The Files.com Sync feature transfers files between two locations, either on a recurring basis, or when started by an Automation.

Sync works with folders in your Files.com site, remote servers, and child sites. A Sync transfers files from a source location to a destination location, with filters for including and excluding files and customizable start times.

A Sync can send or collect data from any supported location to any other supported location.

When used with a remote server, the supported remote server types include Cloud Storage (Akamai Linode, Amazon S3, Azure Blob Storage, Azure Files, Backblaze B2, Cloudflare R2, Filebase, Google Cloud Storage, Wasabi), Content Collaboration (CCP) and Enterprise File Sync & Share (EFSS) solutions (Box, Dropbox, Egnyte, Google Drive, OneDrive, ShareFile, SharePoint), Managed File Transfer (MFT) systems (FTP, FTPS, SFTP, WebDAV), on-premise systems (Files.com Agent), and more.

How Syncs Work on Files.com

Sync jobs run at regular, scheduled intervals. How often a Sync can run is determined by your subscription plan. Syncs can run as often as every 15 minutes on the Power plan, and every 1 to 5 minutes on an Enterprise plan. You can choose a larger interval to run a Sync less often.

Each Sync includes a Synchronization interval (in minutes) setting, which you can change to increase the time between successive runs for that Sync.

When a Sync job runs, Files.com lists the relevant folders on both the source and destination of the Sync and looks for files that are missing or where the size is reported to be different on the source and destination. In these cases, Files.com copies the file from the source to the destination. You can configure Syncs to delete the file from the source after a successful Sync.

Files may be transferred in any order, and parallelism is used where possible.

To limit the maximum parallelism used by Files.com with remote servers, you can use a setting on the Remote Server to define the maximum number of parallel connections. This is useful for avoiding errors caused by a remote server that has limitations on the number of concurrent connections that it can accept.

Sync vs. Mount

If you are concerned about precise timing, we recommend our Remote Server Mount feature instead, which provides a realtime view into the Remote Server via a Files.com folder.

With a Mount, files are only stored on the remote server and not in Files.com. All file operations, including those performed by an Automation, are passed through to the remote server in real time.