Why filex · Coming from another tool · Self-host · Features

Quick start

[!TIP] Look before you install: demo.filex.sh - sign in with [email protected] / demo (admin role, sandbox resets nightly).

Run your own, from the folder you want to serve:

docker run -p 5212:5212 \
  -e FILEX_DEFAULT_STORAGE_DRIVER=local -e FILEX_DEFAULT_STORAGE_PATH=/srv/files \
  -v filex-data:/data -v "$PWD:/srv/files" \
  ghcr.io/brf-tech/filex:latest

Open http://localhost:5212/admin - the first run prints admin credentials and embed instructions to the console. That URL is the operator’s; the people you give accounts to get http://localhost:5212/drive, the same file manager without the panel around it. For Word, Excel and PowerPoint, install the office editor app from Admin → Plugins → Apps: it edits them in the browser and needs no other container.

For a real deployment there are Compose stacks and a Helm chart: Self-host with Compose or Helm. The image is on GitHub Packages.

Why filex

Most self-hosted file managers are either too small (a directory listing with uploads) or too big (a groupware suite you deploy for the file tab). filex aims at the gap. The tour below has eight parts, each with its screenshots folded under it. Every feature in full, with its limits and the guide that documents it, is in docs/FEATURES.md.

The explorer

A file manager people already know how to use.

• A navigation panel with Home · My files · Shared with me · My shares · Recent · Starred · Drafts · Trash; list, grid and gallery views; tabs, tags and a ⌘K palette.
• Presence avatars and file changes arrive live, over WebSocket.
• Compose a theme in your own colours and make it the default: the sign-in page and every public link use it too, and a phone installs the web app under your instance’s name and logo.
• English and Turkish are built in, other languages install as packs, and the interface turns right to left for the languages that read that way.

Every explorer feature in full: docs/FEATURES.md → The explorer.

Storage and protocols

Every storage in one tree, and that tree reachable from anything.

• Mount local disks, S3, FTP, SFTP, WebDAV and SMB/NAS shares side by side, and copy or cut in one and paste in another.
• Reach the same tree as S3, SFTP, FTPS, NFSv3 and WebDAV: point rclone, restic, aws s3, WinSCP or FileZilla at it. The same filex permissions (per person, group and folder), trash and quota apply as in the web UI; the POSIX bits and ACLs on the disk are not mapped to filex users.
• filex mount attaches a remote server over ordinary HTTPS: a folder on Linux, a drive letter on Windows (macOS is not supported).
• For a storage filex does not ship, install a plugin from the admin panel or from an app store’s link.

Every storage and protocol feature in full: docs/FEATURES.md → Storage and protocols.

Sharing and protection

Share with a link you can limit and revoke. Take back a wrong delete or a wrong overwrite.

• Public links with a PIN, an expiry and a download limit, and file requests for what should come in. My shares lists every link you created, to copy or to revoke.
• Share a folder with a person or a group and it appears under their Shared with me, or give them a whole storage from its Access section, on every protocol at once. The storage needs Per-item access control (RBAC) switched on, which it is not by default.
• Deletes are reversible within a retention window and writes keep snapshots, both inside the storage you already mounted.
• End-to-end encrypted folders: encrypted in the browser, and the server never receives a key. An app you allow edits such a file in your browser, which decrypts it for the app and encrypts what it saves. Optional ClamAV scanning of every file written.

Every sharing and protection feature in full: docs/FEATURES.md → Sharing and protection.

People and access

The accounts people already have, and one role each.

• Sign in with a local password, OIDC, LDAP / Active Directory, an authenticating proxy, or the Windows or Linux account of the machine filex runs on.
• Everyone has one role - Administrator, User, Viewer or one of your own - built from named permissions. Groups carry folder access - up to a whole storage - and a role, can follow your directory’s groups, and per-person exceptions beat the role.
• Guessing a password is slow: wrong passwords are counted per account and per address, on the web form, WebDAV, FTPS and SFTP alike.
• Multi-tenant by design, behind one switch: each tenant has its own sign-in providers, its own domain and certificate, and runs itself. Switched off, no screen shows a tenant.

Every feature for people and access in full: docs/FEATURES.md → People and access.

Desktop app & CLI

Folders on your computer stay in step with the server, live.

• A Windows, Linux and macOS (Apple Silicon) app: the same explorer in a window, with several accounts or tenants side by side.
• Right-click a folder → Keep on this computer and it stays in step with the server in both directions, in about a second. Everything else stays online-only in the window.
• It signs in through your browser, so SSO and MFA behave as they do on the web, and it opens Office documents from your own disk in the editor your server runs - and any kind of file an app on one of your servers opens.
• Headless machines get the same engine: filex sync and filex client.

Install it from the Microsoft Store (Windows 10/11) or the Snap Store (Ubuntu and other Linux with snapd):

   

or with a package manager:

brew install brf-tech/filex/filex-app       # macOS 13+ (Apple Silicon), Homebrew tap BRF-Tech/homebrew-filex
sudo snap install filex-app                 # the same snap as the badge above

Embed in your app

A real file manager inside your own product.

The same UI ships as a Vue 3 component, a React component and a framework-agnostic `` web component, backed by your own filex server. A confined token locks it to a per-tenant folder, and the backend enforces that, not the widget. The web component takes two lines:

Apps

New things to do with files, with exactly the permissions you approved.

An app is a WebAssembly module that runs inside filex in a sandbox, an interface of its own in a sandboxed frame, or both. You install it from a store link or its GitHub address, read every permission it asks for, and nothing updates itself. The people of your filex can browse a trusted store on its App store screen and ask you for an app or a storage plugin. Five ship as public repositories:

An app you allow can edit a file together with other people - filex’s relay puts their changes in one order without reading them, and someone who may only read watches live - and can open a file of an encrypted folder, which your browser decrypts for it and encrypts again before it is saved.

A language pack is an app too: Spanish, German and French ship as examples.

Install one in a few minutes: docs/APP-PLUGINS.md → Install one. Every app feature in full: docs/FEATURES.md → Apps.

AI agents / MCP

An agent works in the folder you gave it, and nowhere else.

• A native MCP server at /api/ai/mcp, and a REST surface at /api/ai described in an OpenAPI 3.1 file.
• An API key carries permissions by verb and can be confined to a single folder, and nothing it hands out can be wider than the key itself.
• A large file goes through an upload ticket: a short-lived, single-use URL, so its bytes never travel through the model’s context.
• An AI assistant in the explorer, off until an administrator sets it up: Anthropic, OpenAI or any OpenAI-compatible server, or a local Ollama so nothing leaves your network. It works through the same MCP tools as the person who asks; a change carries Undo, a public link or an access change waits on an approval card, encrypted folders never reach a model and every file content it sends is in the audit log (docs/AI-ASSISTANT.md).

claude mcp add filex --transport http https://files.example.com/api/ai/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer "

What an agent can do, what a key can never hand out, encrypted folders and upload tickets: docs/FEATURES.md → AI agents and MCP; the reference is docs/MCP.md, and the assistant’s is docs/AI-ASSISTANT.md.

Coming from Nextcloud, Dropbox or Google Drive

filex is a file manager, not a groupware suite. What that means next to four things you may be coming from (File Browser among them):

What filex does not have, whichever of these you come from:

• An Android or iOS app. On a phone filex is the web app, which offers itself to be installed like one (On a phone or a tablet) but needs a connection to show files; with it closed, notifications arrive as Web Push once you turn them on for the device.
• Placeholder files in Finder or Explorer. The desktop app copies the folders you keep on the computer, and everything else stays online in its own window (docs/DESKTOP.md).
• An office editor built into the binary. Office documents are edited - alone or together - by the office editor app you install (filex-office-editor, ONLYOFFICE’s editor in the browser, no Document Server), or in an ONLYOFFICE Document Server you connect; with neither they open in a read-only preview (docs/ONLYOFFICE.md).

Self-host with Compose or Helm

The docker run above is enough to try filex out. For a real deployment, ready-made stacks live in deploy/:

• deploy/compose/ - Docker Compose:
  • minimal - filex + SQLite + local disk (one service, zero dependencies).
  • full - filex + PostgreSQL + Redis + Caddy (auto-HTTPS), plus toggleable add-ons: Drawio, an S3 server (Versity S3 Gateway) and an optional ONLYOFFICE Document Server, pinned to the version filex is tested against. Turn each on/off with a Compose profile in .env. Office documents need none of them (the office editor app edits them in the browser, and its engine draws their thumbnails and converts them on the server), and conversion is the Convert app, not a side-car.
• deploy/helm/filex/ - a Helm chart for Kubernetes (Deployment + PVC + optional Ingress), published with every release: helm repo add brf-tech https://helm.brf.sh, then helm install filex brf-tech/filex (or oci://ghcr.io/brf-tech/charts/filex). Every add-on above is an enabled toggle in values.yaml - bundle PostgreSQL / Redis / an S3 server, or wire an external ONLYOFFICE Document Server / Drawio.

Step-by-step instructions for each tier are in docs/INSTALLATION.md. To try what the next release brings, there is a nightly build of every change that passed the nightly tests - ghcr.io/brf-tech/filex:nightly, the desktop app on filex.sh/nightly and the Snap Store’s edge channel - not supported, and not for the data you keep (docs/INSTALLATION.md → Nightly builds).

filex runs at the root of a host of its own or under a path of one it shares (https://example.com/filex/): one setting, FILEX_BASE_PATH, and a proxy that passes the full path - Caddy, nginx and Helm examples in docs/DEPLOYMENT.md → Serving filex under a sub-path.

Documentation

The guides are published as a site at docs.filex.sh, and the full documentation index lists every page.

Start with Installation, Configuration, the desktop app, protocols, apps and ONLYOFFICE. Features gives every feature an entry with its limits and its guide.

Features

Every feature as its own entry - how it behaves, its limits and the page that documents it: docs/FEATURES.md.

Architecture

See docs/ARCHITECTURE.md.

How filex is built

filex has one maintainer, who builds it with AI coding agents (Claude Code). The maintainer decides what filex is and how it works: the architecture, the data and security models, and how each feature behaves. The agents write most of the code inside that direction, in languages the maintainer works in. About 82% of the commits in the development repository carry a Co-Authored-By: Claude line, so this is not hidden.

It is AI-assisted, not unreviewed generated code:

• Every change goes through the test chain before it lands: Go tests (also under the race detector), about 500 Vitest files, about 120 Playwright specs on Chromium, Firefox and WebKit, Cypress, and database tests on SQLite, PostgreSQL and MySQL. Every release is tagged only after GitHub’s full matrix and a dry run of the release workflow pass on the exact commit.
• Changes to sign-in, permissions, sharing and encryption get extra review passes, and a red test is fixed, not loosened.
• Security reports are handled in the open: see SECURITY.md and the published advisories. There has been no independent audit yet.
• The German, Spanish, French and Chinese READMEs and the German, Spanish and French language packs are machine translations that no native speaker has reviewed yet.

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome; before a sizeable pull request, open an issue that says what you are about to do. docs/CONTRIBUTING.md has the workflow, the tests a change has to pass and the documentation rules, and the project follows the Contributor Covenant. A security problem is reported privately, as SECURITY.md describes. What changed in each release is in CHANGELOG.md. A release is cut every day at 10:00 Istanbul time from what main holds then, when it holds something new; a pull request merged after the cut ships with the next day’s (Release process).

License

MIT - see LICENSE.

The store badges in docs/badges/ are the stores’ own artwork, used unmodified and not covered by that licence: Microsoft and the Microsoft Store badge are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies; the Snap Store badge is © Canonical Ltd., licensed CC BY-ND 2.0 UK.

Nextcloud, Dropbox, Google Drive, File Browser and ONLYOFFICE are the names of other parties’ products, used here only to describe them. filex is not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by any of them.