NudgeHost vs WeTransfer in 2026, sending against hosting
Where the two differ on what a free account can do, how long a link lasts, and what each plan costs.
| Feature | NudgeHostFree plan | WeTransferFree plan |
|---|---|---|
| Publish before signing up | Yesup to 25MB | Noan account to send, since November 2024 |
| How long a link lasts | No end dateunless you set one | 3 daysat most, on Free and Starter |
| Opens in the browser | Yesat its own address | Not statedpreviews come before a download |
| API and MCP server | Yeson the free plan | Nonone documented |
The short answer
NudgeHost is the better place to keep a file at a link. You get a link before you make an account, a free account keeps it up for as long as you want, and a PDF or a CSV opens in the browser rather than as a download. On WeTransfer a sender needs an account first, and a free transfer is a download that expires.
Summary
| Theme | NudgeHost | WeTransfer | Ahead |
|---|---|---|---|
| What the free plan holds | 10 links live at once | 10 transfers in any 30-day rolling window | NudgeHost |
| Custom domain | A subdomain of your own domain, from Pro | A WeTransfer subdomain | NudgeHost |
| When you stop paying | Nothing is deleted | Active transfers are deleted after 28 days | NudgeHost |
| Recipients need an account | No | No, they download from the link | Level |
| Recovering an expired file | Nothing to recover | Ultimate, Teams and Enterprise only | Level |
WeTransfer figures from wetransfer.com, verified 16 September 2026.
The free plan
NudgeHost ahead| Feature | NudgeHost | WeTransfer |
|---|---|---|
| What the free plan holds | 10 links live at once, and deleting one frees the slot | 10 transfers or 3 GB in any 30-day rolling window |
| Publishing without an account | Yes, and signing up later keeps the same address | No, an account is required to send, since November 2024 |
| Largest file on the free plan, and how long it stays up | 25MB a file, and a free account's links have no end date unless you set one | Up to 3 GB, and a Free or Starter transfer stays online for up to 3 days |
| Recipients need an account | No | No, recipients download from the link |
WeTransfer takes the bigger file, and the third row says so. What the NudgeHost free plan does differently is keep things online, so a file sent in March still opens in June.
The other gap is what happens first. A NudgeHost link exists before you have an account, and WeTransfer sends a verification code to your inbox before a transfer goes out.
Sending and hosting
Level| Feature | NudgeHost | WeTransfer |
|---|---|---|
| Emailing the file to a recipient | No. You copy the link and send it however you like | Yes, up to 10 recipients on Free and 50 on paid plans |
| Serving a file as a page | Yes. A PDF, a Word file, a CSV or a JSON file opens in the browser at its own address, and a ZIP serves as a site | Not stated. Previews show a transfer's content before it is downloaded |
| Custom domain | A subdomain of a domain you own, 1 on Pro and 5 on Studio | A WeTransfer subdomain on plans with branding |
| Recovering something after it expires | Nothing to recover | Ultimate, Teams and Enterprise only, for up to a year after expiry for smaller files and up to 90 days for larger ones |
| Account storage | No storage allowance. The free plan counts live links and each plan sets a size for one file | 2 TB by default, and up to 5 TB on Teams |
The two products do different jobs in this section. WeTransfer emails your files to the people you name and keeps them in account storage, and NudgeHost does neither.
What NudgeHost does is give a file an address that opens in the browser. If the job is a document people should read in place, you can host a PDF and send the link however you like.
What the money buys
WeTransfer aheadFree
$0
No subscription
- 25MB a file
- 10 live links
- 2 API keys, 20 requests a minute
- No custom domain
Pro
$12 a month
or $120 a year
- 250MB a file
- Unlimited live links
- 10 API keys, 60 requests a minute
- 1 custom domain
Studio
$29 a month
or $290 a year
- 1GB a file
- Unlimited live links
- 30 API keys, 150 requests a minute
- 5 custom domains
| Feature | NudgeHost | WeTransfer |
|---|---|---|
| Paid plans | 2, Pro and Studio | 3 with a published price, and Enterprise on request |
| Entry price | Pro at $12 a month, or $120 a year | Starter at $84 a year, and the monthly price depends on your country |
| Seats for other people | One person per account | Teams from 2 users up to 50, priced by country |
| What happens when you stop paying | The account moves to the free plan and nothing is deleted, though uploads pause while it sits at the free plan's link limit | Active transfers stay online for up to 28 days, then are permanently deleted |
| Refunds | Cancelling takes effect at the end of the billing cycle, and partial periods are not refunded | Within 20 days of a monthly charge or 60 days of a yearly one, for the most recent charge |
Four of these five rows go to WeTransfer. It costs less to start paying for, sells seats where a NudgeHost account is one person, and refunds a recent charge where NudgeHost refunds nothing partial. What a year of Pro buys here is a subdomain of your own domain, and the time, country and a CSV export of each open.
The row that points the other way is what happens when you stop paying. A lapsed NudgeHost account keeps every link, and a lapsed WeTransfer account loses its transfers.
Their monthly and Teams prices differ by country, which is why the table prints an annual figure. Our page on what WeTransfer costs in each country sets them out.
For developers and agents
NudgeHost ahead| Feature | NudgeHost | WeTransfer |
|---|---|---|
| API access | Every plan, free included | No transfer API documented, beyond an activity-log API for Enterprise workspaces |
| API keys and rate limit | 2 keys at 20 requests a minute on Free, up to 30 at 150 on Studio | None published |
| MCP server | Four tools over Streamable HTTP, on every plan | None published |
Three calls give a file its address on any plan, the free one included.
# 1. Ask for an upload URL
curl -X POST https://www.nudgehost.com/api/v1/uploads \
-H "Authorization: Bearer nh_sk_REPLACE_WITH_YOUR_OWN_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"filename": "report.pdf",
"contentType": "application/pdf",
"fileSize": 182734
}'
# 2. PUT the bytes to the upload URL that call returned
curl -X PUT "UPLOAD_URL_FROM_STEP_1" \
-H "Content-Type: application/pdf" \
--data-binary @report.pdf
# 3. Finish it, and get the address back
curl -X POST https://www.nudgehost.com/api/v1/uploads/ID_FROM_STEP_1/complete \
-H "Authorization: Bearer nh_sk_REPLACE_WITH_YOUR_OWN_KEY"The third call returns the address the file is reachable at. The MCP server offers an AI client four tools for the same job: share_text, create_upload_url, complete_upload and list_links.
Publishing without an account
The whole sequence runs signed out. Nothing in it asks for an email address, and no code is sent anywhere.
Drop the file in
On the home page, signed out. A quick browser check runs first and asks you nothing, and a file over 25MB is refused before the upload starts.
Take the link
It is live as soon as the file lands. A ZIP with an index.html gets its own nudgehost.site subdomain instead.
Send it
You can keep 3 links like this at once, each live for 7 days. HTML pages, sites and Word files carry a small NudgeHost bar, and PDFs, images and media carry nothing extra.
Sign up to keep it
A free account takes over the files from your browser, clears the 7-day end date and drops the bar. The links stay the same.
Moving from WeTransfer to NudgeHost
Moving from WeTransfer starts with the files on your own machine, so download each transfer while it is still live. Then upload each file to NudgeHost, or upload a ZIP with an index.html to serve it as a site.
The ceiling is 25MB a file on the free plan, 250MB on Pro and 1GB on Studio, so a file larger than your plan takes will not move. Replace the old WeTransfer link wherever you shared it, and the new one only needs sending once.
Which one to choose
Choose NudgeHost if
- You want a file to stay at one address for as long as you need it.
- You want to publish before signing up.
- You want the document to open in the browser rather than download.
- You want a script or an AI client to publish from the free plan.
- You want the address on a subdomain of your own domain.
Choose WeTransfer if
- You are sending one very large file to somebody who will download it. WeTransfer takes far larger files than NudgeHost does.
- You want the files emailed to the people you name.
- You want account storage to keep files in, or a team workspace.
The verdict
Pick by the job. If you are sending a very large file once, to somebody who will download it, WeTransfer is the better tool. If a file should live at an address that still works next month and open in the browser when somebody clicks it, NudgeHost is.
Two more pages help if you are weighing a move. One sets out what WeTransfer users say in their own reviews. The other lists hosts to move to from WeTransfer, NudgeHost among them, measured on the same criteria.
Frequently asked questions
What happens to a file I upload to NudgeHost without an account?
It stays up until its signed-out window closes, then the file is deleted in the next daily cleanup. Make an account before that and it stays at the same address.
Does NudgeHost limit how often a link is opened?
No. No NudgeHost plan limits visits or bandwidth, so a link that gets passed around keeps serving.
Can I put a password on a NudgeHost link?
Yes, on Pro and Studio. Anyone opening the link is asked for the password before the file opens.
More comparisons
Try the free plan with a real file
25MB a file, 10 live links and no banner. The first upload needs no account.