The FileZilla Replacement You Already Have

Guide to mounting remote folders with SSHFS over SFTP, streaming media like local files, using Dolphin safely, avoiding root, and handling transfers with SCP and SSH keys.

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By. Jacob

Jacob Kristensen (Turbulentarius) is a Web Developer based in Denmark. He is currently pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Web Development at Zealand, focusing on learning React and refining his existing skills.

Edited: 2026-02-13 13:55

Mounting a remote directory on another computer or a cloud server over SSHFS (SSH Filesystem) is my preferred way of handling remote files. Our local system accesses the remote file system over the SSH File Transfer Protocol (SFTP).

I not only use it when uploading backups or new pictures to my image archive, but also for everyday tasks. For example, I can stream music or video files stored remotely without downloading them first, and it behaves almost like working with local files.

Most operating systems already include built-in SFTP support in their file managers, which makes them an excellent choice for straightforward SFTP access. In many cases, this is far more practical than manually issuing commands in a terminal. For typical upload, download, and file management tasks, a graphical file manager is both faster and safer. Mounting a remote folder, from your non-root user, should automatically make it accessible from Dolphin:

sshfs -o IdentitiesOnly=yes -o IdentityFile=~/.ssh/id_ed25519_remoteuser username@example.com:/home/username /mnt/remoteuser

Att. Remember that the mount point on your local system, /mnt/remoteuser, needs to be owned by your local non-root user. This will be the local directory linked with your remotely mounted directory.

Att. username is a placeholder for your own user name on the remote system. You can mount any folder that's accessible by username on the remote, but please avoid using the root user, as it poses a significant security risk, and you could just as easily ruin something on the server yourself with root access!

Att. Create a non-root user that you use to mount a directory in the /home/username folder, or alternatively, give your non-root user access to the folder you want to mount by adding it to the relevant group. E.g. www-data.

SFTP vs SSHFS

That said, there is an important distinction between SFTP and SSHFS. With SFTP, multimedia applications such as VLC may struggle to properly stream media files, especially when seeking through large video files. With SSHFS, however, the remote directory is mounted as if it were part of your local filesystem. This means media players can usually handle streaming and seeking without issues. While browsing a remote filesystem over SSHFS can feel slightly slower than working locally, performance is often more than sufficient for everyday use — and in my experience, even seeking within streamed video files is surprisingly responsive, and in fact it might be quicker than streaming a file hosted in Nextcloud.

Beautifully, simply typing the SFTP address in the address-bar of your File Manager will seamlessly connect to a remote host. E.g.:

sftp://your-host-name

If you use a SSH key file to connect, then you will probably first need to configure it in ~/.ssh/config/. E.g:

Host github.com
  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/GithubMain
  AddKeysToAgent yes

Host your-host-name
    HostName xx.xx.242.41
    User username
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_ed25519_username
    IdentitiesOnly yes

Note I included a configuration for GitHub just to show how to add configurations for multiple hosts. For your-host-name, just replace the placeholders. E.g. Host and HostName IP, xx.xx.242.41 relevant bits with your own. You can easily add more hosts later if needed.

Host. Defines a shortcut name you can use with ssh, scp, and sftp instead of typing the full destination each time.
HostName. The real server address, IP or domain, that the shortcut should connect to.
User. The default remote username to log in as when using this host entry.
IdentityFile. The private SSH key file to use for authentication for this host.
IdentitiesOnly yes. Forces SSH to use only the key(s) specified in the config for this host, ignoring other agent or default keys.

Why use Dolphin for SFTP and SSHFS

I have already documented FileZilla's catastrophic flaw with drag and drop, which makes it dangerously easy to accidentally move files and directories on a server. The exact scenario that enables this simply does not exist in a proper file manager like Dolphin. While I have not tested every alternative file manager extensively, confirmation dialogs are generally considered standard safety features — and in Dolphin they are implemented in a way that actually reduces risk.

When moving a file or folder in Dolphin, a context dialog appears asking whether you want to copy, move, or create a link at the destination. This explicit choice significantly reduces the likelihood of accidentally relocating important files.

The fact that KDE's Dolphin File Manager is less sensitive to unintended drag-and-drop actions makes it a strong replacement for FileZilla in many workflows. Combined with its built-in confirmation dialog and seamless SFTP and SSHFS integration, it provides a safer and more consistent way to manage remote files.

Terminal transfers

I would previously have used SCP for this task E.g.

To upload a file to the server:

scp /some/local/file.txt user@example.com:/home/username/file.txt

To download a file from the server:

scp user@example.com:/home/username/file.txt /some/local/file.txt

And, if you connect with a SSH key file, and haven't configured the host in ~/.ssh/config, you can also use your keyfile inline when doing transfers:

scp -i ~/.ssh/mykeyfile.pem /some/local/file.txt user@example.com:/home/username/file.txt

SFTP vs SSHFS

Why use Dolphin for SFTP and SSHFS

Terminal transfers

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