--- title: "Difference between FTP and SFTP" description: "What is the difference between FTP and SFTP: understanding these two meanings. What is FTP and how does FTP work. What is SFTP and how does SFTP work." author: "Mark Chirillo" published: 2019-08-21 updated: 2019-09-07 canonical: https://www.mindstick.com/articles/167688/difference-between-ftp-and-sftp category: "internet" tags: ["mac os x"] reading_time: 1 minute --- # Difference between FTP and SFTP FTP or SFTP or maybe FTPS, HTTPS … As you see, there are so many [options](https://www.mindstick.com/articles/12789/best-options-for-a-home-based-business) for a [file transfer](https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/109023/how-to-troubleshoot-a-slow-file-transfer) that it can be sometimes very difficult to answer the [question](https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/45034/what-is-a-parliamentary-question) “What is the best way to [secure your](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/157441/what-are-some-ways-to-secure-your-asp-dot-net-core-mvc-application) data when transferring?” This [article](https://yourviews.mindstick.com/view/84667/how-congress-government-misused-the-article-356) is meant to help you to hunt down a question of the [differences](https://yourviews.mindstick.com/view/85280/comparative-differences-dell-vs-hp-which-one-is-better) between FTP and SFTP, and which one is the best [choice](https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/38706/name-the-bollywood-actress-who-became-the-first-india-to-bag-an-award-at-the-american-awards-show-people-s-choice-award) for protecting the transfer of your files. Despite sounding quite similar, there is a significant [difference](https://yourviews.mindstick.com/view/84555/google-analytics-4-ga4-vs-universal-analytics-actual-difference) between FTP vs SFTP. However, both these protocols are widely used for [data exchange](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/160367/why-json-is-commonly-used-in-data-exchange-between-different-systems-and-languages). ![Difference between FTP and SFTP](https://www.mindstick.com/mindstickarticle/5ee783fb-b55d-4f82-8ae9-90ce2e0c6bcf/images/cba3d62a-7736-493d-9b06-9ffd1969e21d.jpeg)\ --- Original Source: https://www.mindstick.com/articles/167688/difference-between-ftp-and-sftp Copyright © MindStick Software Pvt. Ltd. This Markdown version is provided for developers, AI systems, and offline reading.