Google offers more details on the switch to Drive for desktop for Mac users

Google drive on Mac
Google drive on Mac (Image credit: iMore)

What you need to know

  • Google has offered more details on the switch to Drive for desktop for Mac users.
  • People will need to switch from Backup and Sync before year's end.

Google has today offered more details on what the switch from Backup and Sync to Drive for desktop means for Mac users. In short, they have until September to make the switch before they start to be nagged and after files will soon stop syncing altogether.

The move to Drive for desktop will bring with it a unified, easier to use sync client, Google says. That also includes the ability to sync external storage like flash drives and external hard drives to Google Drive, while users can also mirror files on their desktop, too.

The switch to Drive for desktop will apparently happen over the coming weeks, with September 2021 being the date when things will start to get ugly and files will stop syncing. I'd suggest making sure you've made the transition before then, obviously.

In the coming weeks, Backup and Sync users will begin to see prompts asking them to transition to Drive for desktop, which we recommend doing by September 2021. After this point, users will see an in-product notification notifying them they'll need to transition to continue syncing their files.

Google's Drive product is an alternative to iCloud Drive although it is perhaps best compared with Dropbox due to the different levels of integrations within macOS and apps — not least Finder. iCloud Drive is also a better option for those who already pay for storage via Apple One, too.

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.