Rclone is an MIT-licensed, Go-based command-line program that syncs files and directories to and from cloud storage providers, built for anyone who needs one tool for many backends instead of a separate client for every service.

What it is

Rclone describes itself as "rsync for cloud storage". It is a single command-line program, written in Go, that syncs files and directories to and from a long list of cloud storage providers, and it is published under the MIT licence with its homepage, documentation, downloads and changelog hosted at rclone.org. The project lives in the Go and cloud-storage ecosystem on GitHub, where it has accumulated roughly 59,800 stars, 5,400 forks and 1,273 open issues, with its most recent push on 18 September 2026.

The concrete problem it solves is the fragmentation of file transfer across storage services. Where a user would otherwise install Google Drive's client, Dropbox's client, an S3 command-line utility and a separate tool for Backblaze B2, Azure Blob or OneDrive, rclone presents one interface over all of them. It replaces those per-provider clients and ad-hoc transfer scripts, and it extends the model beyond proprietary object storage to older protocols such as FTP, SFTP, HTTP, WebDAV and HDFS, which appear as their own backend documentation pages.

Key capabilities

• Syncs files and directories to and from cloud storage providers through a single command-line interface.
• Supports major consumer and enterprise backends including Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, Google Drive's Photos service, Google Cloud Storage, Azure Blob, Azure Files, Yandex Files, Backblaze B2, Wasabi, Swift and Hubic.
• Handles S3-compatible object storage through one documentation page, covering endpoints such as Ceph, Cloudflare R2, DigitalOcean Spaces and Hetzner Object Storage.
• Covers non-object protocols directly, with dedicated pages for FTP, SFTP, HTTP, WebDAV and HDFS, including SFTP targets such as Hetzner Storage Box.
• Provides encryption and FUSE filesystem capabilities, both present in the project's topic list.
• Ships as a Go binary and is also distributed as the rclone/rclone Docker image on Docker Hub.

Who uses it and how

• Individuals and teams moving data between cloud accounts, using one tool rather than a client per provider.
• Backup and archive workflows writing to Backblaze B2, Amazon S3, Wasabi, Azure Blob or Google Cloud Storage.
• Homelab and server operators using the FUSE filesystem capability to expose remote storage as a local filesystem.
• Container-based deployments pulling the rclone/rclone image, indicated by the Docker Hub pulls badge in the README.
• Migration work between services the README lists, such as Google Photos, iCloud Drive or Internet Archive.

Getting started

Installation is documented at rclone.org/install/, with downloads at rclone.org/downloads/ and full documentation at rclone.org/docs/. Container users can pull the published rclone/rclone image.

How it compares

The README frames rclone by analogy to rsync as "rsync for cloud storage", so it sits alongside rsync-style transfer tools while targeting cloud and object backends rather than local paths and SSH remotes. The supplied facts name no paid product that rclone replaces, so it stands alone in this registry.

When to use it — and when not to

A self-hoster must install the binary or run the container and manage credentials or OAuth tokens for each configured backend, since rclone is a command-line tool rather than a managed service. The open-issue count of 1,273 signals a substantial backlog, and the very breadth of the provider matrix means behaviour and quirks vary from backend to backend. Anyone wanting a graphical, hands-off sync client with vendor support should look elsewhere; rclone rewards users comfortable at a terminal.