Guides / Google Drive account → another Google Drive account

How to Transfer Files Between Two Google Drive Accounts

The fastest way to move files between two Google Drive accounts is a direct cloud-to-cloud transfer: files stream straight from one account to the other, without downloading everything to your computer and re-uploading it. Cloud Combo does this for free, for files and whole folder trees, with live progress.

Maybe you are graduating and losing a school Google account, leaving a job, or consolidating a personal and a family account — moving files between two Google Drive accounts is one of the most common cloud migrations there is. Cloud Combo supports connecting multiple accounts from the same provider, so both of your Google Drive accounts can sit side by side in one dashboard.

Step-by-step

  1. 1

    Create a free Cloud Combo account

    Sign up at cloudcombo.app — it takes under a minute and no credit card is required.

  2. 2

    Connect your first Google Drive account

    From the dashboard, click "Add Drive" and connect your first Google Drive account. You'll sign in with the provider directly via OAuth — Cloud Combo never sees your password.

  3. 3

    Connect your second Google Drive account

    Add your second Google Drive account as well. Both drives now appear side by side in your dashboard.

  4. 4

    Select the files or folders to move

    Open New Transfer, browse the source drive, and select any files or entire folders — nested folders transfer completely, keeping their structure. Shared drives and folders shared with you appear alongside My Drive, so you can move material you do not own but can read.

  5. 5

    Pick a destination folder and confirm

    Choose where the files should land, review the total size, and start the transfer. It runs in the cloud — you can close the tab and watch live progress on the Transfer List page. Files land as ordinary Drive files and count against the 15 GB your account shares with Gmail and Google Photos, so check the free space there rather than in Drive alone.

What happens to your files on this route

  • Google Docs, Sheets and Slides are not ordinary files — they exist only inside Google. They are exported on the way out to .docx, .xlsx and .pptx so they open normally at the destination, which means the file you receive has a different extension from the one you see in Drive.
  • Uploads over 32 MB are sent in resumable chunks sized to Google's 256 KiB unit, so a dropped connection resumes from the last confirmed chunk rather than restarting the file.
  • Because both accounts are on Google Drive, nothing is converted and no filename has to be altered — what leaves the first account is byte-for-byte what lands in the second. Google returns the stored size and its own checksum for every uploaded file, and Cloud Combo compares both before counting the file as delivered.
  • The two accounts stay completely separate in Cloud Combo, labelled by their account email, so there is no risk of writing back into the account you are moving away from.

Good to know for this transfer

  • You can connect as many Google Drive accounts as you need — Cloud Combo keeps them clearly separated by account email.
  • Native Google files (Docs, Sheets, Slides) are automatically converted to .docx, .xlsx and .pptx during the transfer, so they stay usable in the destination cloud.
  • The transfer runs on our servers, not in your browser, so it keeps going once you close the tab — and it does not consume your own bandwidth, which matters when your first Google Drive account holds more than your connection could move in a day. Files that fail are retried on their own and reported one by one; a single unreadable file never stops the rest.
  • Nothing is counted as delivered on trust. the second has to confirm what it stored matches what left your first Google Drive account, and anything that does not match is sent again — which is also how a re-run repairs a damaged earlier copy instead of skipping it.
  • Your files are never stored by Cloud Combo: they stream directly between your old Google Drive account and the new one over encrypted connections, authorized via OAuth 2.0.

Common questions

Can I connect two Google Drive accounts at the same time?

Yes. Cloud Combo keeps multiple accounts from the same provider side by side, labelled by account email, which is what makes a direct account-to-account transfer possible without downloading anything.

Will my files be removed from the old Google Drive account?

No — the transfer copies. The old account keeps everything, so you can confirm the new account is complete before you close the old one or clear it out.

What if I am about to lose access to the old account?

Start the transfer while you can still sign in. It runs server-side and continues after you close the browser, but it does need the connection to stay authorised for the duration — so do not revoke access or let the account be deleted while it is running.

Do duplicate files get overwritten?

No. Uploads over 32 MB are sent in resumable chunks sized to Google's 256 KiB unit, so a dropped connection resumes from the last confirmed chunk rather than restarting the file. Re-running a transfer is therefore safe.

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