elFinder: Open-source Free Feature-Rich Web File Manager

Hazem Abbas

Jul 10, 2023 — 4 min read

elFinder is an incredibly useful open-source file manager that can greatly simplify your web browsing experience. By allowing you to navigate through your files with ease, elFinder eliminates the need to constantly switch back and forth between different windows and tabs. With its intuitive interface and powerful features, elFinder is the perfect tool for anyone who wants to streamline their web browsing workflow.

One of the things that makes elFinder so unique is the fact that it is written entirely in JavaScript using jQuery UI. This means that it is lightweight, fast, and easy to use, with no need to download any additional software or plugins. And because it is open-source, you can customize it to suit your specific needs and preferences.

But what inspired the creation of elFinder in the first place? Well, it was actually the simplicity and convenience of the Finder program used in the macOS operating system. By taking the best elements of this popular program and adapting them for the web, the developers of elFinder have created a tool that is both familiar and innovative.

So if you're tired of struggling with clunky and outdated file managers, give elFinder a try! With its sleek design and powerful functionality, it's sure to become your go-to file management tool in no time.

Features

Usability like the MacOS Finder or Windows Explorer
Mobile friendly view for touch devices
All operations with files and folders on a remote server (copy, move, upload, create folder/file, rename, etc.)
High performance server backend and light client UI
Multi-root support
Local file system, MySQL, FTP, SFTP, Box, Dropbox, GoogleDrive and OneDrive volume storage drivers
Support AWS S3, Azure, Digital Ocean Spaces and more with League\Flysystem Flysystem driver
Cloud storage (Box, Dropbox, GoogleDrive and OneDrive) drivers
Background file/folder upload with Drag & Drop HTML5 support
Chunked file upload for large file
Upload directly to the folder
Upload form URL (or list)
List and Icons view
Keyboard shortcuts
Standard methods of file/group selection using mouse or keyboard
Move/Copy files with Drag & Drop
Drag & Drop to outside by starting drag with alt/option key press
Archives create/extract (zip, rar, 7z, tar, gzip, bzip2)
Rich context menu and toolbar
Quicklook, preview for common file types
Edit text files and images
"Places" for your favorites
Calculate directory sizes
Thumbnails for image, movie files
Easy to integrate with web editors (elRTE, CKEditor, TinyMCE)
Flexible configuration of access rights, upload file types, user interface and other
Extensibility by event handling of backend and client side
Simple client-server API based on JSON
Supports custom information in info dialog
Configuable columns of list view
Supports custom CSS class function for the custom folder icon

Connector Plugins

AutoRotate : Auto rotation on file upload of JPEG file by EXIF Orientation.
AutoResize : Auto resize on file upload.
Normalizer : UTF-8 Normalizer of file-name and file-path etc.
Sanitizer : Sanitizer of file-name and file-path etc.
Watermark : Print watermark on file upload.

Tech and Requirements

jQuery / jQuery UI

jQuery 1.8.0+
jQuery UI 1.9.0+
Required: draggable, droppable, resizable, selectable, button and slider
Recommend: sorter (To make sortable the List column and the Places)

However, we recommend newest version.

Client

Modern browsers both of desktop or mobile. elFinder was tested in newest Chrome, Edge, Firefox, IE and Opera
Caution: Web App mode ("apple-mobile-web-app-capable" meta tag) on iOS is not work perfectly in elFinder

Server

Any web server
PHP 5.2+ (Recommend PHP 5.4 or higher) And for thumbnails - GD / Imagick module / convert(imagemagick) require
Recommend PHP 7.1 or higher to supports non-ASCII character of file path/name on the Windows server