Self-Hosted Cloud Storage: Nextcloud vs Seafile vs Syncthing

Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive hold terabytes of personal and business data on servers you do not control. Self-hosted cloud storage eliminates that dependency, giving you unlimited storage capacity (limited only by your hardware), complete privacy, and no per-user licensing fees. Three solutions lead the self-hosted storage space: Nextcloud (the full productivity suite), Seafile (the performance-focused sync engine), and Syncthing (the decentralized peer-to-peer approach).

Each solves the cloud storage problem differently. Understanding those differences is essential to choosing the right one for your needs.

Architecture Comparison

Docker Deployment: Nextcloud

Nextcloud is the most feature-rich option, providing a Google Workspace-like experience entirely self-hosted:

# docker-compose.yml for Nextcloud
version: "3.8"
services:
  nextcloud:
    image: nextcloud:latest
    container_name: nextcloud
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - POSTGRES_HOST=nextcloud-db
      - POSTGRES_DB=nextcloud
      - POSTGRES_USER=nextcloud
      - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=${DB_PASSWORD}
      - REDIS_HOST=nextcloud-redis
      - NEXTCLOUD_ADMIN_USER=${ADMIN_USER}
      - NEXTCLOUD_ADMIN_PASSWORD=${ADMIN_PASSWORD}
      - NEXTCLOUD_TRUSTED_DOMAINS=cloud.example.com
      - OVERWRITEPROTOCOL=https
      - OVERWRITEHOST=cloud.example.com
    volumes:
      - nextcloud_app:/var/www/html
      - nextcloud_data:/var/www/html/data
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    depends_on:
      - nextcloud-db
      - nextcloud-redis

  nextcloud-db:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    container_name: nextcloud-db
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - POSTGRES_DB=nextcloud
      - POSTGRES_USER=nextcloud
      - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=${DB_PASSWORD}
    volumes:
      - nextcloud_db:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  nextcloud-redis:
    image: redis:7-alpine
    container_name: nextcloud-redis
    restart: unless-stopped
    command: redis-server --requirepass ${REDIS_PASSWORD}
    volumes:
      - nextcloud_redis:/data

  # Cron job for background tasks
  nextcloud-cron:
    image: nextcloud:latest
    container_name: nextcloud-cron
    restart: unless-stopped
    entrypoint: /cron.sh
    volumes:
      - nextcloud_app:/var/www/html
      - nextcloud_data:/var/www/html/data
    depends_on:
      - nextcloud

volumes:
  nextcloud_app:
  nextcloud_data:
  nextcloud_db:
  nextcloud_redis:

Nextcloud Performance Tuning

# config/config.php additions (mount to /var/www/html/config/)
'memcache.local' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\APCu',
'memcache.distributed' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis',
'memcache.locking' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis',
'redis' => [
    'host' => 'nextcloud-redis',
    'port' => 6379,
    'password' => 'your_redis_password',
],
'default_phone_region' => 'US',
'maintenance_window_start' => 3,  # 3 AM UTC

# PHP-FPM tuning (use fpm variant image)
# nextcloud:fpm-alpine for better performance
# Then use Nginx as the web server in front

Docker Deployment: Seafile

# docker-compose.yml for Seafile
version: "3.8"
services:
  seafile:
    image: seafileltd/seafile-mc:latest
    container_name: seafile
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - DB_HOST=seafile-db
      - DB_ROOT_PASSWD=${DB_ROOT_PASSWORD}
      - SEAFILE_ADMIN_EMAIL=${ADMIN_EMAIL}
      - SEAFILE_ADMIN_PASSWORD=${ADMIN_PASSWORD}
      - SEAFILE_SERVER_HOSTNAME=files.example.com
      - SEAFILE_SERVER_LETSENCRYPT=false
      - TIME_ZONE=America/New_York
    volumes:
      - seafile_data:/shared
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      # - "443:443"  # If using built-in Let's Encrypt
    depends_on:
      - seafile-db
      - seafile-memcached

  seafile-db:
    image: mariadb:10.11
    container_name: seafile-db
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=${DB_ROOT_PASSWORD}
      - MYSQL_LOG_CONSOLE=true
    volumes:
      - seafile_db:/var/lib/mysql

  seafile-memcached:
    image: memcached:1.6
    container_name: seafile-memcached
    restart: unless-stopped
    entrypoint: memcached -m 256

volumes:
  seafile_data:
  seafile_db:

Docker Deployment: Syncthing

# docker-compose.yml for Syncthing
version: "3.8"
services:
  syncthing:
    image: syncthing/syncthing:latest
    container_name: syncthing
    restart: unless-stopped
    hostname: my-syncthing
    environment:
      - PUID=1000
      - PGID=1000
    volumes:
      - syncthing_config:/var/syncthing/config
      - /mnt/data/syncthing:/var/syncthing/data
    ports:
      - "8384:8384"    # Web UI
      - "22000:22000/tcp"  # Sync protocol (TCP)
      - "22000:22000/udp"  # Sync protocol (QUIC)
      - "21027:21027/udp"  # Discovery

volumes:
  syncthing_config:

Syncthing requires no server at all; each device runs its own instance and syncs directly. The Docker deployment is useful for creating an always-on node that other devices can sync against, effectively functioning like a server without the client-server architecture.

Performance Comparison

Real-world sync performance with 10,000 files (mixed sizes, 5 GB total):

Seafile's performance advantage comes from its block-level deduplication engine written in C. Instead of syncing entire files, it splits files into blocks and only transfers changed blocks. This makes it especially efficient for large files with small changes (like office documents or database files).

Collaboration Features

Nextcloud

Nextcloud offers the most extensive collaboration suite:

• Nextcloud Office: Built-in document editing (based on Collabora or OnlyOffice)
• Nextcloud Talk: Video conferencing and chat
• Calendar and Contacts: CalDAV/CardDAV compatible
• Deck: Kanban-style project management
• Notes, Tasks, Forms: Additional productivity apps
• App ecosystem: Hundreds of community apps

# Add Collabora for document editing
  collabora:
    image: collabora/code:latest
    container_name: collabora
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - domain=cloud\\.example\\.com
      - username=admin
      - password=${COLLABORA_PASSWORD}
      - extra_params=--o:ssl.enable=false
    ports:
      - "9980:9980"
    cap_add:
      - MKNOD

Seafile

Seafile provides lighter collaboration features:

• Online file preview and editing (with SeaDoc or OnlyOffice integration)
• File comments and history
• Wiki functionality within libraries
• File locking for concurrent access control

Syncthing

Syncthing has no collaboration features. It is purely a synchronization tool. For collaboration, pair it with other tools.

External Storage and Backends

Nextcloud supports mounting external storage sources:

# Nextcloud external storage options:
# - Local filesystem
# - SFTP/FTP
# - SMB/CIFS (Windows shares)
# - WebDAV
# - Amazon S3 / S3-compatible (MinIO, etc.)
# - OpenStack Swift

# Example: Mount S3 bucket via Nextcloud admin panel
# External Storage > Add Storage > Amazon S3
# Bucket: my-bucket
# Region: us-east-1
# Access Key / Secret Key

Seafile supports S3-compatible backends for its storage layer:

# Seafile with S3 backend (seafile.conf)
[commit_object_backend]
name = s3
bucket = seafile-commits
key_id = your-key-id
key = your-secret-key
host = s3.amazonaws.com

[fs_object_backend]
name = s3
bucket = seafile-fs
key_id = your-key-id
key = your-secret-key

[block_backend]
name = s3
bucket = seafile-blocks
key_id = your-key-id
key = your-secret-key

Mobile App Comparison

Which One Should You Choose?

• Choose Nextcloud if you want a full Google Workspace replacement with file sync, document editing, calendar, contacts, video calls, and dozens of apps. Accept the higher resource usage and occasional performance quirks.
• Choose Seafile if file sync performance is your top priority and you do not need the full productivity suite. Ideal for teams with large file collections or development environments where sync speed matters.
• Choose Syncthing if you want simple, reliable file synchronization between devices without any server infrastructure. Perfect for personal use, backup strategies, and scenarios where you want no single point of failure.

Many self-hosters run Syncthing alongside Nextcloud: Syncthing for fast, reliable device-to-device sync, and Nextcloud for the web interface, sharing, and collaboration features. All three can be managed alongside your other Docker services through container management platforms like usulnet.