From download to a working drive.

1. Install

Get the installer for your computer from the download page. Because CloudPool is new and not yet signed with a paid Apple or Microsoft certificate, the first launch needs one extra click:

• Mac: open it once, then go to System Settings, Privacy & Security, and click Open Anyway.
• Windows: on "Windows protected your PC", click More info, then Run anyway.
• Linux: install the .deb with sudo apt install ./CloudPool-Linux-amd64.deb, or make the AppImage executable.

The download page has the details for each system.

2. Your CloudPool login

The first screen has one button: Continue with Google. Your browser opens CloudPool's sign-in page; choose your Google account there, and CloudPool comes back signed in.

This login is what lets another computer or your phone open the same accounts later: sign in there with the same Google account. It holds the list of accounts you connect, encrypted before it is synced (the security page says exactly how).

You stay signed in until you choose Sign out in Settings.

3. Connect accounts

Open Storage accounts at the bottom of the sidebar and click Add storage. The services are grouped into cloud drives, object storage, and your own servers and disks, and you pick the drive each account joins. Add as many accounts as you like, including several of the same kind; each one adds its space as soon as it connects. Nothing is ever deleted from an account when you disconnect it.

Google Drive (15 GB free)

Google asks every app that uses Drive to have a sign-in key. CloudPool walks you through making your own the first time you add a Google account. It is free, takes about five minutes, and is done once: every Google account after that uses the same key.

1. In Google Cloud Console, create a project. Any name works.
2. Enable the Google Drive API for that project.
3. In Google Auth Platform, set up the consent screen: choose External and give your email as the support contact. Under Audience, press Publish app, so sign-ins do not expire after 7 days. Under Data Access, add the scope that ends in /auth/drive.
4. Under Clients, create a client of type Desktop app. Copy its Client ID and Client secret into CloudPool and click Save key. CloudPool checks the pair with Google before saving it.

Then your browser opens Google's sign-in page. Choose the account and allow access. Because the key is your own, Google shows "Google hasn't verified this app": click Advanced, then Go to the app. That warning is expected for personal keys. The CloudPool window updates by itself when you are done.

MEGA (20 GB free)

Enter the account's email and password. CloudPool signs in to MEGA directly and stores the password encrypted.

If the account has two-factor login, open My account has two-factor login and paste the 2FA key, the long setup code MEGA shows when you turn two-factor on. With the key, CloudPool makes the six-digit codes itself and never needs you again. Typing just today's code also works, but then MEGA asks again whenever CloudPool restarts.

TeraBox (1 TB free)

Click Open TeraBox sign-in. TeraBox's own sign-in page opens inside CloudPool: log in the usual way, with email, Google or Apple. When your files appear, CloudPool keeps the session and closes the window. For another TeraBox account, do the same again; every sign-in window starts fresh, so accounts never mix.

If TeraBox shows a captcha or asks you to verify the login, finish that in the window and open a folder or two before it closes. Already signed in to TeraBox in your browser? Paste a browser cookie instead accepts the ndus cookie from there.

GitHub

Files go into a private repository. GitHub is made for code and asks that a repository stay under about 5 GB, with no file over 100 MB. Best for small files you rarely change. CloudPool uses it as a small-file account, below GitHub's 100 MB file limit.

Other services

Services with their own sign-in page open it in your browser: OneDrive, Dropbox, Box, pCloud, Yandex Disk, Huawei Drive, Zoho WorkDrive, HiDrive, Put.io, premiumize.me and ShareFile. Approve access there and CloudPool finishes by itself. The others ask for a few details, and the form says where to find each one:

• An app password for Koofr, Mail.ru Cloud and Nextcloud. Make one in the service's security settings; your normal password will not work.
• Keys and a bucket for object storage: an access key pair for Amazon S3 and S3-compatible services, an application key for Backblaze B2, a service account key for Google Cloud Storage. CloudPool creates the bucket if it is not there yet.
• A server address for Nextcloud, ownCloud, WebDAV, SFTP, FTP and SMB shares, with a username and password. SFTP also takes a private key.
• A token or API key for Jottacloud, Pixeldrain, Gofile, 1Fichier and Storj, made in that service's settings.
• Your Apple Account or Proton password for iCloud Drive and Proton Drive, plus a code from your devices when two-factor login is on. Works when Advanced Data Protection is off. Apple asks for a code from one of your devices, and again about every 30 days.
• A folder for a disk on this computer. An external or second disk works best, and files kept there only open on this computer.

Every service on the Integrations page lists what it asks for.

Photo libraries and web folders

iCloud Photos, Google Photos and Web folder (HTTP) are added the same way but never become part of a drive. They are for jobs and comparisons: copy your iCloud Photos library into a drive every night, upload photos into Google Photos, or fetch files from a public web folder. Google Photos only shows apps the photos they uploaded themselves, so CloudPool can add to it but cannot read your existing library.

4. Drives

Accounts live in drives. Your first accounts go into one drive; create more, such as Personal, Work and Media, to keep things apart. Each drive has its own accounts, its own free space and its own folders, and can appear as its own disk on your computer (see Finder and File Explorer).

Click + next to Drives in the sidebar, or New drive on the Storage accounts page, to make a new one. A drive can hold as many accounts as you like, of any mix of services. To look at two places side by side, choose Open in a new window on a drive or a single account.

5. Use a drive

A drive shows everything in its accounts, merged folder by folder, with one space gauge for the whole lot.

• Add files: drag files or folders onto the window, or use Upload. Progress shows in Transfers, and uploads continue if you close the window.
• Open a file: double-click it. CloudPool fetches it and opens it with its usual app.
• More actions: right-click a file or folder for Download, Share link, Send to a nearby device, Rename, Move to folder and Delete.
• Find something: type in Filter this folder.

Files already in your accounts before you connected them appear too. Deleting in CloudPool deletes from the account that holds the file.

6. Where files are kept

You never choose an account. CloudPool places each new file by size:

1. Under 100 MB: to a small-file account in the drive that has room.
2. Bigger: whole, to a big-file account that has room.
3. Over 3.5 GB: split into pieces across big-file accounts. In the drive it stays one file; opening, downloading, moving and renaming work as usual.

Every service starts as a small-file or a big-file account (the Integrations page shows which), and you can switch any account. The 100 MB line can be changed in Settings, under Where files are kept, from 25 MB to 500 MB. Folders exist in every account, so moving and renaming stay instant and nothing is uploaded twice.

7. Finder and File Explorer

Click Show my drive in Finder (or File Explorer) at the bottom of the window, or use the menu bar or tray icon. A drive then works like a USB disk: save into it from any app, drag folders in, play a video straight from it. Each drive can appear as its own disk.

• Mac: it appears in Finder's sidebar. No extra software. The first drive is ~/CloudPool, others ~/CloudPool <name>.
• Windows: the first drive gets P: when it is free, others the next free letter. Windows needs WinFsp, a free helper, installed once; CloudPool tells you if it is missing.
• Linux: it appears as a folder in your home folder, through FUSE (sudo apt install fuse3).

A drive's private folder can appear as a disk of its own too.

After a restart, or when the computer wakes from sleep, CloudPool mounts your drives again by itself. Files you open from a disk are kept on your computer for a while so they open fast the second time; Settings has the cache size (10 GB by default).

8. Two-way sync

Sync keeps a folder the same on your computer and in a drive. Open Migrate & Sync in the sidebar, choose Sync, click Choose folders to sync, and pick Two-way or Back up for them.

• Two-way: add, change or delete a file on either side and the other side follows. If a file was deleted on one side and changed on the other, the change wins.
• Conflicts keep both copies. If the same file changed on both sides, both are kept and this computer's copy is renamed, for example Report (conflict from Studio Mac 2026-09-19 14.05).pdf. Keep the one you want and delete the other.
• Deleted files are not gone. They wait 30 days in the drive's Deleted files folder, or go to the computer's Trash.
• Back up: only this computer's changes go up, and the drive copy never changes your files.
• Several computers: sync a folder two-way on the first computer, then on the second use Sync with a folder in the drive and pick it.
• Pause all stops syncing for now; changes are noted and go through when you resume.
• If a backed-up folder suddenly looks empty (an unplugged disk, say), CloudPool keeps the drive copy and waits for you before mirroring that.

Phones back up too: the Sync tab in the phone app sends photos, videos and files into Drive / Sync / your phone's name, skipping what is already there.

9. Migrate

For freeing up space. In Migrate & Sync, choose Migrate, click Look at my folders, tick folders such as Desktop, Documents or Downloads (or Select everything, or add Another folder from anywhere, like an external disk) and start.

• Everything lands in the drive under Mac (or PC), then your computer's name.
• Each file is deleted from your computer only after it has safely arrived. Pause any time; resume later and it continues where it stopped.
• Apps, system folders, AppData, other cloud-sync folders and photo or music libraries are left alone.
• Bring back copies a migrated folder back to where it came from.

Keep the computer awake and online while it runs. Big migrations can take many hours, mostly because of upload speeds.

10. Scheduled jobs

Open Jobs in the sidebar and click New job:

1. What it does: copy (new and changed files are copied; nothing is deleted), mirror (the destination is made to match the source; replaced and deleted files wait 30 days in a CloudPool deleted folder next to it, unless you turn that off), move (copied, then removed from the source) or check (compares the two places and reports, changing nothing).
2. From and to: a folder on this computer, a drive, one account, or a photo library or web folder.
3. Filters, if you need them: by name, size or age.
4. When: by hand, every so many minutes (five at least), daily at a set time on the weekdays you pick, or each time CloudPool starts.

Select several jobs to run, stop, enable, disable or delete them together. Recent runs shows the last 25 runs of a job and what each did. A run missed while the computer slept or CloudPool was closed happens once it can, and at most two jobs run at the same time.

11. Compare folders

Open Compare and pick two places: a folder on this computer, a drive, one account, or a photo library. CloudPool sorts every file into the same, different, only on the left or only on the right; files count as different by size and date, or by checksum if you turn that on. Nothing changes until you copy the files you pick in either direction. Export CSV saves the list for a spreadsheet.

12. Private folders

Each drive can have a private folder: choose Add private folder for a drive, and a Private entry appears under it in the sidebar. Everything you put in it is encrypted on this computer before it is uploaded, file names included. In CloudPool, and on your other computers once they sign in, it opens like any folder, and it can appear as a disk of its own; in the service's own app there are only scrambled names.

• Private files cannot get share links, and the phone app cannot open them.
• The key lives only in your encrypted login, so every computer you sign in to opens the folder; the storage service never gets it.

The security page explains the encryption.

13. Share links

Right-click a file and choose Share link. CloudPool makes a share link at the account that holds the file and wraps it in a short CloudPool link, which it copies for you. People who open it see the file name and size on a CloudPool page, and the download button takes them to the file.

Shared links in the sidebar lists every link with how often it was opened. Stop sharing turns a link off for everyone at once.

Two things cannot be shared as one link: files kept in pieces, and folders whose files are spread over several accounts. For those, share the individual files, or send them with Nearby.

14. Nearby over Wi-Fi

Nearby sends files between devices on the same Wi-Fi, directly, without uploading anything. It speaks the same language as LocalSend, a free app for iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac and Linux, so phones only need that app. Other computers running CloudPool show up by themselves.

• Send: drop files onto a device in Nearby, or right-click in a drive and choose Send to a nearby device.
• Receive: CloudPool asks before accepting and saves to CloudPool Received in your Downloads folder. Files from computers signed in to your own login arrive without the question; Settings can turn that off.
• No app on the other phone: Share through a browser shows a QR code. The phone's camera opens a page to download your files, or to send files back.

On a Mac, allow CloudPool on the local network when macOS asks. On Windows, allow it on Private networks when the firewall asks.

15. Alerts and remote control

Open Alerts & remote at the bottom of the sidebar to choose where alerts go:

• Desktop notifications, on from the start.
• Email, sent through your own mail account. Pick Gmail, Outlook or another provider and CloudPool fills in the server; Gmail needs an app password.
• Slack and Discord through a webhook, and Telegram through your own bot.

Then set each kind of alert to off, problems only or everything. Quiet hours hold everything but errors until they end, the same alert comes at most once in six hours unless it gets worse, and a daily summary email can sum up the day.

Remote control works through the same Telegram, Discord or Slack bot. Click Pair a chat and CloudPool shows a six-digit pairing code; send it from a private chat and that chat is remembered, while anyone else is told the bot is private. Then ask for the status, run sync now or sync pause, jobs run a job, or make a share link with link. The answers come from CloudPool on your computer, so it has to be running there, and commands sent while it was off are not run late.

16. Command line

In Settings, on the Advanced tab under Command line, click Install. The cloudpool command then works in Terminal on a Mac, in PowerShell or Command Prompt on Windows, and in any Linux shell. On a Mac it goes into /usr/local/bin (macOS may ask for your password; otherwise ~/.local/bin), on Windows onto your user PATH, and on Linux into ~/.local/bin.

It talks to the CloudPool app on the same computer, and cloudpool open starts it if it is not running. Run cloudpool help for every command; a few to start with:

$ cloudpool status
$ cloudpool ls Work:Photos
$ cloudpool upload report.pdf --to Work:Invoices
$ cloudpool sync now
$ cloudpool jobs run "Nightly photos"
$ cloudpool transfers --watch

Add --json to any command for output a script can read.

17. On your phone

Open cloudpool.vercel.app/app in Safari or Chrome and sign in with your CloudPool login. The phone talks to your accounts itself, so your computer can be off.

• Browse, upload photos and videos, download, make folders, rename, delete and share links, on accounts at Google Drive, MEGA, TeraBox and GitHub.
• Tap Add to Home Screen in the app and it opens like an app from then on. Android installs it right away; on iPhone the button shows where to tap in Safari (the ••• button next to the address bar, then Share, then Add to Home Screen). Then sign in once more from the new icon.
• Connecting new storage accounts, and files over 3.5 GB, need a computer.

18. A second computer

Install CloudPool there and choose Sign in instead of Create login. Every connected account comes back by itself, with your Google key and file size settings. Accounts you connect or disconnect on one computer follow on the others within a few minutes.

Settings that belong to the computer itself, like its name in Nearby or the download folder, stay per computer.

19. Settings worth knowing

• Open at login and Keep running when the window is closed: CloudPool lives in the menu bar (Mac) or notification area (Windows) so transfers, sync, jobs and Nearby keep working.
• Where files are kept: the size line between small and big files.
• Transfers, Speed: an upload and a download limit, all day or only during the hours you choose, and how many files move at once (eight uploads and eight downloads unless you change it).
• Privacy, App lock: CloudPool asks for a passcode you choose for this computer, or Touch ID on a Mac, before it shows your files. It can lock again when the computer sleeps or after you have been away, and syncing carries on while it is locked.
• Appearance: System, Light or Dark, an accent color, and a compact file list.
• Advanced, Logs: Open logs shows what CloudPool and its engine did, with filters and with passwords and tokens hidden. Set Engine detail to Debug while you chase a problem, then set it back.
• API keys, MCP server and API: opens your account page, where you make keys for AI apps and scripts (see the developers page).
• Sign out of this computer: removes the accounts from this computer only. They stay in your login.
• Delete login: erases your login, the encrypted account list and your share links from the server.

Stuck on something? The questions page has a troubleshooting section.