Good video, Leo! There's another option and it's my preferred. You can sign-in to a Microsoft app (Word, Excel, etc.) with your same OneDrive account and be able to access the files directly using the native desktop app for PC, without using the OneDrive standalone application. Word can open/save OneDrive when signed in. No need to download and upload or use the web interface.
Hi Leo, I have a Synology NAS and use Synology Drive to sync my documents etc. from PC to the NAS. The NAS in turn is running Cloudsync linked to Onedrive. I have now not had Onedrive on my PC for over 12 months and use the online method you use when I need to access files from a different PC. It sounds awkward, but setup was actually very straightforward and it works perfectly. Please keep up the good work on you channel - you have a great knack of making the complicated sound simple. Thanks.
You took the words right out of my mouth. Except that I use SyncThing instead of Synology Drive so that I can use my own folder structure instead of Home / Homes, etc. And you're right, it's very straight forward and we get to control the sync. Well done.
@@DavidM2002 Thanks for the heads up on "SyncThing" - something I wasnt aware of but will look into as Synology does tie you down to the folders they want you to use. I don't know why they do this.🙂
Did you know that if you click on the 3 dots to the right of the file name, it gives you the option to open the file using your desktop app then creates a sharepoint link. This is for those cases when you need the functionality and power of the desktop app programs while simultaneously not wanting to use the one drive app. Remember, even OneDrive’s backend uses Sharepoint.
Pretty much what I do Leo, glad someone else runs it this way, I primarily use it for sharing large files that can't be e-mailed etc. Have a fantastic 2025 !!!
There is also another added benefit Leo...Remember in your past video about backup people were concerned about viruses or malware being backed up in an image...So if you use OneDrive or Microsoft, they scan your files in the cloud...So, if your pc becomes infected and your external backup is infected, you can just download yesterday's files from the cloud and not have to worry about infecting your pc again...
Hello from Amsterdam. An interesting video. I've been wanting to get rid of my Onedrive app on my laptop for a long time now. It confuses me terribly. But what happens to the folders and files if I delete or uninstall this app? Will these remain on the web version of Onedrive or will they be deleted there too? Gr Wim
If your OneDrive is synced between PC and OneDrive.com online, then removing the app will only remove the synchronization. Files will remain in both places, but it'll be up to you to decide and/or update what you want where, manually.
I have a 25TB OneDrive from work. We used to have Box and the PC software was so much better for 10s of millions of files in terms of performance. I have had to work around performance problems since the switch. I have had to use rclone to upload some of my data since neither the builtin support or the web copy and past were very good at handling uploading a million files and several hundred GBs of data in one go.
I used OneDrive to allow me to work on lesson plans, lectures, example problems, animations, videos… at home desktop, then use the work in class on my university’s provided computer - laptop or desktop and switch between Apple, Windows or Linux!
What a well done video that was. My OneDrive App has for some reason been 'preparing to upload' for days now. Not sure why. Now - A great alternative to fixing it.. :) Just quit out of it. *Just need to make sure everything is off line - on my PC, or in my backup. -- And use my 100GB as extra online storage, or for sharing purposes.
i have a new windows 11 laptop if i create a local account can i still log into my outlook and onedrive ect or would i benefit from logging into my MS account
Works perfect. Terrabyte. Only had a REAL problem with OneDrive once. Didn't lose data, just had a bit of a mess to clean up. I have had way more trouble with backup software (to include Seagate Backup Exec to tape) and RAID controllers (like HighPoint IDE RAID) failing and losing everything. That RAID card was a $2000 (in year 2000 money) data recovery flail to get all my ISP customer websites back online. I was lucky one my customers owned a low level media recovery shop with a clean room and the whole 9 yards, and his website was on the failed RAID array or it would have cost me way more than $2000. Something like OneDrive and File History would have been awesome that time. OneDrive works better than most, and the beauty is that for the average person "it just works™." I find it one of the better implemented features in Windows. It has an occasional problem with file locking, and it does take some understanding when using it on two PCs (where it actually shines once it's configured correctly, and you exclude the right folders.) But, in general it works great.
Leo, Another excellent video. However, unless Microsoft has recently changed its policy, I think OneDrive provides only 5GB of free storage, rather than the 15GB shown in your video at the 30-second mark. By way of comparison, Google Drive does in fact provide 15GB of free storage. Hope I haven't misinterpreted something here.
Thanks for video. I now has 5 Gb that I can put files in. Used an old Microsoft account with telephone number not active on my pc no more. I'm from Denmark and we only have 5 Gb of free space on Onedrive.
When I signed in to One Drive I was confronted with a a message that either I reduce my files (I don't have any) or buy more space, or my account would be frozen again after 30 days. Not exactly what I was expecting!
@@JohnColgan. If you're using OneDrive online with out the app, there really is no concept of "sync". You manually upload the files you want to upload, and you manually download the files you want to download.
If the OneDrive program is running on the computer, then you can also choose to upload a file by copy&paste to the "OneDrive - Personal" folder shown in your computer's File Explorer.
I have issues with Onedrive app in that it will start uploading and then stop. The only I cane get the upload complete is to shutdown Onedrive and restart it again or reboot my PC.
Suppose I have a folder of files on my computer that i upload manually to OneDrive online. Now I edit some of those files on my computer, and I want to manually update the copies of the files in OneDrive online. There seems to be no easy way to do that. It would be good to simply upload the folder again and have OneDrive overwrite the existing files that have changed, but as far as I can see, that is not possible. (The OneDrive app for a computer purportedly does that, but I do not want to use that app, because of all the problems with it that Leo describes. I tried it once, and it was a disaster.)
@@askleonotenboom Yes, you can do that and delete the existing folder. But if it's a big folder, that is very wasteful --- it could be that only a few files have been changed. It would be much better if, when you uploaded the folder, it gave you the option to skip files that have not changed and overwrite ones that have changed. That is, to sync the online folder with the one on your computer. Instead, if the folder already exists, the only option is to create a new folder online and upload the whole folder to that new folder.
@@martin.j.osborne The synchronization you're looking for is what the OneDrive app is all about. So you'd not use it "cloud only", but actually have the app running in which case all the files in your OneDrive folder would be automatically updated online as they changed. (And vice versa.)
@@askleonotenboom Yes, of course you are right. I tried the app 2 or 3 years ago, with disastrous results. The app occasionally (apparently randomly) stopped syncing files, and then when I restarted it, it copied *old* files from the cloud to my PC, renaming the existing files. So then I had, for example, a file named test.txt, which was the old version from the cloud that OneDrive had copied, and one named test-Optiplex9020.txt, the latest version, which had been named test.txt but was renamed by OneDrive. (Optiplex9020 was the name of my computer.) It took me hours to clean up the mess. Despite this fiasco, I gave OneDrive another chance , and the same thing happened again! (This second time, however, I realized what was happening and stopped OneDrive before it had done too much damage.)
When you open your document with Word Online rather than Word app, you have extremely limited features and functionality for Word. I rarely open anything with Word online. My Word documents have many advanced Word features. Not sure why you don't like OneDrive--I absolutely depend on it for syncing files between my PCs without issue. I don't use it to backup. Also, if you download and edit a file, you must then upload it to make sure the most recent file is online--not sure why you would go through all that rather than simply using OneDrive on your PC.
It seems unclear how much free storage you get. At minimum it's only 5Gb but I seem to have 15Gb free plus another 15Gb as a "camera roll bonus". making 30Gb free storage in total. I'm nor sure how I got the extra free storage nor do I know if the extra free storage can be relied on as permanent or just temporary.
Onedrive AUTOMATICALLY finds and uploads all files across my computer, wheever i touch them, to th we e cloud then AUTOMATICALLY downloads an places those files to my 2 other PCs and laptop. The syncing is its main human tine saving benefit. So Leo you must have a lot of free time to do all this work yourself manually. This functionality did ot seem to get a mention in your video.
This video is specifically for people that don't want the app running on their PC because of all the havoc it can create. I have lots of other content on OneDrive's normal operation. And I use it as you describe myself.
I will never subscribe to a monthly fee for One Drive storage. I would consider paying a one time fee for One Dive. One Terabyte is so far above what I would ever use it's not even funny. If they were to sell something like 100 Gigabytes online storage for a specific, reasonable amount or say 250, 500, etc. I would consider purchasing it, but I'd never go for a monthly or annual subscription. May as well purchase something and do it myself. I find it very difficult to manage OneDrive. It's time consuming and just doesn't work very well.
@@askleonotenboom Een vermakelijk verhaal. Lang geleden was ik al op een mailinglist van je en gezien je naam dacht ik een Nederlander die een groot publiek wil aanspreken dus Engels schrijft maar het ligt net iets anders.
✅ Watch next ▶ How Do I Get Rid of OneDrive? ▶ ruclips.net/video/_2O6bzb_W9s/видео.html
I stopped using the OneDrive app several months ago, in favor of the website. Best decision I made since upgrading to Windows 11.
Good video, Leo! There's another option and it's my preferred. You can sign-in to a Microsoft app (Word, Excel, etc.) with your same OneDrive account and be able to access the files directly using the native desktop app for PC, without using the OneDrive standalone application. Word can open/save OneDrive when signed in. No need to download and upload or use the web interface.
Hi Leo, I have a Synology NAS and use Synology Drive to sync my documents etc. from PC to the NAS. The NAS in turn is running Cloudsync linked to Onedrive. I have now not had Onedrive on my PC for over 12 months and use the online method you use when I need to access files from a different PC. It sounds awkward, but setup was actually very straightforward and it works perfectly. Please keep up the good work on you channel - you have a great knack of making the complicated sound simple. Thanks.
You took the words right out of my mouth. Except that I use SyncThing instead of Synology Drive so that I can use my own folder structure instead of Home / Homes, etc. And you're right, it's very straight forward and we get to control the sync. Well done.
@@DavidM2002 Thanks for the heads up on "SyncThing" - something I wasnt aware of but will look into as Synology does tie you down to the folders they want you to use. I don't know why they do this.🙂
Thanks!
Thank you!
Did you know that if you click on the 3 dots to the right of the file name, it gives you the option to open the file using your desktop app then creates a sharepoint link. This is for those cases when you need the functionality and power of the desktop app programs while simultaneously not wanting to use the one drive app. Remember, even OneDrive’s backend uses Sharepoint.
Pretty much what I do Leo, glad someone else runs it this way, I primarily use it for sharing large files that can't be e-mailed etc. Have a fantastic 2025 !!!
There is also another added benefit Leo...Remember in your past video about backup people were concerned about viruses or malware being backed up in an image...So if you use OneDrive or Microsoft, they scan your files in the cloud...So, if your pc becomes infected and your external backup is infected, you can just download yesterday's files from the cloud and not have to worry about infecting your pc again...
What happens if a file in the cloud is found by OneDrive/Microsoft to be infected with sa virus?
@@branchau Well, I assume Windows Defender would give you a notification that a file is infected...Hopefully, Leo will answer...
Great tips! Thanks Leo.
Thanks for the good info.
Hello from Amsterdam. An interesting video. I've been wanting to get rid of my Onedrive app on my laptop for a long time now. It confuses me terribly. But what happens to the folders and files if I delete or uninstall this app? Will these remain on the web version of Onedrive or will they be deleted there too?
Gr Wim
If your OneDrive is synced between PC and OneDrive.com online, then removing the app will only remove the synchronization. Files will remain in both places, but it'll be up to you to decide and/or update what you want where, manually.
I have a 25TB OneDrive from work. We used to have Box and the PC software was so much better for 10s of millions of files in terms of performance. I have had to work around performance problems since the switch. I have had to use rclone to upload some of my data since neither the builtin support or the web copy and past were very good at handling uploading a million files and several hundred GBs of data in one go.
Or use end to end encrypted cloud storage such as Proton Drive or Mega.
super !!! Thank you
I used OneDrive to allow me to work on lesson plans, lectures, example problems, animations, videos… at home desktop, then use the work in class on my university’s provided computer - laptop or desktop and switch between Apple, Windows or Linux!
What a well done video that was. My OneDrive App has for some reason been 'preparing to upload' for days now. Not sure why. Now - A great alternative to fixing it.. :) Just quit out of it.
*Just need to make sure everything is off line - on my PC, or in my backup. -- And use my 100GB as extra online storage, or for sharing purposes.
i have a new windows 11 laptop if i create a local account can i still log into my outlook and onedrive ect or would i benefit from logging into my MS account
RClone on Linux Mint works excellently with OneDrive...mapping it as a drive in Linux file structure.
Are there any benefits to this as a secondary source, if you're using Google Drive?
Works perfect. Terrabyte. Only had a REAL problem with OneDrive once. Didn't lose data, just had a bit of a mess to clean up. I have had way more trouble with backup software (to include Seagate Backup Exec to tape) and RAID controllers (like HighPoint IDE RAID) failing and losing everything. That RAID card was a $2000 (in year 2000 money) data recovery flail to get all my ISP customer websites back online. I was lucky one my customers owned a low level media recovery shop with a clean room and the whole 9 yards, and his website was on the failed RAID array or it would have cost me way more than $2000. Something like OneDrive and File History would have been awesome that time.
OneDrive works better than most, and the beauty is that for the average person "it just works™." I find it one of the better implemented features in Windows. It has an occasional problem with file locking, and it does take some understanding when using it on two PCs (where it actually shines once it's configured correctly, and you exclude the right folders.) But, in general it works great.
Same with Live Mail, I use it through the browser.
Leo,
Another excellent video. However, unless Microsoft has recently changed its policy, I think OneDrive provides only 5GB of free storage, rather than the 15GB shown in your video at the 30-second mark. By way of comparison, Google Drive does in fact provide 15GB of free storage. Hope I haven't misinterpreted something here.
Leo. Microsoft OneDrive provides 5 GB of free cloud storage to all users not 15. Google Drive provides 15GB Free.
Exactly! On the bulls eye!😀
15 GB? You mean 5?
Thanks for video. I now has 5 Gb that I can put files in. Used an old Microsoft account with telephone number not active on my pc no more. I'm from Denmark and we only have 5 Gb of free space on Onedrive.
Yeah it's only 5GB nowadays.
Google gives 15GB of space, shared between their different services like docs or mail.
@@MikaelKKarlsson 5 Gb is enough for me to share files with others.
Thanks Leo! This is a transformational discovery for me!
Free 15GB? I only have 5GB. How do I get the extra 10GB?
I only have 5!
That was my question as well. That's why I use Google Drive
When I signed in to One Drive I was confronted with a a message that either I reduce my files (I don't have any) or buy more space, or my account would be frozen again after 30 days. Not exactly what I was expecting!
How secure is the personal Vault on OneDrive?
So, does that mean if OneDrive is currently installed on my PC, I can simply uninstall it and use its services in the manner described in this video?
That's kinda the point, yes.
@@askleonotenboomso you have to manually sync pc & OneDrive?
@@JohnColgan. That's what I understand.
@@JohnColgan. If you're using OneDrive online with out the app, there really is no concept of "sync". You manually upload the files you want to upload, and you manually download the files you want to download.
I can't figure out how to delete a file. Can anybody help?
How do you get rid of outlook
The program on your PC? Uninstall. The website? Don't visit it.
@askleonotenboom thanks for your speedy reply.
If the OneDrive program is running on the computer, then you can also choose to upload a file by copy&paste to the "OneDrive - Personal" folder shown in your computer's File Explorer.
I have issues with Onedrive app in that it will start uploading and then stop. The only I cane get the upload complete is to shutdown Onedrive and restart it again or reboot my PC.
How do you get 15GB, I thought it was only 5GB
I use the OneDrive app on my PCs but I select only those files I want to be in OneDrive. It's not that difficult.
Yes!
Suppose I have a folder of files on my computer that i upload manually to OneDrive online. Now I edit some of those files on my computer, and I want to manually update the copies of the files in OneDrive online. There seems to be no easy way to do that. It would be good to simply upload the folder again and have OneDrive overwrite the existing files that have changed, but as far as I can see, that is not possible. (The OneDrive app for a computer purportedly does that, but I do not want to use that app, because of all the problems with it that Leo describes. I tried it once, and it was a disaster.)
I'm not sure why you say it's not possible. Uploading the changed file or files again is exactly what one would do.
@@askleonotenboom Yes, you can do that and delete the existing folder. But if it's a big folder, that is very wasteful --- it could be that only a few files have been changed. It would be much better if, when you uploaded the folder, it gave you the option to skip files that have not changed and overwrite ones that have changed. That is, to sync the online folder with the one on your computer. Instead, if the folder already exists, the only option is to create a new folder online and upload the whole folder to that new folder.
@@martin.j.osborne The synchronization you're looking for is what the OneDrive app is all about. So you'd not use it "cloud only", but actually have the app running in which case all the files in your OneDrive folder would be automatically updated online as they changed. (And vice versa.)
@@askleonotenboom Yes, of course you are right. I tried the app 2 or 3 years ago, with disastrous results. The app occasionally (apparently randomly) stopped syncing files, and then when I restarted it, it copied *old* files from the cloud to my PC, renaming the existing files. So then I had, for example, a file named test.txt, which was the old version from the cloud that OneDrive had copied, and one named test-Optiplex9020.txt, the latest version, which had been named test.txt but was renamed by OneDrive. (Optiplex9020 was the name of my computer.) It took me hours to clean up the mess. Despite this fiasco, I gave OneDrive another chance , and the same thing happened again! (This second time, however, I realized what was happening and stopped OneDrive before it had done too much damage.)
I love OneDrive. I had Carbonite once. It was terrible and expensive.
OneDrive actually runs on the MS Sharepoint cloud system.
When you open your document with Word Online rather than Word app, you have extremely limited features and functionality for Word. I rarely open anything with Word online. My Word documents have many advanced Word features. Not sure why you don't like OneDrive--I absolutely depend on it for syncing files between my PCs without issue. I don't use it to backup. Also, if you download and edit a file, you must then upload it to make sure the most recent file is online--not sure why you would go through all that rather than simply using OneDrive on your PC.
I like and use the OneDrive app. This is an option for the many (MANY) people that don't and don't want to.
It seems unclear how much free storage you get. At minimum it's only 5Gb but I seem to have 15Gb free plus another 15Gb as a "camera roll bonus". making 30Gb free storage in total. I'm nor sure how I got the extra free storage nor do I know if the extra free storage can be relied on as permanent or just temporary.
I use rclone with encryption and microsoft sends me notices that I have a virus. Silly fools
I only use it through the browser, I only upload to it in a piecemeal way.
In mac OS nothing of this happens, One drive just behaves exactly like a drive and that is how should be.
You have it wrong; Onedrive uses you for microsoft.
Computers have become as worthless as Wikipedia and Google. Bring back the good old days of poke and drag.
"Using OneDrive Without Using OneDrive"... Same can be done... "Using Without Using ". except for the S3 types.
Onedrive AUTOMATICALLY finds and uploads all files across my computer, wheever i touch them, to th we e cloud then AUTOMATICALLY downloads an places those files to my 2 other PCs and laptop. The syncing is its main human tine saving benefit. So Leo you must have a lot of free time to do all this work yourself manually. This functionality did ot seem to get a mention in your video.
This video is specifically for people that don't want the app running on their PC because of all the havoc it can create. I have lots of other content on OneDrive's normal operation. And I use it as you describe myself.
I will never subscribe to a monthly fee for One Drive storage. I would consider paying a one time fee for One Dive. One Terabyte is so far above what I would ever use it's not even funny. If they were to sell something like 100 Gigabytes online storage for a specific, reasonable amount or say 250, 500, etc. I would consider purchasing it, but I'd never go for a monthly or annual subscription. May as well purchase something and do it myself. I find it very difficult to manage OneDrive. It's time consuming and just doesn't work very well.
Are you Dutch or do you only have a Dutch sirname?
Dutch parents. Immigrated before I was born.
@@askleonotenboom That explains the Dutch name and the accent-free English.😁
@@alexde-leeuw Story about that: leo.notenboom.org/english-second-language/
@@askleonotenboom Een vermakelijk verhaal. Lang geleden was ik al op een mailinglist van je en gezien je naam dacht ik een Nederlander die een groot publiek wil aanspreken dus Engels schrijft maar het ligt net iets anders.
I extended OneDrive storage from 1Tb to 5Tb for free.
Do tell ?
@mannytabletje4678 go as Administrator into settings & extend too 5Tb
Sharing using MS One Drive with only the intended recipient 😂😂😂😂😂 ????
15 GB? 🤔
I only have 5.