Gathmo vs a Dropbox file request: a drop box is not an album

Gathmo vs a Dropbox file request

Gathmo is the better choice if the point is that everyone gets to see it: guests open 1 album, watch it fill during the evening, leave a spoken message and take the whole thing home afterwards. A Dropbox file request is a drop box — guests upload and see nothing, not even their own photo, because collecting files is what it was built to do. Dropbox is the better choice if you mainly need room and permanence: 2 TB on the Plus plan against our 250 GB, and the files stay as long as the subscription runs, with no event window at all. Both let your guests send without making an account, and both open in the phone browser with no app.

Dropbox limits and prices verified on help.dropbox.com and dropbox.com/plans, 21 August 2026. Prices are Dropbox's own, in US dollars — they set prices by country, and only the US version was checked.

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THE SHORT VERSION

One collects files; the other holds an evening

Dropbox file request

A Dropbox file request is a link that lets anyone send you files without a Dropbox account, on every plan including the free one. The files land in a folder you choose. That is the whole feature, and it is a good one: 2 GB per file on Basic and Plus, 2 TB of storage on Plus at $9.99 a month, no deadline unless you set one. What it does not do is show anything to the people uploading — there is no album, no screen at the venue and no voice recording, because a folder was never meant to have those.

Gathmo

Gathmo is built for the evening itself. Guests scan a code, see the album fill as other people add to it, record a spoken message if they want to, and the hosts approve what reaches the screen. Photos, video and voice sit on one timeline, and everything downloads as a ZIP at original quality afterwards. The album is online 90 days on Essential, six months on Celebrate and a year on Grand — and then it is not.

Side by side

Gathmo vs a Dropbox file request, feature by feature

What you can do	Gathmo	Dropbox file request
What lands in the album
What guests can send	Photos, video and voiceAll three in one album, on one timeline	Any file, but no voice recordingGuests upload files they already have; there is nothing to record a message with
How much guests can send	Unlimited with every paid planPhotos, videos and voice notes; the plan sets the storage, from 50 GB	As much as your storage holds2 GB per file, and 2 TB of space on Plus; the free plan has 2 GB in total
The day itself, and after
What guests see after uploading	The albumTheir photo appears, and so does everyone else's, during the evening	NothingA file request is upload-only; guests cannot see their own upload or anyone else's
On a screen at the venue	From CelebrateApproved photos and messages on a screen	Not offeredThere is no live view of a folder as it fills
Approving what appears	Every paid planThe hosts approve each item before it reaches the screen	NoneNothing is shown, so there is nothing to approve; you see what arrived when you open the folder
The album afterwards	90 days to a yearThe plan decides; the album is live that whole time	As long as you subscribeNo event window; the folder stays until you delete it or stop paying
Guests who cannot come	Live stream, on GrandThey watch as it happens and send a voice note back	They can upload, on every planThe link works from anywhere, but there is nothing to watch
App for guests	Not neededOpens in the phone browser after a scan	Not neededAnyone can send files without a Dropbox account
What you get and pay
Keeping the originals	YesEverything downloads as a ZIP at original quality, from Essential	Yes, on every planThey are files in your folder, which is the most direct form of keeping them there is
What it needs from you	A table and a printed codeFour sign templates and a 300-dpi PDF	A link and your own signageYou write the wording, make the QR code and print it yourself
Starting price	Free for 20 items20 photos, videos or voice notes at no cost; then a one-time price per event, shown in your own currency below	Free for 2 GBThen $9.99 a month for Plus, billed for as long as you keep it

More on these features: Live photo wall · Audio guestbook

Wording is deliberate. “Not offered” here does not mean Dropbox fell short — it means a file request was built to collect files, and a live screen or a voice recorder was never part of that. The rows exist so you can see where the tool stops, not to score a storage product against a party. Dropbox prices are theirs, in US dollars; they price by country and only the US page was checked.

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Where they win

Where Dropbox is ahead

Two things Dropbox does that Gathmo does not. If either matters to you, that is a real reason to use it.

Room, and a lot of it

Plus gives 2 TB for $9.99 a month. Our largest plan gives 250 GB. If a hundred guests film the whole evening in 4K, that difference stops being theoretical. Dropbox is a storage company and it shows.

No clock at all

A Gathmo album is online for 90 days, six months or a year, and then it closes. A Dropbox folder stays until you delete it or stop paying. If you already pay for Plus, collecting the photos there costs you nothing extra and they are still there in ten years — which is the one thing an event album, by design, cannot promise.

The difference

Where the two differ

The guests see it

With Gathmo the album fills while the party is happening. A guest uploads a photo, watches it appear, sees what everyone else has added, and quite often adds three more because of it.

A file request is one-way by design. The guest picks a file, uploads it, and the page thanks them. They never see their photo again, and they never see anyone else's — which also means nobody is nudged into sending more.

The voices

Gathmo records voice messages in the browser on every plan, including the free one, and puts them beside the photos — the toast nobody filmed, the message from someone who could not come.

Dropbox stores whatever a guest already has on their phone. There is no recorder, so a spoken message only exists if the guest thought to record one in some other app first — which, in practice, means it does not exist.

One evening, or forever

Gathmo is priced and built around a single event: one payment, an album that is live while it matters, and a download at the end.

Dropbox is priced around a year at a time and keeps everything indefinitely. It has no notion of an event at all: nothing opens, nothing closes, and nothing is ever presented to anybody. That is better for archiving and less suited to a party — and if you were going to pay the subscription anyway, the marginal cost of using it for a wedding is zero.

Dropbox details come from help.dropbox.com and dropbox.com/plans, reviewed on 21 August 2026, quoting their own US dollar prices. Dropbox does not sell an event product and has never claimed to — this page exists because couples use the file request that way, not because Dropbox competes for the same buyer. Two of the rows below go to Dropbox, and on storage it is not close. Tell us if anything is out of date.

Reviewed by Martin Freiwald, founder of Gathmo

FAQ

Questions people ask before switching

Can I just use a Dropbox file request for wedding photos?

You can, and it works: anyone can send files without a Dropbox account, on every plan including the free one. What you get is a folder. Guests see nothing after uploading, there is no screen at the venue and no way to record a spoken message. If those do not matter to you, the file request is free and has more space than we do.

Do guests need a Dropbox account?

No. Dropbox states that anyone can send a file to you whether they have an account or not. The same is true of a Gathmo guest link — neither side asks your guests to sign up or install anything.

How much can guests upload?

With Dropbox: up to 2 GB per file on Basic and Plus, limited overall by your storage — 2 GB in total on the free plan, 2 TB on Plus. With Gathmo: 20 items on the free tier, then unlimited photos, videos and voice notes on every paid plan, with storage from 50 GB.

Is Dropbox cheaper?

It depends on whether you already pay for it. Plus is $9.99 a month, roughly 120 dollars a year, which is more than any of our one-time plans — but if it is already on your card, using the file request costs nothing extra. The free Dropbox plan gives 2 GB in total, which a few dozen guest videos will fill.

Can guests leave a voice message in Dropbox?

Not really. Dropbox stores files; it does not record anything. A guest would have to record a voice memo in another app and then upload the file, which is two steps too many at a party. Gathmo records in the browser on every plan, including the free one.

Can I use both?

Yes, and it is the sensible combination. Use Gathmo for the event — the album, the voices, the screen — then download the ZIP at original quality when it closes and keep it in Dropbox for as long as you like.

The extra

Your guests get the whole album — and can download it.

Photos, videos and voice messages, all on one page.
Guests open the link and download whatever they want.
Public, or behind a password — you decide.

The shared album page with every guest upload in one grid

Pricing

How the two price it

The models are not the same shape. Dropbox charges by the year for space: Basic is free with 2 GB in total, Plus is $9.99 a month for 2 TB, and file requests work on every plan including the free one, with 2 GB per file. Over a year Plus is around 120 dollars, but it is not an event cost — it is a subscription you were either paying already or will keep paying afterwards, and if you already have it, collecting wedding photos in it costs nothing extra. Gathmo charges once per event: the free tier takes 20 items so you can walk the guest path first, and the paid plans appear in your own currency in the pricing table on this page. Each paid plan takes unlimited photos, videos and voice notes and moderates them; the plan decides storage, clip length, the screen at the venue, the live stream and how long the album stays online. The honest way to compare them is to ask what you want afterwards: a folder that keeps growing, or an album that was there on the night.

Pricing

From $49. Pay once, per event.

No subscription for hosts. Free to start, upgrade only when you need more.

Free

Forever free

Try Gathmo at a small gathering.

20 photos, videos & voice notes
5 GB storage included
Unlimited guests — no app needed
30 days album
Video up to 30 sec · voice 30 sec
Gathmo badge on shared media
No original-quality download

Start free

Essential

$49

one-time · per event

Every memory, full quality, yours to keep.

Unlimited photos, videos & voice
50 GB storage included
Download all originals (ZIP)
No Gathmo badge on your media
90 days album
Video up to 5 min · voice Unlimited
Host moderation tools

Choose Essential

Using both, or moving from one to the other

Decide what the guests should see
This is the whole question. If it is fine that guests upload into a void and only you ever look at the result, a file request does that for free. If the point is that the room sees the room, it cannot.
Start a free Gathmo event
Name, date, done — about two minutes, no card. The free tier takes 20 photos, videos or voice notes: enough to scan the code yourself and see what a guest sees.
Print the code
Four sign templates with your own wording and a 300-dpi PDF. With a file request you would be making that sign yourself, which is a small job that quietly never gets done.
Keep Dropbox for the archive
These two are not really rivals. Download the ZIP from Gathmo when the album closes and put it in Dropbox — the album for the evening, the folder for the decade.