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File Manager is cPanel’s built-in file browser. It opens at your home directory (/home/<username>) and lets you do everything you’d normally do over FTP, without installing anything. Open it from cPanel home → Files → File Manager.
File Manager showing toolbar, directory tree on the left, and file listing on the right

The File Manager interface

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What’s on the page

The interface has three regions:
  • Top toolbar with the actions you take on selected files (File, Folder, Copy, Move, Upload, Download, Delete, Restore, Rename, Edit, HTML Editor, Permissions, View, Extract, Compress)
  • Left sidebar with the directory tree of your account
  • Right pane with the contents of the current folder, showing Name, Size, Last Modified, Type, and Permissions

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What you can do

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Tips

  • Hidden files. cPanel hides dotfiles by default. Click Settings in the top right and tick Show Hidden Files to see .htaccess, .env, and similar.
  • Trash recovery. Deletes go to .trash first, not straight to oblivion. Recoverable via View Trash until you empty it. The trash counts toward your disk quota, so empty it once you’re sure.
  • Editing config files. For a single .htaccess or .env line change, File Manager is faster than SSH or FTP.
  • Large uploads. For files over a few hundred MB, the browser uploader can stall. Use Web Disk to mount your account as a network drive and copy files natively from Finder or File Explorer.

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Need a hand?

Open a ticket

Best for anything that needs an account check or a config change on our end.

Live chat

Faster for quick questions during business hours.