Commander One Pro Review: A Finder Alternative for Power Users
ATTENTION: There’s a special surprise at the bottom of this post. Don’t miss out!
Despite incremental improvements to Finder over the years, it has remained largely the same and often leaves power users wanting more out of their file manager. That’s where Commander One, a Mac application written entirely with Apple’s Swift programming language, comes in. Commander One is a Finder alternative for your Mac that’s designed to let you take control of your files and folders with ease using its powerful features.
Command & Control
Commander One’s main window is split into dual panes that can be used to view and work with files and folders in multiple locations at once. It comes in two versions: a free version, which works with local and network drives for search, preview, and other file operations, including the nifty ability to rename files while performing a copy and move. And then there’s the paid Pro upgrade (for $19.99) which adds several unique power user features like archive compression and extraction, a built-in FTP manager, a process viewer, and direct access to Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon S3, as well as iOS devices.
In terms of the Dropbox integration, I really liked it. It’s fast and works well. The best thing about it though, in my opinion, is the fact that you can right click on any files/folders and generate a Dropbox share link directly from within Commander One Pro (even if you don’t have the Dropbox app installed on your computer).
Commander One Pro also includes an assortment of color themes which is a nice perk, but I didn’t care for most of them — the standard design looked best to me.
One of the more compelling features of Commander One are global function key shortcuts for routine file tasks such as View, Edit, Copy, Move, and Delete (others can be customized in the preferences). These are displayed across the bottom of the window at all times, which is great because having to commit them to memory would be a pain. There are also three different views available for each pane: list, column, or thumbnail grid. I’m a fan of list as you can see. It’s also worth noting you can add multiple tabs to each pane so you aren’t limited to only two folders being open at once.
One area where I’d like to see improvements with Commander One is UI. At first this app may be a bit overwhelming to some people with the various buttons, features, and options. Finding a way to simplify the UI a bit while keeping the power of the app would be a welcome addition. That being said, once you get the hang of it and have it configured to your liking, Commander One is a solid Finder alternative and the additions in the Pro version are well worth the money.
SURPRISE BONUS GIFT
Eltima, the company behind Commander One has offered to giveaway FIVE (5) licenses to Commander One Pro to BestTechie readers! Entering to win is easy: just leave a comment with your email. The first five people to leave a comment below with their email will get the licenses.