It wasn’t all that long ago, before the advent of the MP3 file, when music files took up too much room and there wasn’t enough storage space to go around.
While the modern computer has a lot of room for music, some people still have too much.
If you have thousands of songs across your music library you might want to consider cloud storage for music.
Here are five of the best cloud storage for music out there for storing – and listening to – music online.
5 Music Cloud Storage
- pCloud
- Icedrive
- Google Drive
- Dropbox
- Koofr
What to Look for in Music Cloud Storage that comes with Built-in Player and App
An important thing to consider with cloud storage is value for money.
The service you choose has to be worth your time, attention, and money. You want to find a service that offers a lot of storage space for a relatively small amount of money.
Check the different pricing plans for the services and see what they offer with our best cloud storage recommendation by GoodCloudStorage.
You may be able to get away with a free version of the service if you don’t have too much music. Two of the options in our list offer 10GB of free storage and Google Drive has up to 15GB free.
If you plan on uploading and storing a lot of music you’ll want a storage solution that has good upload speeds.
Uploads are faster with services that have a robust infrastructure in place to distribute and manage data.
Of course, you also want to be able to easily access and listen to the music you store.
A streamlined user experience is a must.
The services in our list all have the kind of user-friendly experience you’d expect, but some are a little bit more complicated than others.
Last but not least, you want to consider content control – things such as expiry dates on sharing links and password protection are important defenses to have in place.
These measures ensure that nobody but you has access to your music library unless you want them to.
Here goes our cloud music storage.
1. pCloud
Key Takeaways
Affordable
Built-in Music Player
Free account with 10GB storage
Cons
Have to pay to protect files with a password
Difficult to manage the music playlist
pCloud is a Swiss app that has been around since 2013 and currently has over 8 million users.
Some of the biggest names around, including Coca-Cola and Twitter, rely on pCloud for their storage needs.
The service offers personal and business accounts alike, though for music storage you’ll be fine sticking with a personal plan.
How much storage you get for your files depends on which plan you choose. Spend $4.99 a month for the Premium plan for 500GB or $9.99 a month for the Premium Plus plan and 2TB.
pCloud offers a straightforward user experience across all devices.
The web client offers the smoothest performance.
It offers more features, is easier to navigate, and has everything pCloud offers in one convenient place.
There’s also a desktop client and a mobile client available for all major operating systems.
One great thing about pCloud is how easy it is to share your files with others.
And our pCloud review shows how easy is for you to manage and store files with them.
Just hit the Share button on a song and you can send it out to just about any social media platform in an instant.
You can also share directly with other pCloud members or copy and paste a link to the song.
Another interesting little feature is that when you share folders with other people they can view and modify them easily.
Protect your folders and music by putting expiry dates or passwords on the link, which also comes in handy for sharing photos and other files.
You can try pCloud out for yourself with the free trial account that comes with a generous 10GB of storage space, which should be more than enough for a small library of music.
You can store around 1600+ music or songs given that each file size is around 6MB for free music cloud storage.
2. Icedrive
Key Takeaways
Great file security
Simple user interface
Virtual drive for desktop
Cons
Missing collaboration features
Poor support
Icedrive is a British cloud storage service that claims to be made with love.
It’s easy to see just how much care and attention, and indeed love went into making this service.
The security in particular is top-notch. Files are secured with Twofish encryption, which is some of the best around.
The service is relatively new but the team behind Icedrive has made tremendous progress with developing and implementing new features.
The service is a promising new addition to the scene, with a clear focus on the privacy and security of files.
With this great security and a clean interface to match, Icedrive is one for a great future. The cloud storage market is pretty crowded already, but Icedrive has plenty of good things going for it.
Icedrive first appeared sometime in early 2019 and has only grown since then. We had written a great detailed review about Icedrive.
The main selling point of the service is the zero-knowledge encryption process.
Files are encrypted automatically so users don’t have to do anything.
As impressive as it is though, nothing is perfect.
Icedrive is still missing some key features that will likely be implemented in the future.
Icedrive is very similar to pCloud that it’s close enough for us to do a comparison between these two, pCloud vs Icedrive.
3. Google One
Key Takeaways
Auto music organization
Mobile app lets you listen on the go
30 days free trial
Cons
No option to upgrade past the 50,000 songs limit
Slow response
Google Drive together with the Google Play Music app is another great cloud storage for music.
This service is great for people who have a whole lot of music. Rather than give you a set amount of space for music, Google Play Music simply tells you how many songs you can upload and store.
Free users can have up to 50,000 songs, which is generous no matter how you slice it.
Another great feature of Google Drive is that it organizes things like a desktop music player client would.
The service automatically organizes music by artist, album, genre, etc., and allows you to create your own custom playlists.
There’s even a “Recently Added” section for all of your latest music.
Google Drive offers two paid plans for music storage. The first is the individual plan which costs $9.99 a month. The second is the family plan, which costs $14.99 a month and allows access for up to six people.
Both plans come with a full 30-day money-back guarantee.
Google Drive also makes it easy to discover and subscribe to podcasts and YouTube music. Make sure you check out our review on Google Drive.
However, is Google Drive still the mainstream when it comes to all the prominent cloud storage providers as the like of Google Drive vs Dropbox vs OneDrive?
4. Dropbox
Key Takeaways
Easy file sync
Great Pro features
Available on all OS
Cons
Lackluster free version
Paid plans are expensive
Most people look at Dropbox and they see it as a business solution for cloud storage.
That reputation is earned, as the service makes it easy to send and receive documents and other important files.
Although people are preferring a more secure dropbox alternative, still they are an excellent choice for music storage.
Dropbox makes it easy to keep all of your media up-to-date in a single, easy-to-access environment. Access all of your songs across all of your devices thanks to the native apps that keep everything synced up.
What’s good about Dropbox is that files can be stored and accessed in a hurry.
You can even share your music with other people just like you’d share photos or documents.
Dropbox offers a premium Dropbox Plus package for $9.99 a month, or $99 as an annual payment. Dropbox Plus offers 1TB of storage and the ability to store files and folders offline, the ability to remotely wipe devices, and access email support.
The Dropbox Professional plan costs $19.99 a month or an annual fee of $199.
This plan will grab you everything included in Dropbox Plus, 2TB of storage, and other features such as file versioning, chat support, better sharing options, and the ability to keep track of work properly.
No matter which plans you go with you can expect to get access to the sleek interface that has made Dropbox a hit with users as we had reviewed here.
Files are sorted and organized clearly so you’ll never have a problem accessing your favorite music.
5. Koofr
Key Takeaways
Flexible pricing options
Integrated native music player
Great sharing features
Cons
Complicated desktop client
No block-level sync
Last but not least is Koofr. Koofr has some friendly pricing plans available and a sleek-looking user interface.
The syncing client could look a bit better though, and there’s no client-side encryption.
That’s a bit of a letdown to see with a service like this.
With that said, Koofr does go above and beyond in the file-sharing options.
You’ll have no problem sharing your music and other files with your friends and family.
The sharing features are on par with, if not better than, some of the biggest names in the business.
Another great benefit of using Koofr for music storage is that it has an integrated music player.
You’ll have no problem listening to your music, even as you look through other files on your online storage.
Our Koofr review shows that they can do much more than just store music.
5 Best Practices For Your Music Cloud Storage Strategy
As a music lover, you know that music is essential to your creative process.
That’s why it’s important to protect your music in the cloud. Here are 5 best practices for your music cloud storage strategy.
1. Look for a provider with a strong track record
When choosing a music cloud storage provider, it’s important to look for a provider with a strong track record.
A good provider will have been around for a while and have a good reputation.
Make sure the provider has a robust system in place to protect your data, and that they offer customer support if needed.
Our providers above all are carefully selected with testing in mind. We only partner with providers who have a proven track record of providing reliable and secure cloud storage.
2. Compare pricing and offers before signing up
When considering whether or not to sign up for a music cloud storage service, it’s important to compare pricing and offers before making a decision.
Some of the most popular services offer free accounts with limited storage space, while others offer paid plans with more space.
It’s also important to consider the features offered by each service before signing up.
Some services allow users to upload and access their music from any device, while others only allow access from specific devices. It’s also important to consider the quality of the service and the customer support available.
3. Consider security when choosing a provider
You might think that security might not be so crucial or paramount since you are only storing music on some cloud storage platform, but seriously, we would ask you to think again.
Some providers offer more secure storage options than others, so it is important to research which option is best for your needs.
Security and privacy are paramount in the music industry, so make sure to choose a provider that will protect your data.
4. Back up your music regularly
It is important to back up your music regularly in order to avoid losing any of your music files.
There are a few different ways to back up your music: using a cloud storage service, using a local backup program, or exporting your music files and storing them on an external hard drive.
Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages.
The beauty of cloud storage for music is the ability to sync and auto-backup your music folder on all your devices.
This means that you never have to worry about losing your music files. And to avoid the hassle of backing up them manually from time to time.
5. Store only authorized copies of your music
Another best practice for managing your music cloud storage strategy is to only store the music that you own.
This means that you should not store any copyrighted music files on your cloud storage account.
If you are storing copyrighted music files, make sure to get the appropriate licensing from the copyright holder.
We never encourage pirate copies of music. This can lead to copyright infringement and legal action.
Only store music that you own.
If you are a musician and want to sell your music online, make sure that the rights have been transferred to you before uploading your songs to a cloud storage service.
Finally, if you ever decide to stop using a cloud storage service, be sure to delete all of your stored music files so that they do not become available to anyone else.
