To see what’s happening in this market, let’s take a brief look at this Google Trends graph of interest in the top four packages over the past 5 years:
Google Trends
Shows pretty clearly that ownCloud and Nextcloud dwarf the competition, and it also seems pretty clear that since its inception, interest in Nextcloud has been growing fast and today has actually more Google searches than ownCloud.
Which project is actually bigger however is not clear. On a 2018 press release Nextcloud notes that they had “over 100K downloads of the Collabora Nextcloud app” in 2017 and in another 2018 press release claim that they have over 35 employees and “over 100 customers and partners.” ownCloud, on the other hand, in a 2018 blog post claim that they have almost 500 customers and that they hired 17 new employees in 2017. Both appear to be growing fast.
Not a surprise then that people are asking every day for details about Nextcloud vs ownCloud. What’s the difference?
This is indeed an excellent question and below we’re going to detail exactly what differences exist. Yes, we are entering now the Battle of the Clouds! 🙂
We will examine four areas:
History – when and how did these two projects get started
Who – what people are funding and supporting the software
License – what is the license for each
Product – what differences exist in the actual product
The last section Product is certainly the largest section and may be of most interest to many, so if you want, just click on the word Product to jump straight there.
A Brief History
ownCloud was launched in January 2010 by Frank Karlitschek and the first beta release came out in March 2010. In 2012 ownCloud Inc. was formed to serve the needs of the community of users of ownCloud. After the Nextcloud fork, ownCloud Inc. was shut down and today ownCloud is still managed by ownCloud GmbH.
Nextcloud was launched in April 2016 when Karlitschek forked ownCloud to create Nextcloud. Most of the core contributors of ownCloud left with Karlitschek to join forces in the new Nextcloud project, managed by the new company formed at the same time, Nextcloud GmbH. Within 6 months Nextcloud GmbH was profitable and remains today profitable and still manages the Nextcloud project.
The ownCloud project is split into two components, the open source Standard Edition and the Enterprise Edition, which is not open source, but the code can be downloaded without obfuscation. The Standard Edition is represented by owncloud.org and managed by ownCloud GmbH and the list of contributors is online.
The Enterprise Edition is represented by owncloud.com, has more features, and is also managed by ownCloud GmBH. They also have an exclusive partnership for North American clients with a company called XTIVIA and there is an XTIVIA page on the ownCloud site describing this relationship. ownCloud also has an official Meet the Team page.
Nextcloud has one open source edition and is represented online by nextcloud.com and managed by Nextcloud GmbH and the list of contributors is online and boasts that over 1000 people have contributed to Nextcloud.
The latest release of ownCloud Standard Edition released May 2017 is version 10 or ownCloud X, as they call it. The rest of our review is only regarding the Standard Edition, which is open source. The ownCloud Enterprise Edition does have more features not listed below.
Nextcloud’s latest release, from February 2018, is version 13.
Below we have these sub-sections in this section:
Screenshots
Pricing
Technology
Security
Features
Community and Support
Here’s the first one:
Screenshots
Preview the two login screens head to head — they’re quite similar:
Here we show you the top left corner of the initial screen, known as the “Files” page. This is essentially the Home page of a private cloud:
Nextcloud Files ScreenownCloud Files Screen
Click on the share icon for a file and you see on the right side the share menu for that file:
Nextcloud Sharing MenuownCloud Sharing Menu
On our installation with several apps installed, Nextcloud shows each as a small icon, accessible directly from the main menu top bar. If you install a lot of apps in Nextcloud, however, you also must use a dropdown menu feature to see the rest:
Nextcloud Apps Menu
In ownCloud you must first click on the dropdown menu, but then the app icons are larger and have text also:
ownCloud Apps Menu
Here is the initial apps page of Nextcloud:
Nextcloud Apps Page
If you select a category on the left, however, you do get a nicer view of available apps:
Nextcloud Apps Category
Here is the initial Marketplace page of ownCloud:
ownCloud Marketplace
Pricing
Pricing for Nextcloud and ownCloud are free. That means they cost precisely zero dollars and zero cents to use them for as unlimited time, with unlimited data and unlimited users. There is no fee whatsover to download and use either package — they are both Open Source and completely free.
The marketing experts at FileCloud will try to convince you that each of these packages costs thousands of dollars per year, more in fact than their own commercial package. They make a convincing case that their product is less expensive. What they fail to mention, however, is that the fees they mention for Nextcloud and ownCloud are not software fees, they are optional support subscriptions.
There is a Nextcloud Pricing page as well as an ownCloud Pricing page, but again, these are only for a support subscription — you are not required to purchase that.
The base price for both is just ZERO. You of course need hosting and you can see our own Nextcloud hosting page for information about our hosting services, or you can host it yourself at home.
Technology
Both packages are built in PHP and support SQLite or MySQL/MariaDB. The installation procedure is virtually the same for both. For details, see our own How to Install Nextcloud page.
Regarding the code base, both are public of course and so you can see exactly what progress is being made. If we compare the GitHub Nextcloud “commit activity” graph and the ownCloud “commit activity” graph, you can see that Nextcloud has around twice as many commits as ownCloud does. A representative from ownCloud commented to us offline that their approach is to make fewer, but larger commits, but if we examine the Nextcloud “code frequency” graph vs the ownCloud “code frequency” graph it’s quite clear that since the split in 2016, the Nextcloud team has made far more development with the codebase than ownCloud.
They also have several more releases over the past year than ownCloud. Given that both packages started with the exact same code base when Nextcloud forked, this gives one an idea of where the action is.
Security
The Nextcloud team has invested a lot in improving security for their product, such as better password handling, brute force protection, rate limiting, integration with various enterprise authentication methods, CSP and more.
Nextcloud features a public Security Scan Tool which scans both Nextcloud and ownCloud instances and ownCloud also has a public Security Scan Tool as well.
Nextcloud, however, features an up to $5,000 Bug Bounty Program at HackerOne, a vulnerability coordination and bug bounty platform. You can see more on the Nextcloud page there.
The Nextcloud page there boasts an initial response time of under an hour and a response percentage of 100% whereas ownCloud’s page doesn’t mention the initial response time and shows a response percentage of only 82%.
ownCloud also has a page there, but as of Dec 19, 2018, it is not active and says “ownCloud is taking a break and is not accepting new submissions”. You can see for yourself the ownCloud page there.
Features
Feature
Nextcloud
ownCloud
Files
File Storage
YesUpload, synch, comments, tags, multiple versions, move files via web interface
YesUpload, synch, comments, tags, multiple versions, move files via web interface
File Sharing
YesShare via user, email, link, social media sites, password protection and expiration date. Can allow user without an account (just email) to edit a document.
YesShare via user, or link, social media sites, password protection and expiration date
Full Text Search
YesThe Nextant app integrates Apache Solr
YesIntegration with ElasticSearch available via a fee-based add-on
Folder Sharing
YesShare via user, email, link, social media sites, password protection and expiration date. Can allow user to view and upload.
YesShare via user, or ink, social media sites, password protection and expiration date. Can allow user to view and upload.
YesWCAG 2.0 AA and AAA standard compliance Keyboard/screen reader support Dyslexia-friendly font
No
Translations
33 languages available
103 languages available
Community and Support
ownCloud has a Support page with links to documentation, forums, IRC channel and other venues such as a Google Plus community, plus a mailing list. They then also have premium support for their Enterprise clients.
Nextcloud’s Support page has the same links for their documentation, forums, IRC channel and other venues such as a Google Plus community. They also provide premium support for clients who use their Enterprise support services.
If you prefer video, for Nextcloud there is a Nextcloud GmbH YouTube channel with over 60 videos, the most popular of which has 25,000 views.
For ownCloud there is the ownClouders channel, which, based on the logo used, appears to be focused on the Standard Edition and has over 250 videos and the most popular there has 170,000 views, and then there is the ownCloud channel apparently representing the Enterprise Version (here you see the Enterprise logo) with over 80 videos and the most popular video there has almost 3,000 views.
A quick Google search for “Nextcloud” brings up over 841,000 results and a search for “ownCloud” brings up almost 2 million results.
Conclusion
Both packages have a solid base and a growing set of addon apps, both have support available. Nextcloud, however, has a lot more action, “buzz” and growth. ownCloud does not appear to be dead at all, but the future of open source clouds clearly looks to be with Nextcloud.
Post Conclusion
If you’re looking for hosting for Nextcloud or for ownCloud, whether in the USA or Europe, we recommend CiviHosting. Let us install and secure your cloud for you:
We are often asked if Nextcloud can be installed in a subdomain and the answer is yes.
There are two ways to do this, technically speaking. Let’s say your domain is puppies.com and you have hosting for that and you’re not ready to change that, but you want a Nextcloud instance and you want it on a subdomain called cloud.puppies.com. To get that, all you need to do is purchase hosting from us and in the “Domain Name” box put “cloud.puppies.com.” We will then set up your account for you using that subdomain and install Nextcloud for you.
Then we will help you create an “A record” in your DNS settings to point only that subdomain to our servers.
The second way to do this is to sign up and use “puppies.com” as your “Domain Name” and then just ask us to install Nextcloud in a subdomain called “cloud” for you. The DNS settings are the same, but now the “main” part of your hosting account with us is empty and so you could later put your main site puppies.com into that space and then use CiviHosting to host your main site as well as your Nextcloud.
With this method, you could also host the main domain with us, as well as other subdomains, such as mautic.puppies.com if you wanted to use Mautic.
Nextcloud has two separate components which may need to be installed. They are the server and the client. We will describe each separately:
Nextcloud Server
The Nextcloud server is all that you actually need to run Nextcloud. The term “server” here means the web software that powers your Nextcloud website, the place where you can login via a web browser:
Nextcloud Login
and view/add/edit/share etc. your files and other data on your cloud:
The Nextcloud client is a program that runs on your computer or phone and, once configured, mostly just runs by itself “in the background” and synchronizes the files on your PC to those on the cloud. That means that if you edit/add/remove a file from your “cloud” folder on your PC then the same thing happens to that file on your online cloud. Also of course if someone edits/adds/removes a file from the online cloud, your PC will be updated with that same change.
You are not required to use this program to use a cloud. What it does, however, is synchronize all changes back and forth and so many users like it. Here is how it looks on a PC:
The install process is then the same as any other program:
Nextcloud Client Installer
Just click “Next” repeatedly until it’s done. When you now launch the program, the first step is to connect it to your cloud. It will ask you for the “Server Address” which means the URL of your cloud.
Enter that and click “Next” and then enter your Username and Password.
If you get those right, then the wizard will ask you if you want to sync everything or only certain files, and it will allow you to specify which folder on your PC to use to sync the files. Set those up as you like and then that’s it.
The client may need a few minutes to download (or upload) files to sync everything, but after that, you’re in business. 🙂
And if you’re looking for hosting for Nextcloud, whether in the USA or Europe, we are here for you. Get started now and we install and secure Nextcloud for you:
The easiest way to install Nextcloud server is to host your cloud with CiviHosting — we will do it for you. For more information, see our Nextcloud hosting page. 🙂
But if you don’t host with us, or you just prefer to do it yourself, there are two steps:
Get the files onto your account
Install Nextcloud
Get the files onto your account
There are two methods to get the Nextcloud files onto your account:
Via the Web Installer
Manually
You can use whichever method you prefer — the end result is the same.
Load Files Via the Web Installer
To get the Web Installer, right click on this link: setup-nextcloud.php and save that file; it will be called setup-nextcloud.php.
Next, upload file to your hosting account. With CiviHosting, you can use the File Manager tab of the hosting Control Panel to upload this file.
Now visit the URL of that file in your browser, meaning browse to http://mysite.com/setup-nextcloud.php and you will see the Nextcloud setup wizard:
Click “Next” and enter a directory if you want and click “Next” again.
You may need to wait a bit now as the installer fetches all the files from Nextcloud’s servers. When it finishes, you will see a message “Success — Nextcloud is now installed” with another “Next” button.
Click that button and then jump below to the “Install Nextcloud” section.
Unzip the file. On CiviHosting, you can simply find the file in the File Manager tab of the hosting Control Panel and click on it and the Control Panel will unzip it for you.
Now visit the URL to where you put the files. If you put them in the main area of your account, then the URL would be http://mysite.com/ or perhaps http://mysite.com/nextcloud.
Now the files are in place and you can proceed to the next step.
Install Nextcloud
After finishing the above step, you should be looking at the Finish Setup screen:
While it’s a bit tempting to just click “Finish setup,” we don’t recommend that as it will use SQLite for the DB server and that’s only a smart choice for very simple sites. For any normal use, you could click on “Storage & database” and then click on “MySQL/MariaDB.”
When you do that, you will see boxes to enter the Database user, password and name. You must create a database (or ask your host to) and this process is different on every host. With CiviHosting, just visit the MySQL Databases tab of the hosting Control Panel and you can create a database there. You can then use the name and password of your Control Panel login or you can create a different user and password on the same page.
Once those are ready, enter them into the boxes on the Nextcloud Finish setup page and then at the top of the page, enter your desired username and password — this will be the admin user for Nextcloud and you can use whatever password you want.
Click the “Finish setup” button, watch Nextcloud do its thing and that’s it. Your cloud is ready to use!
And if you’re looking for hosting for Nextcloud, whether in the USA or Europe, we are here for you. Get started now and we install and secure Nextcloud for you:
Today we are going to clarify what a “Private Cloud” is in very simple terms that anyone can understand.
Overview
A Private Cloud, in one sentence, is a website where you can store and share files and other information (like a calendar and contact lists) with everyone you need to. It’s a replacement for tools like Google Drive or DropBox. With a private cloud, your data is secure and private only to you.
A bit more in depth, a Private Cloud is a website which is password-protected so only you and your staff and students etc, have access to it. Inside of this website you can access files and other information that people shared on the cloud. Someone who is logged in would see something like this:
Private Cloud File Browser
This sample shows a list of files in a folder we called “Shakespeare 204.” You see in the middle a list of files that have been added to our cloud in that folder. We can now share these files with our students and colleagues. Whoever has access could download any of these files.
But there’s more. 🙂
We can edit these files online as well. Here you can see how we are editing the word “Venice” in our Othello document:
Online Editor
This is all happening right in the web browser, with no need to download the document — just like Google Docs, except this cloud is totally private.
There are other interesting features of a private cloud, which we will detail below, each in its own section.
Synch with your PC
One question is how do we get these files from our PC onto the cloud to begin with? For this, there is a “client” which means a program that runs on your computer that synchronizes your files with the files on the cloud. That means that if you had that Othello document on your PC and you edit it on your PC and save it, then it will automatically be updated on the cloud. And also the opposite–if someone else edits it (whoever has permission to edit that file) then it will be automatically on your PC. Same thing if a file is added or deleted from either place–every activity is synched in both places.
There are clients available for Windows, Mac and Linux. Let’s see a bit how this works, to make it easier to understand. After I install the client and put in the location of my cloud and my username and password (those are fairly easy tasks) then I tell the client which folders in my PC I want to synch with the cloud. In this screenshot, I clicked on the “Add Folder Sync Connection” button and then I chose the folder “C:\Courses”:
Synch with PC
The client then automatically synched me with the cloud and when I open that folder I see my “Shakespeare 204” folder and if I click on that, I see my files:
See Files on Your PC
During normal operation, the client is minimized to an icon in my Windows system tray in the taskbar and it will show me a message every time a change is made to my cloud.
Sharing
Now that I have my files ready to share, I need to inform everyone. Of course I could just do that at a lecture or at a staff meeting or some such, but a private cloud provides more high-tech options also. 🙂
Here is a picture of what I see if I click on the little “triangle” icon next to “Hamlet”:
Share Files Online
On the right side, I can now add tags or comments to my file. I have selected the “Sharing” option and I can now share this with other users on my cloud or even with “remote users” which means someone who is not part of my cloud at all. I can put in an email of any person with whom I want to share my file. When I share a file, everyone who I am sharing it with will get an email with a link directly to the file in question. A “remote user” has no access to my cloud beyond this one file that I am sharing with him and I can add a password or even an expiration date which means that his access to this file will expire when I decide.
Gallery
Using the built-in “Gallery” app, we can view images that have been uploaded in a gallery view:
Image Gallery Online
Calendar
Share a calendar of events online:
Calendar Online
Contacts
Store and share contact information:
Contact Information
Other
There are many other features also, including external storage support to sync your cloud with a public cloud such as Dropbox, or media players for videos and audio files for online viewing. There are other features and tools as well, and new ones being added all the time.
I hope this gives you an idea of what a private cloud is and how you can use it. If you have any questions, just contact us.
If you’re looking for hosting for a private cloud, whether in the USA or Europe, we can help. Get hosting with CiviCRM we install and secure your cloud for you:
