I’m not sure why this app usually has a bad overall rating. Most of the time App Store ratings are very accurate but this app seems to get bad ratings more than I think it should. I’d say 4.5 stars because I’d love a few more features but overall this is a good quality app.
I have Synology Drive installed on both an iPhone and an iPad. I’m occasionally in environments outside of my home (which is where my NAS is) in which I do not have cellular or Wi-Fi access, but I still want to be able to access my synced files. So, I painstakingly selected a few thousand files for offline access. Please Synology, give us the ability to select offline access by folder like you used to in DS Cloud. That being said, I was camping a few weeks ago somewhere without internet access, and I needed to access a file. I fired up Synology Drive on both devices and kept on getting a “Failed to establish network connection” message. What use is selecting a file for offline access when you can’t actually access it when you’re offline? But it gets worse. As I write this I’m away from home at my office, connected to my office’s WiFi on both my phone and iPad. I need to access a file, but I keep on getting the same “Failed to establish network connection” message on both devices and am unable to access any of my synced files. Synology Drive has been a pile of garbage since it was first released.
The app is not responsive at all. Text doesn’t flow to adjust for screen size. This means it’s super small on a 5in iPhone. In landscape, the keyboard covers the interface to the point that you can’t see what you’re typing. Worse yet, while typing, any suggestions that might complete the current word do not take and instead insert a space after the portion of the word you completed. So if you type wi and autocomplete suggests will, you tap on “will” and get stuck with “wi “. So, in its present state, this app can not in effect be used for much other than viewing odocs and perhaps some copy, paste or formatting operations. Actually typing up or editing a doc is way too slow and cumbersome to be useful. Please fix this soon. Otherwise we’re stuck using Google Docs. Because it’s hard enough to get people to try something else. If it then falls way short of established shared doc platforms, you’re done.
This used to be a useful app. Now it has so many bugs, it’s hardly usable. I find myself considering going back to a paid cloud service. Bugs I encountered in just one session today: - No ability to mark files for offline use. The menu item is missing. - When browsing the drive folders, folders won’t open and show their contents. The only possibility is to manipulate things at the top level. - trying to add files to a collection, the only way to add, I’m shown a long long list of arbitrary old files, that have nothing to do with recent files and it would take days of scrolling to find the right files to add. There’s no search or any other option. With just these three bugs I encountered in one session, the app is basically in useable. And what other bugs are lurking?
Great way to access your files, we w/some issues with file types
(After sometime passed the issue I had before of not being able to dive into subfolders is fixed. I don't know what fixed it? Logging out and back in? Regardless it works now) Great app to access your Synology NAS files. Accesses files MUCH quicker than connecting it to iOS Files app. It has some issues with unsupported files types, and though it recommends apps to access those files. I tried one (VLC media player) and integration is not good. It tries to open a file but instantly closes it. Taking off 1 star for this, but I'll try and play around more with alternative apps for these unsupported file types.
The basic functionality works well, but app seems a bit buggy
I’ve been slowing transitioning away from popular cloud-based online document store, and this product has been a great aid, however, the document editor that is included works well for most part except when my iPad goes to sleep and I come back to find the app frozen in editor mode. This has been happening consistently and I have to close the application all together and then reopen it to resume work again. Thankfully, it still saves the work so I can easily resume. Please fix so it can resume without any issues!
Basic functions work great - but some weird choices.
The “recent files” tab makes no sense. If you turn it off in the settings, it then says “Show Temporarily”? What’s the point of disabling it? Really we need to be able to disable the entire home tab. Also, If we are going to do a recent tab (which could be useful to some people), why can’t we clear recently accessed files? I had tax documents showing up and I wanted to remove them. I used the “checkmark” selection on the recent files, and selected and deleted them. Now, I should have read the dialogue - but I didn’t, and didn’t realize that it deletes it from the share. I assumed it removed it from the recent files. I’m begging you guys to please remove the select and delete function from the recent tab, and add a “clear recent list” option, or let us select and clear individual items.
Overall this is a great app. It is very useful and helps me to keep my phone backed up to my NAS. I’m only giving this app 4 stars because you have to keep the app open for it to work. I’ve also noticed it doesn’t back anything up unless you view the app, making it active. In other words, it really doesn’t run in the background at all. I’d love to see an update that allows this app to truly run in the background.
Just wish there was built in dark mode and the ability activate text to speech from writing a document, that would make this my GO TO word processor EDIT: another thing i noticed was that it did not have an offline edit feature, i could view but it wouldnt let me edit and then upload the “newer” version or merge like using a diff program. That would be neat.
The app is getting better, I’d like to suggest to the team to add a search box on the “save to drive” screen when prompting users to see the which folder to upload from iPhone. It makes it easier to locate the right folder from hundreds of folders. Other apps all have search function. Please prioritize this feature for the mobile version. Thanks
Most things work well, but I found two issues. 1. When you set a passcode on the app and try and open Synology drive through iOS files app it just opens a white page and it cannot connect. 2. When copying files from the files app to synology drive through files app it will not copy. It copies but says waiting under it in the destination folder. If I try and copy the same files connected to the NAS server through SMB straight to the same file location it copies quick and just fine. Also sharing those files directly to the drive app also works fine. Please fix these issues.
Everything else is great but it does not show the status of the file upload when its happening. I uploaded a big size video but it did not show the status. May be its happening in the background, but it should have shown on the UI. Such a bad UX.
I like the app and the ability to sync files since the prior cloud sync all was canceled but it is constantly crashing when syncing files from my NAS. It would also be nice to see a sync progress or file pending sync count. No idea how much is left or how long it will take… if the app manages to not crash.
Sometimes unable to connect to my nas, but not sure if it’s this app or not. Missing the feature to request files from someone, really wish it had it here so I can request files on the go! I do freelance work and not near a computer all the time so requesting files from clients on the spot would be great.
They definitely broke something after the latest version update. It doesn't sync files anymore. Whatever I do, whatever I try it just doesn't sync files. I have tried reinstalling the app, syncing over the wifi, creating new sync task and deleting the old one. It just doesn't work. After the update it became a useless app.
Really frustrating that I can only share single files. I had a photo shoot with 150+pictures I wanted to share and I have to specify permissions and users one photo at a time. This is overly tedious when I’d really like to be able to select a list, folder, or collection and share it once with other internal users.
Synology has provided some very useful features across the major file types. You can easily use this for genealogy, reference materials and general purpose file storage while keeping things simple.
Needs the ability to clear recent. Just spoiled a Christmas gift for my wife because of it. Setup was a bit confusing because none of my shared NAS files showed up for a day and then they did all of a sudden. Snappy and responsive. Has dark mode (which competitors don't). Would like Face ID protection on iOS.
The Photo backup should be split into two backups or have an option to not include video extensions. It gets hung up on large videos so it would be nice to do large transfers on internal networks.
I download some files from the internet from my phone. Normally when I select Drive it used to let me save files to a shared folder, now it’s only showing the folders I have for My Home. I can’t save it to a spot my other users can see anymore. Pre update, was solid, this is a pretty big take away for me.
The editing functionality in this app for Synology docs is beyond horrible. There is NO editing menu. It has ability to do fonts, indents, and maybe highlight with color. But.. No ability to cut and paste. No ability to insert something. It has less than a 1000th of the functionality of Google doc. Either there is some issue with my install, or this is just one truly HORRIBLE product.
Does the basics. No folder sync, no external access
If want to sync a folder to my phone, the only way is to mark each file offline. I also cannot browse any of the synced files from iOS Files as I can access files from other apps. It does the basics of letting you view files that are there, but not sure how much you can view. My PDF just says “data”.
Works fine as a way to access and view files on you NAS, but it lacks basic editing features. If you use your Synology NAS for any sort of productivity/business use where you need to edit documents/spreadsheets then you will find yourself using the web browser interface since the Drive app doesn’t let you edit.
Best feature ever: Sync task to allow 2 way syncing of folders from the Synology in my office. Works great! I choose not to access my Synology remotely, so the local sync before leaving the office works out great. Love it! Thanks Synology!
I’ve had this app for a couple of years now, the latest version has started crashing when playing videos (especially when airplaying to another device) or browsing through photo albums. This is really disappointing because the most convenient thing about this app is that I can play all my local media via AirPlay.
App randomly crashes when playing music from it. Sometimes it plays about 3 songs before it crashes but most of the time it doesn’t even get through one before it crashes. It worked fine up until sometime in Nov. it hasn’t worked right since. I opened a support ticket about it and so far I’m getting no where fast.
Mid November 2023 and the version released a week ago to fix the “app opening issue” is still buggy. On multiple iPads now it will crash and close after a few minutes of use. Please fix this Synology!
If you turn on the photo backup and ask it to backup all of them, it lists the backup task on a page title "Background Tasks", but, of course, the Photo Backup task won't backup in the background, it has to be in the foreground, no matter how long it will take. I'll probably get screen burn with it.
Lately the app is consuming a pretty big part of my battery each day and I’m not in it that much. I even disabled background refresh but that hasn’t apparently helped. It’s the top app listed as a battery consumer in Settings > Battery. I’ve also noticed it crash some times while I’m using it for a while.
Love the storage ability, but other features are awful. The document feature specifically is just trash. It’s buggy, often fails to let me even type and I have to close the document and reopen.
I have tried to find ways to sync, certain folders and files for off-line use, but it just doesn’t work. Everything is set up up correctly as if it should sync these files to be available off-line but once the sync is finished and I test out I get the error about failed to….
There were so many decent works which I could do, but there was this minor issue that I cannot be happy with. I was getting into using the spreadsheet, and it is good that I got to see the information I would like to see. BUT the spreadsheed would not be edited.
I like the functionality, but the video player keeps crashing mid-video. Also: you have to keep the app in the foreground while it is downloading files for offline viewing.
Really love this app potential and features. I would love to see a UI refresh. Simple feature request, show progress bar/percentage/speed of the backups in progress.
What is the point of having a native app that will not allow you to make changes? Edits to any NAS files are not possible and there is ZERO a help on this… Frustrating because its so easy to fix and that would a huge game changer for me and my company’s processes.
The app is definitely getting better and better. With iOS phone and tablets getting TB drives, large sync options would be nice. With a tree view for folders.
Not sure if it’s a setting in my system, but audio has trouble playing. It recently got worse, the tracks stop after 15 seconds and then I see an error message that I should download and use VLC Player or OPlayer or others.
You cannot access files with this app. You can see the file structure and you can see the file folders but clicking the folders will not reveal any info. Pretty much useless. But, the actual service for your computer works very well.
Overall the app works okay. But the fact that you can’t open a PDF and “share” it with Drive without going through an intermediate app first (PDF Expert or the like) just makes it incredibly frustrating to use.
Updated to the new version of the app but I am still unable to preview HEIC files even with the option to preview the files on wifi or cellular enabled. Please fix
When are you going to actually integrate with iOS? Edit: much better integration with iOS files app but no easy way to select a file or folder and designate it for offline availability.
I love this app only thing I wish it was better is the editing. With other apps is a more native experience, with Synology Drive is just the web version
One of my main objective that lead to my purchase of my Synology NAS was the desire to replace Google dDrive and Google Apps. Synology’s Word Processing App are, unfortunately, terrible. It basically is unusable, especially for any important documents. Keyboard entry will suddenly stop working, and backspace key will not work, making corrections difficult
**To use this app and enjoy its features, you must own Synology NAS and install the latest Synology Drive Server.** Synology Drive iOS mobile app allows you to easily access and manage files in your Synology Drive on the go. In addition to common file types, such as documents, images, videos, and music, the app's user-friendly in-app viewer can open Synology Office documents, spreadsheets, and slides. Convenient management features, such as syncing, searching, sharing, moving, and applying labels to files, are all available in the app, allowing users to complete tasks efficiently anytime, anywhere.
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