What you need, and which install method to pick
Filemote has two halves. The agent runs on the computer whose files you want to reach; the web app is how you reach them from anywhere. This page covers installing the agent — there is nothing to install for the web app.
Before you start
- An account on Filemote, and the computer you want to reach powered on and online.
- Free disk space: about 500 MB for the agent itself, plus room for AI models if you use them. On Windows the installer also fetches a private Python runtime, several hundred MB more, so leave about 1 GB free there.
- 512 MB of free RAM for the agent alone; 8 GB or more if you want the AI features.
- Outbound HTTPS (port 443) from that computer to
api.filemote.com. A network that lets you browse the web almost always allows it.
You do not need to open any inbound ports or set up a VPN: the agent makes an outbound connection, so it works behind a home router untouched.
Windows
| Method | Pick it when |
|---|---|
Installer .exe | Normal case. Sets up .NET 8 and Python for you and adds a Start-menu entry. Installs for your Windows user only. |
Portable .zip | You cannot install software on the machine, or you want to run Filemote from a USB drive. Nothing is written to the registry; delete the folder to remove it. |
| ClickOnce | You want the configurator to update itself. Needs an internet connection on first run, which it uses to install .NET 8 if the machine lacks it. |
Windows will warn that the publisher is unknown — Filemote is not signed with a commercial certificate yet. Choose More info → Run anyway. Where a release publishes a digest, the download page shows the file's SHA-256 next to it so you can verify the file first.
Linux
One archive per architecture: x64 for ordinary PCs and servers, arm64 for
Raspberry Pi 4/5 and ARM servers such as AWS Graviton or Oracle Ampere.
- With the install script (needs root): installs into
/opt/filemote, provisions .NET 8 and Python through your package manager, and registers afilemote-agentsystemd unit so the agent survives reboots. The script enables the unit but does not start it — you start it yourself once the agent is configured. - Run in place (no root): make
FilemoteCliandFilemoteAgentexecutable and run them straight from the extracted folder. Nothing starts after a reboot, and the AI service is not provisioned. The binaries are self-contained, so this path needs no .NET at all — useful on a locked-down box, since the install script treats .NET 8 as mandatory and stops if it cannot provision it.
The archives are packed on Windows, which carries no Unix executable bit, so chmod +x
is always required before running anything from them.
macOS
One archive for Apple Silicon (arm64) and one for Intel (x64). If you are unsure
which Mac you have, open the Apple menu → About This Mac: "Chip: Apple M…" means
Apple Silicon, "Processor: Intel" means Intel. Installing the wrong one gives you a
binary that cannot run at all.
The install script provisions Homebrew, .NET 8 and Python, installs into
~/Applications/Filemote, and registers a launchd agent that starts at login. Because
it runs as your user, the agent only reaches files your account can read.
If you extract the archive with Finder, macOS copies the quarantine flag from the
download onto the files and then refuses to run them. Extracting with tar in Terminal
does not do this. Clearing the flag is harmless either way:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine .
AI features are optional
You never have to use the AI features, and their heavy parts — the model files and the Python packages that run them — are only fetched when you first turn AI on.
How completely you can opt out depends on the platform:
- Linux and macOS: pass
--no-aito the install script and nothing AI-related is provisioned at all. - Windows: the installer always sets up a private Python runtime, whether or not you ever enable AI. That is the several hundred MB in the disk figure above. Only the AI packages and models are deferred.
On a Raspberry Pi with less than 8 GB of RAM, install with --no-ai.
Next step
Whichever method you used, the agent still has to be linked to your account. That is one pairing code and takes under a minute — see the download page's final section.
Updated 2026-10-16