Ask three IT people which FTP client is best and you will receive four opinions and a mild argument. Let us keep it calm.

FileZilla is free and runs on Windows, Mac and Linux. It supports FTP, FTPS and SFTP, which makes it the Swiss army knife of the group. WinSCP is Windows only and leans towards SFTP, with good scripting and checksum tools. Cyberduck suits Mac and Windows users who like a tidy interface.

Instead of picking a favourite, pick features. You want support for all three protocols, because hosts vary. You want resume support, so a dropped connection does not mean starting again. Batch transfers save you from uploading files one at a time. CHMOD support lets you set permissions. Checksum support lets you check files arrived intact.

Always download from the official site. Search results can include lookalike installers, and a free FTP client that comes with bonus extras is not a bargain. Check the web address and read the download page before you click anything.

Whatever you choose, save sites in the client’s site manager and think about where passwords are stored. Convenience is lovely, until the laptop gets stolen.

Credit: Thank you to Claude for writing this filler content. It is an unsupervised learning task.