iCloud Drive Review

In the world of cloud computing, cloud storage services play a huge role, and it’s not strange to see many companies doing this kind of job. The famous iCloud Drive is one of those services, that is tailored and optimized specifically for Mac users. If you own a Mac, you probably have iCloud integrated within your operating system by default, and if you aren’t using it, well… our article should help you determine whether or not you want to use it. To find more about iCloud Drive, read the iCloud Drive review below.

iCloud Drive Performance and Features

First, I’ll start with performance and features. To be honest, iCloud Drive is really fast, and that’s one of the first things I noticed here. I tested both the backup and restore to determine how fast iCloud Drive is, and again, I’ve spent $119 to upgrade to premium 1TB of storage to do the math. It’s very fast, completing the 1TB backup in around eight days, which is very fast. The backup process was very consistent and stable, so I was having a great time with it. On the other side, we have the restore time, which is, guess what? Less impressive than backup time.

Restore time here varies, but with my internet settings, it would take a little over two weeks to restore 1TB of data, which is too much, considering that some cloud services can take up to several days to finish it. Now, I’m not saying that downloading speed is slow, but I was very impressed with the backup speed, that restores speed somehow faded away. Overall, iCloud Drive can pride itself on being one of the most reliable and fastest cloud service.

Now, let’s talk more about features of iCloud Drive. Feature-wise, iCloud Drive really didn’t impress me that much, offering just a solid backup speed and a good restore speed. On top of that, 5 GB of free storage that you get here isn’t going to get you far, especially if you have an iPhone that can record 4K videos and high-res photos, then the things are only getting worse. Now that features didn’t impress me that much, I decided to test the Ease of Use, and the results are below.

Ease of Use

If I hate something, it’s the overall complexity of a particular cloud service, where I could barely find the right option for either restoring or backing up my files. Unfortunately, I gained a wrong first impression when I used iCloud Drive, as initially, I was unable to do my backup properly. This is due to the fact that there isn’t an inherited process to guide you through the whole process of backing up, creating some confusion. The good news here is that once you do it once, it becomes very simple, so props to that.

On the other side, restore process is more complicated than backup process, and now I really mean it. First, you have to log in to your iCloud account, and then, as there isn’t a clear button for restoring your files, you’ll have to go to the Settings tab and restore your files from there. I’ve seen a similar workflow with many other cloud services, and I’m not impressed with it. Why simple when it can be a little more complicated, right? But, nothing is subtracted here, as the restore speeds are great, as I mentioned before. 1TB for around two weeks is still a pretty good result, so iCloud Drive isn’t that bad for restore speeds after all.

iCloud Drive Pricing

Being a Mac cloud service, plus having the prefix “i” allude that the price of the service is high but is it really like that? I’ll definitely take out the free version, as it’s worthless with its 5 GB of space unless you plan to store your Word documents here. For a 1TB subscription, you’ll need to spend close to $120 a year, or if you are for a month-to-month subscription, expect to pay around $9.99 a month, which is still a fair amount. Here, we are talking about a single computer, but what about family subscription plans?

Speaking of family, there are big and small families, with five and three PCs respectively. Apple will charge your $24 per computer for a big family and $40 per computer for a small family. When you put that on the paper and calculate it, it comes at the same. Five computers will cost you $120 a year, while three computers also cost that much. Compare it with the price of a single PC and it’s a simple calculation. Price-wise, I’ve seen some cheaper cloud services, but overall, I think that Apple did a relatively good job with iCloud Drive in terms of pricing.

Security

While the 128-bit AES encryption isn’t bad by any means and will protect your files just fine, there is another concerning feature here. The whole concept of security here is to protect your files AFTER it’s uploaded to the server, meaning no protection during the upload. On the other side, if the server is hacked, the only thing that stands between your data and the hacker is the 128-bit AES encryption. And if you didn’t know, iCloud Drive is notorious for being easily hacked, and that’s exactly’what happened a few years ago when hundreds of celebrities lost their iCloud accounts wich pictures being stolen. So, I suggest you be cautious with iCloud Drive and don’t upload very important and intimate files.

Verdict

Apple’s iCloud Drive isn’t one of the most reliable cloud services in terms of security, but it’s very fast and reliable and offers great performance. However, as I’m very meticulous when it comes to security, I wouldn’t put too much trust in iCloud Drive, and especially not put important files there. Overall, the price to performance ratio is good, as well as the value for the money, especially for 1TB subscription plan which is the top offer in my opinion. At the end of the day, it all boils down to you. If you’ve used it and you like it, then go on, don’t let my review ruin your great experience.

iCloud Drive