Below are common questions about managing Google Drive for an organization or team.
Looking instead for a Drive feature overview?
Overview
Is Google Drive different than Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides?Yes. Drive is a place to store and access all your files, while Docs, Sheets, and Slides are types of web-based documents, as are Forms and Drawings. The suite of Google's web-based editors is referred to as Google Docs editors.
Similarly, Google My Maps are also web-based documents that you can create or share in Drive. Like Docs editors, My Maps can be used with or without Drive.
With Drive, your data is always backed up or stored in the cloud, so no matter what happens to your devices, your files are safe. You get the same business-grade data protection and security advantages that you get with Google Workspace, as described in Google Workspace security and privacy.
Accessing Drive files
With Drive for desktop, are Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, and My Maps stored on my computer?No. Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, and My Maps are found on your computer as files that are essentially just pointers to web documents. These small "pointer files" have Google extensions (such as .gdoc, .gsheet, and .gslides). If you open these files on your computer, they open in your browser where you can edit them online as usual.
For cloud-based Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms, you can enable offline access to Docs editors. My Maps aren't available offline.
With Backup and Sync, local files are always available offline. For example, PDFs, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, and other files in your Google Drive folder that weren't created with Docs editors are available offline.
With Google Drive for desktop, you can make selected Drive files available for offline use.
If you need to blacklist the Drive for desktop cache from virus or backup software, exclude this directory:
- Windows:
%LOCALAPPDATA%\Google\DriveFS - Mac:
~/Library/Application Support/Google/DriveFS
You can optionally customize the cache location.
With Backup and Sync, local files (those not created with Docs editors or My Maps) still exist on your computer, as usual. Future changes to the local files will no longer sync as your computer won't be able to authenticate with Drive. Because Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms are stored in the cloud, you need your user name and password to access them.
With Drive for desktop, you need a valid Google Account to access all Drive files.
No. If you turn off the Drive service, this disables Docs editors as well as all Drive components (Drive on the web, Drive mobile apps, and Drive sync applications).
Drive search includes full search over all file content, in addition to the operators listed here.
Folder limits in Google Drive
How many items can I have directly in a folder?Any single folder in Drive which is not in a shared drive can have a maximum of 500,000 items placed within it. This limit does not apply to the root folder of 'My Drive'.
Items which are counted toward this limit are:
- Folders
- Files
- Any file you can store in Drive counts toward the limit.
- Ownership of the file does not matter.
- Shortcuts
- A shortcut counts as a single item within a folder, even if the item it points to is not within that folder.
Example 1
This example shows how items are counted: Folder A counts as having 4 items and Folder B as having 2 items:
- My Drive (root)
- Folder A (four items directly in this folder: Doc 1, Doc 2, Doc 3, Folder B)
- Doc 1
- Doc 2
- Doc 3
- Folder B (two items directly in this folder: Doc 4, Doc 5)
- Doc 4
- Doc 5
- Folder A (four items directly in this folder: Doc 1, Doc 2, Doc 3, Folder B)
Example 2
This example shows that items placed directly in a folder count towards the 500,000 item limit, but items placed in child folders do not count towards the 500,000 limit for the parent folder.
- My Drive (root)
- Folder C has 300,000 items directly placed in it
- Folder D has 400,000 items directly placed in it
- Folder E has 200,000 items directly placed it it
- Folder C has 300,000 items directly placed in it
This example is permitted because there are fewer than 500,000 items in a single folder. Also note that in this example, Folder D and Folder E are each counted as 1 item toward the limit for Folder C.
Syncing files
This depends on whether you use Google Drive for desktop or Backup and Sync. To compare these options, see Choose a sync solution.
If you use Drive for desktop, your Drive files are moved to the cloud, freeing up disk space and eliminating the network bandwidth needed to keep all your files synced from your computer to the cloud. You can stream Drive files on demand, or make them available for offline access.
If you use Backup and Sync, your local files will remain in your Drive folder on your computer, and a synced copy is also stored online. You can also configure Backup and Sync to delete local files and keep them safe in the cloud.
With Drive for desktop, files are stored in the cloud and don’t need to sync with online versions, saving network bandwidth. Files that are cached for offline access will sync back to the cloud when you’re online.
Backup and Sync doesn't throttle bandwidth by default, but you can choose to limit your bandwidth settings. You can also pause syncing at any time if Drive is consuming too much of your Internet connection.
See Back up & sync files with Google Drive to learn how to limit bandwidth.
Yes. As the administrator, you can turn on or off Drive for desktop, Backup and Sync, both, or neither. See Turn on sync for your organization to learn more.
Yes, if both applications are allowed in your organization. Learn what happens if you allow both applications.
Backup and Sync supports APFS, HFS+, and FAT (on OS X), and ReFS, NTFS, and FAT (on Windows). There is currently no support for network volumes (e.g. SMB or NFS).
Files deleted from Drive for desktop will be purged from the system trash after 30 days.
The Drive for desktop content cache supports connected APFS, HFS+, or NTFS file systems. Drive for desktop currently doesn’t support network volumes (for example, SMB or NFS).
Drive for desktop creates a virtual Drive, which appears as a FAT file system.
Note: FAT has some file size limitations. For example, the largest possible file for a FAT32 drive is 4GB (minus 2 bytes).
- You can’t upload a folder larger than the available storage in the partition where the cache folder is located.
- Drive for desktop will show a limited Drive quota (even for unlimited accounts), according to the available space in the local drive where the cache is located.
We recommend that you use Backup and Sync, as Drive for desktop cache and FAT limitations might cause errors. In any case, please always keep a copy of the original (use copy/paste, not cut/paste), as we can’t recover files that never made it to the cloud.
Furthermore, if you try to drag a .gdoc or .gsheet file from your desktop into a shared drive in your browser, you will see the error message "Can’t duplicate filename.gdoc.” Instead, to add a file to a shared drive, use a web browser and follow these instructions.
Storage
Drive storage is shared between Google Drive, Gmail, and Google Photos. The amount of free storage for each user depends on your type of account:
|
30 GB per user |
|
30 GB per user added to pooled storage |
|
2 TB per user added to pooled storage |
|
5 TB per user added to pooled storage |
|
|
|
100 GB per user added to pooled storage, |
|
Unlimited storage |
|
100 TB pooled cloud storage Additional storage:
|
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15 GB |
* Available April 2021
If needed, you can purchase additional storage.
Content created with My Maps doesn't count toward storage quotas.
Individual users can only upload 750 GB each day between My Drive and all shared drives. Users who reach the 750-GB limit or upload a file larger than 750 GB cannot upload additional files that day. Uploads that are in progress will complete. The maximum individual file size that you can upload or synchronize is 5 TB.
Drive storage is for users and Cloud Storage is for developers.
Multiple revisions of a file are available online, but only the latest version is available on your computer. The online revisions are not counted toward your storage quota unless you’ve explicitly decided to keep older revisions.
No. Only one version counts against your storage quota.
No. Files that have been shared with you in Drive never count toward your storage limit, even if you move them to My Drive.
See what uses your storage space.
With Google Drive for desktop, this is no problem. Your files are stored exclusively online unless you make them available for offline access.
With Backup and Sync, if you don't have enough storage on your computer you can choose to sync only a subset of folders in Drive. See Back up & sync files with Google Drive to learn more.
The user can still access any files already in Drive, but they won't be able to add additional files until they're under quota or have their quota increased.
Starting June 1, 2021, any newly created Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms, or Jamboard files will count toward Drive storage. Existing files within these products will not count toward storage, unless they’re modified on or after June 1, 2021. If you are over quota, you can’t create new files in these products, and until you reduce your storage usage, neither you nor anyone else can edit or copy your affected files. Learn more.
Organizations that need additional storage should upgrade their Workspace edition.
Ultimately, you are limited to the amount of storage described in our terms of service, and we reserve the right to disable uploads to Drive if you exceed your limit.
Next steps: Set up Drive for your team
