Features

nextExplorer mixes a modern browser experience with secure access controls and filesystem workflows. Here are the standout capabilities available out of the box.

File browsing & previews

• Dual views: Switch between responsive grid, list, and column modes while keeping breadcrumbs, toolbar, and search accessible.

• Inline previews: Images, videos, PDFs, and text files preview instantly without downloads. Image/video thumbnails are generated automatically using FFmpeg (FFMPEG_PATH/FFPROBE_PATH can override binaries).

• Media gallery: Pictures and videos open in one viewer and are browsed together — swipe on a touch device, arrow keys or on-screen arrows elsewhere. Pictures zoom by pinch, double-tap or ctrl-wheel; while zoomed, dragging pans the picture instead of turning the page.

• Subtitles: A video offers the subtitle tracks inside it and any subtitle files sitting beside it — film.srt, film.fr.srt, film.en.forced.srt — converted to WebVTT and listed in the browser's own captions menu. Blu-ray and DVD subtitles are pictures of words rather than text, so they are not offered; turning those into captions would need OCR.

• Why a video is silent: Playback hands the file to the browser and never transcodes — that is a media server's job, not a file explorer's. The consequence used to be invisible: a film whose soundtrack is AC-3, E-AC-3, DTS or TrueHD plays perfectly with no sound in Chrome or Firefox, because those browsers will not decode them. The player now says so, naming the codec, and says the same when the picture itself is one the browser cannot decode — HEVC, most often. Switching between audio tracks appears only in browsers that support it, which today means Safari.

• Drag-to-move (desktop): Select one or more items, then drag them onto a destination folder to move them. Hold Alt (Option on macOS) to copy instead, and drop onto a favorite in the sidebar to send items there without navigating.

• Move to / Copy to: From the context menu, pick a destination from a dialog that offers your recent destinations and favorites before any browsing. This is the way to move files on a touch device, where dragging is unavailable.

• Drag-to-upload: Drop files or folders from your device onto the main pane to upload them.

• Mobile selection mode: On touch devices, use Select to enable checkbox selection for batch actions.

• Context menus: Right-click the background or individual items for quick shortcuts (New Folder/File, Paste, Move to, Rename, Get Info, download, delete).

• Quick actions: An optional inline menu puts the actions you choose on each row, without opening the context menu. Off by default; configure it in Settings → User preferences.

• Per-folder sorting: A folder reopens sorted the way you left it.

• Folder sizes: With FOLDER_SIZE_MODE, folders show their recursive size, computed in the background and kept up to date as files move.

• Keyboard navigation: Move through a folder with the up and down arrows, open with Enter or the right arrow, and go up a level with Backspace or the left arrow.

Editing, sharing & document workflows

• Built-in editor: Double-click any text or code file to edit it inline with syntax highlighting, line numbers, and Save/Cancel actions. Supports 50+ file types by default (txt, md, json, js, ts, py, yml, html, css, and many more). Extend support for additional formats at runtime using the EDITOR_EXTENSIONS environment variable—no rebuild required.
• Link-based sharing: Use the Share button in the toolbar to create share links for any folder or file you can access (including items under My Files when personal folders are enabled). Shares can be:
  • Read-only or read/write.
  • Anyone with the link or specific users.
  • Downloadable, or read-only in the stricter sense. Turning downloads off leaves the share readable while withholding the file itself — the download button is gone and the endpoint refuses. It is deliberately independent of read/write, because "collaborate on this, but do not take a copy home" is a coherent thing to ask for. Shares created before this existed, and any share where it is not set, allow downloads.
  • Optionally password-protected and time-limited with an expiration date. After creation, the dialog shows a friendly label, final URL (based on PUBLIC_URL when set), and a one-click Copy link button.
• Guest access to shares: Public “anyone with the link” shares use short tokens (for example, /share/aBc123XyZ) and create a limited guest session so visitors can browse just the shared item. Password-protected shares prompt for the password first; user-specific shares redirect to the login screen and apply normal access checks after authentication. The password applies to everyone except the share's owner — being signed in, including as an administrator, is not the same as knowing it. This matters for shares pointing at a personal folder, which no other account can reach any other way. With AUTH_MODE=disabled there are no accounts to tell apart and every visitor already browses the whole filesystem, so the prompt is skipped.
• “Shared with me” view: The Shares section in the sidebar links to a Shared with me page showing items other people have shared with you, including status (active/expired), access mode, and last accessed time.
• ONLYOFFICE integration: When ONLYOFFICE_URL and the JWT ONLYOFFICE_SECRET are configured, docx/xlsx/pptx/odt/ods/odp files open for editing via /api/onlyoffice/*. Two people opening the same document join the same session and edit it together. The editor follows the app's theme, closes with its own button (saving on the way out), and can rename the open document, save it under a new name, share it, mention other users, compare against another version, and insert files picked from your own storage. Work is saved in the background while the document stays open.
• New office documents: The drawer beside New file creates a blank Word, Excel or PowerPoint document and opens it straight in the editor.
• Favorites: Pin folders to the sidebar with a star so critical paths stay in reach across sessions.

Search & metadata

• Smart search: The search bar uses ripgrep under the hood (enable or disable via SEARCH_RIPGREP, SEARCH_DEEP, and SEARCH_MAX_FILESIZE) to find filenames and contents inside the current folder and its children.
• Filename patterns: * and ? in a search term match filenames rather than text — *.ps1 finds the scripts, conf?g.json finds either spelling, and Stacks/*/logs/*.log reaches across folders. A pattern names a shape, so nothing is read inside files for it, which is also what makes it immediate.
• Inside documents: Word, Excel and PowerPoint files are archives of XML and PDFs keep their words in compressed streams, so a plain content search finds nothing in either. Their text is read and searched — including a word an author emphasised halfway through, which Word stores in pieces. A scanned PDF is a picture of a page and stays unsearchable: that would need OCR.
• Metadata overlays: List view shows size, kind, modified date, owner, and volume stats (volume usage visibility flips on with SHOW_VOLUME_USAGE).
• Thumbnail cache: /cache holds thumbnails, RAW previews and search indexes that regenerate when cleared; thumbnails and previews are kept within their limits (THUMBNAIL_CACHE_MAX_FILES, RAW_PREVIEW_CACHE_MAX_FILES).

Access & security

• Local users & groups: Create local accounts from Settings → Admin; the first account becomes admin and can’t be removed while others exist.
• Two-factor authentication: Any local account can turn on a second factor in Settings → Two-factor — a QR code for any authenticator app, a code to confirm the phone kept the secret, and ten recovery codes shown once. Signing in then asks for a code after the password; six digits are worth one sign-in, and a recovery code one use. With OIDC the second factor is the provider's.
• OIDC SSO: Express OpenID Connect exposes /login, /logout, and /callback, so you can federate with Keycloak, Authentik, Authelia, or any compliant provider. Admin elevation happens when the IdP groups/roles intersect OIDC_ADMIN_GROUPS.
• Per-user access control: Grant or deny paths per user or group, with read, write and delete kept apart. Personal folders (USER_DIR_ENABLED) and per-user volumes build on the same rules.
• Secrets from files: Every credential can be read from a file instead of the environment, so nothing sensitive appears in docker inspect. See Secrets.
• Workspace lock: A workspace password (set on first run) gates access, and admin-only sections (Files & Thumbnails, Security, Access Control, Admin Users) appear only when your role allows it.

Operational helpers

• Resizeable sidebar: The sidebar can be dragged to different widths for wide or narrow monitors.
• Notifications & transfers: A floating panel tracks uploads, copies, moves and archive work, with pause, resume and cancel, the transfer rate, and per-file detail when several run at once.
• Chunked uploads: Large files can be uploaded in resumable chunks (UPLOAD_CHUNKED_ENABLED), which survives a dropped connection and gets past reverse proxies that refuse large bodies — a fallback switches to chunks automatically when one does. Once the transfer ends, the server may still be writing the file into place; that phase is reported separately rather than appearing to stall at 100%, and a file that arrived but could not be put in its folder is reported as a failure, with the reason, never as done.
• Cancellable file operations: Copy and move run natively with real progress and can be stopped mid-way, leaving nothing half-written.
• Nothing is ever replaced: A copy, a move, an upload, an extraction, a new archive, a new folder, a Save as, a copy of a version or a restore from the trash takes the name it asks for only when nothing holds it — even something that arrives while it runs — and otherwise takes “name (1)”, or “name 2” for a new folder. It never replaces a file and never pours into a folder that is already there, and undoing one that failed removes only what it wrote itself: a file someone saved in the meantime stays.
• Keyboard shortcuts: ⌘/Ctrl+C/X/V for clipboard actions, plus quick navigation via breadcrumbs and toolbar icons.

How it compares

Two projects solve the same problem from a different angle: FileBrowser Quantum, the active fork of File Browser, and Filestash, which speaks every storage protocol there is. Every cell below was read on 16 September 2026 from the project it describes — its repository, its documentation, its pricing page — rather than from anybody's marketing or anybody's comparison chart. The sources are listed underneath, including the ones about NextExplorer.

✅ shipped · 🚧 announced by that project as coming · ❌ not offered · 💰 paid tier · — not documented

The project

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Licence	GPL-3.0	Apache-2.0	AGPL-3.0 (core)
Price	Free	Free	Free — Pro from $50/mo, Enterprise from $290/mo
Interface languages	15	26	—
Docker image, amd64 and arm64	✅	✅	✅
Official installer outside Docker	❌	✅	💰

Archives, without unpacking them

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Browse one like a folder	✅ zip, 7z, rar, iso, tar, tar.gz…	🚧	✅ viewer plugin
Read a file inside one	✅ text, Markdown, images	🚧	✅ viewer plugin
Take one entry — or several — out	✅ into any folder you pick	❌	❌
Compress a selection	✅	✅	❌

Getting data in and out

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Chunked, resumable uploads	✅	✅	✅
Upload a whole folder	✅	✅	✅
Never replaces a file silently	✅ “name (1)”, and it says so	—	—

When something goes wrong

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Trash, with restore	✅	🚧	❌
Restore part of a deleted folder	✅	❌	❌
Earlier versions of a file	✅	❌	💰 Enterprise
Versions from the office editors' own history	✅ ONLYOFFICE and Collabora	❌	❌

Finding things

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Search by name, indexed, as you type	✅	✅	✅
Search inside file contents	✅ Office documents and PDFs too	❌	✅

Viewing and editing

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Images, video and audio, in the browser	✅	✅	✅
Office documents	✅ ONLYOFFICE / Collabora	✅	✅
Text and code editor	✅	✅	✅
Folder sizes in the listing	✅	✅	—

Who gets in

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Local accounts	✅	✅	✅
OIDC single sign-on	✅	✅	💰 Enterprise
LDAP sign-on	❌	✅	💰 Enterprise
Second factor from an authenticator app	✅ with recovery codes	✅	💰 Enterprise
Passkeys (WebAuthn)	❌	✅	💰 Enterprise
Brute force on the sign-in	✅ account lockout	✅ rate limiting	—
Access rules per path	✅ read, write and delete apart	✅	💰 RBAC

Sharing

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
Links with a password and an expiry	✅	✅	✅
Per-operation permissions on a link	✅	✅	✅
Guests can upload into a share	✅	✅	✅

Running it

	NextExplorer 3.7	FileBrowser Quantum	Filestash
WebDAV	❌ by choice	✅	✅
Storage beyond the local filesystem	❌ by choice	❌	✅ about 25 protocols
API tokens for scripts	🚧	✅	✅
Activity log	🚧	✅	💰
Space quotas	🚧	🚧	💰
Terminal in the browser	✅ switchable	❌ removed deliberately	❌

Where each answer comes from

• NextExplorer: the pages on this site — archives, trash, file versions, search, two-factor and access — and the suites in the repository. The 🚧 are recorded in TODO.md with what each would take; they are intentions, not dates. The ❌ are honest: there is no LDAP here and no passkeys yet, and the two marked by choice are settled positions rather than a backlog nobody got to.
• FileBrowser Quantum: its README states OIDC, LDAP, JWT, password + 2FA and proxy sign-in, WebDAV, folder sizes, API tokens, granular permissions, share expiry and permissions, and that shell commands were removed on purpose. Its own comparison chart is where trash, quotas and browsing archives are marked as coming, and content-aware search as absent. In its source: chunked uploads, TOTP, WebAuthn passkeys, rate limiting on the auth routes, archive creation as zip or tar.gz, and twenty-six interface languages — and no extraction from an archive, and nothing about versioning.
• Filestash: its pricing page is where free ends and paid begins — the self-hosted Hobby edition is AGPL and free, Pro starts at $50/month, Enterprise at $290/month. In its own feature table, OIDC, SAML, LDAP sign-on, MFA, RBAC and versioning are Enterprise; quotas and the audit journal are Pro; resumable uploads, shared links, the editors and Docker are free, and the Debian and RHEL installers are not. Its README is the source for the storage protocols and the viewer plugin that opens tar, tgz and zip. Nothing in either describes a trash or an extraction.
• The original File Browser is left out: its README says it was archived on 1 September 2026, that there will be no further releases, and that two classes of security issue — the command runner, and sessions that are self-contained JWTs and therefore cannot be revoked — will not be fixed. Quantum is its active fork, and stands in the table instead.

Reading the 🚧, and the two crosses that will not change

An activity log, space quotas and API tokens are what the comparison says is missing here, and the three are in the backlog with the shape each would take: the share counters an activity log would read already exist, the recursive folder-size index already counts what a quota would hold people to, and token minting is written and deliberately switched off.

WebDAV is a cross rather than a 🚧, and stays one. NextExplorer is a file browser, not a server: something you open and use, not something other software mounts. A protocol is a second permanent way in — its own way of proving who is asking, its own locks, its own clients writing whenever they like — on top of a filesystem this already reaches, and every rule about who may read, write or delete a path would have to hold on that side too. What is mounted into the container is what this browses, the way a drive is a volume in Windows Explorer: an NFS or SMB share mounted on the host is already here, without this project speaking a protocol of its own. Twenty-five storage protocols are a cross for the same reason from the other end: that is Filestash's ground, and arriving second on it would cost the thing this does well, which is knowing one filesystem deeply.