The cloud computing is increasingly relevant, especially storage services that add a lot to the user experience. Among them, Google Drive is possibly one of the platforms most used by users on the Internet.
Not only is the fact that it is factory pre-installed on all devices with Android operating system, But it works perfectly complementing other platforms and tools from Google itself, as we can well mention the automatic backups of the devices.
The benefits of using Google drive there are many, and in In this article we are going to discuss each of them, in addition to teaching you how to make the most of this powerful tool.
What is Google Drive and what is this service for?
Google Drive is a cloud storage service in which you can safely save all kinds of files; from text documents and spreadsheets, to photos, audios and videos of all kinds. To access it, you simply have to create a Gmail account.
Which will give you access to a free space of up to 15GB. This space is expandable up to 30TB paying a monthly subscription. Without a doubt, the main advantage of Drive is that it is completely linked to your Google user., so you can use it to back up information in basically any application or service of the company.
What are the main features and functions of Google Drive?
This service is definitely one of the most practical and used for Internet usersThis is because its main features solve many problems for the Internet user.
Some of these ranges are:
- Access to information from any device: in a way it can be considered a digital suite in which information about the same user is stored, so that as long as you have the key (Google account) you can access said information from any device.
- Full compatibility: it uses an image viewer, an audio and video player, as well as text engines, spreadsheets and presentations, so you can view and edit any type of document regardless of its format, this being another of its strengths .
- Security and privacy: If there is one thing you can be sure of, it is that no third party will access your Drive account if they do not have the permissions to do so. Security backed by a powerful encryption method makes this one of the most reliable platforms on the Internet.
- Share files: Another of its strengths is its organizational ability to work together, since you can create perfectly editable files in the cloud and share them with other users who have access and permissions to modify any aspect of it.
- Expandable space: Although more than 50% of Drive users rarely use more than the 15GB free that the platform gives to each Google account, it is good that you know that you can request more space by paying a monthly subscription whose prices you will know in the next section .
Google Drive Plans and Fees What are all the types of accounts out there?
Google drive has a series of plans whose rate varies depending on the amount of space that we want to have in the cloud. From the outset we tell you that these plans can be expensive, especially the most powerful since the cloud computing It requires a fairly demanding maintenance.
Without further ado we leave you with the costs of Drive subscriptions:
- Gratuitous: 15GB of storage and access to all Drive tools.
- Plan 1: 100 GB for € 1.46 / month and access to all the platform tools.
- Plan 2: 1 TB for € 7.34 / month and use of Drive tools.
- Plan 3: 10 TB for € 73.45 / month and full access to the platform.
- Plan 4: 20 TB for € 147 / month.
- Plan 5: 30 TB for € 220 / month.
Despite this, Drive is by far the cheapest cloud storage service out there and the one that offers you the plans with the highest capacity on the market. Other platforms such as iCloud only give us 5GB and his broader plan is only 50GB for almost € 10 per month.
Much more expensive and less powerful than plan number 2 of Drive for example. The other platform with competitive prices is Dropbox, and in the same way it falls far behind since its most expensive rate is almost € 50 per month and only gives you access to 500GB, barely half that of Drive’s Plan 2 and much more expensive.
List of the best Google Drive tricks you should know
With the intention of teach you how to get the most out of this tool already quite powerful, we show you some Quite useful tricks you should know about Drive.
Let’s see below:
Find anything with the search engine
Drive count with one internal search engine in which you can search for any document by its title and it will locate it regardless of whether it is in a shared folder or on your drive, as long as you know the title (or at least one keyword from it) and have access to it, you can find anything.
Take advantage of the advanced search engine
In case the search bar may not be a solution Well, you don’t know precisely the title of the document you are looking forYou can use the advanced search engine that has some very useful filters that will allow you to find files according to their creation date, format and other special characteristics.
Drag files as if they were on your computer
It is not necessary to right-click on a file to cut it or move it to another folder. If it’s on screen, you can simply drag the file as if it were an icon from your PC desktop. Easy and simple is to organize all your content in different folders with Drive.
Share with just one link
You don’t need to know a person’s email what do you want have access to a document to share. Among the file options you have the activate shared links, with which you can give access to whoever you want just by giving the direct link to the document.
Edit the permissions of the links
By default, who has a link to a document can edit it, but you as the creator of it can edit link permissions, so that whoever enters the document by this means can only see the content but never modify it.
Set individual permissions to each member of the workgroup
As is done with a link, you can configure the permissions that those users who have invited directly by email, so that you have complete freedom to define roles and determine who can edit content, who can comment and who can only view.
Take advantage of the group chat of documents
When you are in the shared work mode, you can communicate with all the members of the work team who are online in the document at the same time as you. This is thanks to group chat with which Drive has, a tool as simple as it is useful to make things easier when working as a team.
Convert documents to other formats
While this is not a direct function, you can perfectly open a PDF document as a .doc text document and vice versa, as well as with the images. A trick that will save you a lot of time converting files online.
Know the best alternative applications and services to Google Drive
Yes Drive not enough for you below we present a list of the main services hosting in the cloud that are the most competitive alternative with Google drive.
Go for it:
iCloud.com
This is Apple’s cloud storage service, Google’s natural rival in the world of computing. Although this has more expensive and limited plans than Drive, It must also be said in its favor that it is much more secure and rigorous, in addition to having much more complete functions in case one of our devices is stolen or lost. Their most extensive plan is only 50GB for almost € 10 per month, which makes it the most expensive service of all those on the market.
Dropbox.com
This is the second most used platform after Drive and can be used with any email account, but works best with Outlook from Microsoft. Although its functions do not offer anything different than what we have with the Google service, It should be noted that it has a more organized interface in which it is easier to find things. Its most complete plan is 500GB with a price of almost € 50 per month.
OneDrive
We couldn’t forget from Microsoft’s cloud storage service, the third in contention in the digital world between Manzana Y Google. Its platform is truly useful and is supported by all the tools in the Office suite, which makes it even more complete in that sense than Drive. Its highest rate is 200GB of storage for only € 8 per month, which makes it the second cheapest after Drive.