MEGA

Storing, syncing and sharing files with end-to-end encryption switched on by default — and, famously, offering one of the most generous free tiers in the whole field. People reach for MEGA when they want to send large files privately: encrypted share links, an encrypted chat, and no size anxiety on the free plan make it a popular drop-off point for big transfers. It's a genuine Dropbox-style cloud with privacy built in rather than bolted on.

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Technically very safe. Files are encrypted on your own device before they ever reach MEGA's servers, and only your password-derived keys can decrypt them — MEGA cannot read your data, and its client code is public for anyone to inspect. A 2022 academic study exposed weaknesses that MEGA then patched, and today's design holds up. The important flip side is by design: if you lose both your password and your recovery key, nobody — not even MEGA — can retrieve your files. So safety here depends heavily on you guarding your credentials.

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The free tier is the headline draw — 20 GB of encrypted storage at no cost, the biggest genuine free allowance in this line-up. Paid plans start at €8.33/mo and scale up through several terabyte tiers, so you can grow from a few hundred gigabytes to multiple terabytes as your needs change. Even at the larger sizes, MEGA is among the cheapest encrypted storage anywhere. If the free space is enough for you, you can stay on it indefinitely without ever entering card details.

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Mega Limited, a privately held company based in Auckland, New Zealand and founded in 2013. Its original founder, Kim Dotcom, exited in 2015 and has had no role since — a point worth stressing given the brand's early notoriety. For a decade it has run under professional management, subject to New Zealand privacy law rather than any founder's control.

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Yes. Zero-knowledge, end-to-end encryption is the default for every file, and because the client code is public, its privacy claims can actually be verified rather than merely trusted. A 2022 academic critique prompted protocol fixes, and today neither MEGA nor anyone who managed to compromise its servers can read your files. The single point of failure is your password: it derives your encryption keys, so if you lose it without a recovery key, your data is unrecoverable by design. Protect those credentials and MEGA's privacy is genuinely structural, not just a policy.

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A few. Free accounts have transfer quotas that throttle heavy downloading once you've moved a lot of data. The desktop sync client is solid but less polished than pCloud's. There's no built-in document editing. And despite a decade of clean, independent operation, the brand still carries some founder-era baggage in people's minds. There's also no UK data centre. For free encrypted gigabytes, though, it remains unbeatable — the disadvantages bite mainly if you push it hard as a paid everyday sync tool rather than as a private file locker.

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