Products · Product
Syncthing
Raised as a usability problem by 67 people on Hacker News over 13 years (2014–2026), in 51 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
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Every issue, all time, most people first
Sync conflicts are annoying to resolve and syncing stops for no reasonUnreviewed
20142026- Sync often breaks, stalls, or goes into proxy mode, needing manual fixes2024-04-22
- Sync stops silently and must be restarted manually; status stuck on starting up2024-01-21
- Syncing hundreds of small generated files gets stuck for hours, blocking urgent syncs2022-12-03
Setup is clunky compared to cloud sync tools that just require logging inUnreviewed
20142026- Too hard for normal users to figure out2026-05-19
- Understanding the setup is difficult for people used to managed cloud sync2022-06-22
- Hard for most users to set up, especially on Windows2022-01-07
Doesn't sync automatically in the background on iPhoneUnreviewed
20142026- Syncthing on iPhone doesn't sync automatically in the background, so the user stopped using it2024-08-14
- Must manually sync all the time because iOS blocks background sync2023-07-06
- Getting Syncthing to work on iOS is the author's biggest headache2022-07-27
Connection and sync status updates lag, so users can't tell what is happeningUnreviewed
20142026- Sync or connection takes ages to start with no feedback on why2021-10-14
- Web interface gives little information about what sync is doing2021-05-14
- Connection and sync status updates lag, so users can't tell what's happening2019-05-16
Hard to find a file in synced folders from an iOS phoneUnreviewed
20142026- Found it extremely obtuse, and it silently never syncs files between devices2026-05-18
- App can't show whether a folder is fully copied to other devices, only local completeness2023-05-09
- Hard to find a file in synced folders from iOS phone2019-08-31
One-way backup sync propagates phone deletions to the computerUnreviewed
20142026- Couldn't set up one-way backup sync; deletions on phone propagate to computer2023-11-29
- Hard to set up one-way sync; the do-not-erase setting is hidden and can break things2022-04-09
- Hard to monitor backup sync status from the phone; easy to forget ignore-delete setup2021-05-14
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Too hard for normal users to figure out2026-05-19
- Found it extremely obtuse, and it silently never syncs files between devices2026-05-18
- Filenames with characters another OS rejects cause sync problems2026-02-22
- GUI runs as a background web server opened in a browser, not a proper app2026-01-07
- Stopping a machine from syncing a folder requires editing a hidden ignore file manually2025-11-05
- UI feels intimidating and requires learning its jargon and internals2025-06-27
- Android build silently stopped syncing symlinks, causing unexpected surprises2025-06-27
- Settings are confusing to work out without reading the manual2025-06-27
- Silent default notifications hide new folder shares, so user thinks sync is broken2024-09-29
- Syncthing on iPhone doesn't sync automatically in the background, so the user stopped using it2024-08-14
- Sync often breaks, stalls, or goes into proxy mode, needing manual fixes2024-04-22
- Setting up and adding devices is so inscrutable that the commenter gave up2024-04-21
- Interface is not beginner friendly and takes some playing around2024-01-22
- Sync stops silently and must be restarted manually; status stuck on starting up2024-01-21
- Setting up a share requires sending and typing a very long ID string2024-01-13
- Couldn't set up one-way backup sync; deletions on phone propagate to computer2023-11-29
- Must manually sync all the time because iOS blocks background sync2023-07-06
- Early mis-steps from not understanding how best to use it2023-05-10
- App can't show whether a folder is fully copied to other devices, only local completeness2023-05-09
- Setup is convoluted, made the commenter give up several times2023-02-04
- Syncing hundreds of small generated files gets stuck for hours, blocking urgent syncs2022-12-03
- Sync conflicts are annoying to resolve and syncing sometimes stops for no reason2022-11-09
- Ignore-deletes option is hidden and hard to verify; sync-out-of-sync button gives no preview and can't be dismissed2022-10-17
- Misunderstood how to add a new device and deleted an entire directory2022-09-18
- Getting Syncthing to work on iOS is the author's biggest headache2022-07-27
- Understanding the setup is difficult for people used to managed cloud sync2022-06-22
- Syncthing's iOS clients are so bad the commenter found syncing unworkable2022-05-15
- Easy to accidentally lose data; creates hundreds of sync conflict duplicates2022-05-02
- Dashboard is cluttered with extra details, confusing users who can't build a mental model2022-05-02
- Syncing a 2GB file over the local network is very slow, possibly due to missing configuration2022-04-17
- Hard to set up one-way sync; the do-not-erase setting is hidden and can break things2022-04-09
- Folder scans take unbearably long at terabyte scale, slower than Dropbox2022-01-08
- Hard for most users to set up, especially on Windows2022-01-07
- Setup is clunky compared to cloud sync tools that just require logging in2021-11-15
- Sync or connection takes ages to start with no feedback on why2021-10-14
- Not usable by non-technical people; setup and UI are hard for them2021-10-14
- Confusing folder paths versus IDs; users must read docs to understand the UI2021-10-14
- Phone power-saving features stop the app syncing, with no easy way to disable them2021-10-14
- Not intuitive for anything beyond the default setup2021-10-05
- Sometimes syncthing gets confused, forcing a manual database reset via REST call2021-07-25
- Users end up with duplicate files with different edits without noticing sync stopped2021-07-24
- Versioning is hard to use; wants a friendlier interface than Syncthing's2021-07-23
- Hard to set up, especially on mobile due to confusing OS filesystem restrictions2021-07-13
- Ignore-delete setting is easily missed, hidden from status, forcing manual checks on both devices2021-05-14
- Hard to monitor backup sync status from the phone; easy to forget ignore-delete setup2021-05-14
- Web interface gives little information about what sync is doing2021-05-14
- Sync was very slow because Windows marked the network public, forcing relay use2021-05-14
- Gets sync conflicts despite editing on one host; must manually force rescan for immediate sync2021-05-14
- Reaching the web UI on a cloud server required manual SSH port forwarding2021-03-16
- Syncthing doesn't sync in background; user must open app to trigger sync2021-01-18