal flaw added in July 2024; and CVE-2026-28318, an unauthenticated resource-consumption flaw added on June 5, 2026 while being exploited in the wild. Serv-U runs on infrastructure you own, so patching each one within the deadline is your team’s responsibility. Files.com is patched by Files.com.

No. SolarWinds Serv-U is software deployed in your own data center, with Serv-U Gateway as a separate add-on component for DMZ deployments. Files.com is a cloud platform operated for you, and reaches systems that must stay on-premise through the on-premise Agent, an outbound-only connection that needs no inbound firewall change.

Yes. Files.com serves the SFTP, FTPS, FTP, and HTTPS that Serv-U serves, and adds the automation, partner workflows, sharing, governance, and audit trail that a workload needs as it grows. Teams retire Serv-U servers for Files.com routinely, running Files.com in parallel with Serv-U so nothing breaks on the way over.

Files.com publishes its pricing and includes the full platform, rather than licensing a server per instance and leaving you the cost of the machine it runs on, the engineer who patches it, and the add-on module for DMZ deployment.

The Decision

If your requirement is that the transfer server itself sit inside your perimeter, on hardware you control, Serv-U does that and Files.com does not. Files.com is a cloud platform, and the Agent reaches into your data center rather than living there.

For everyone else the question is what the server is costing you: the patching, the hand-built accounts, the person who watches for a file and does the next step, and the cutover nobody wants to own. With Files.com running in parallel, retiring the server stops being a project anyone has to schedule.

Keep The Endpoint, Lose The Server

The same protocols your partners already use, with the hostname and host key they already trust, plus automation, partner onboarding, and a tamper-proof audit trail. Nothing for you to patch.

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