How to Send Large Files via Email Without Google Drive or OneDrive

Email runs on Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), standardized in 1982 to transmit plain text messages between university mainframes. To attach binary files (photos, PDFs, videos) to an email, clients convert binary bytes into text using Base64 encoding.

Base64 encoding increases file sizes by roughly 33%. A 20MB file becomes a 26.6MB payload once encoded into MIME text format. Because internet service providers and corporate mail gateways (Microsoft Exchange, Google Workspace) enforce strict 25MB or 50MB message size limits to prevent mailbox bloat and spam flooding, attaching large files directly to emails is technically unfeasible.

When Gmail or Outlook automatically converts an oversized attachment into a cloud link, three critical UX failures occur:

1. The 'Request Access' Wall: If your Google Workspace account defaults to internal organizational sharing, external clients outside your company domain cannot view the file. They must click 'Request Access', wait hours for you to wake up and approve it, and repeat.

2. Corporate IT Domain Blocks: Many enterprise financial institutions, government agencies, and healthcare providers completely block employee access to consumer cloud storage sites (including `drive.google.com` and `dropbox.com`) to prevent data leakage.

3. Storage Quota Contamination: Uploading temporary project deliveries consumes your primary Google One or Microsoft 365 cloud quota, eventually forcing you into paid storage tiers.

Here is how the four primary alternatives for emailing large files stack up in practical business environments:

The fastest, cleanest way to send files too big for email is to generate a direct ButterShare transfer link and paste it into your email message.

Because ButterShare operates peer-to-peer, you never upload files to a cloud database. You drop the file into buttershare.com, copy the shareable room link, and paste it into your email: 'Hi Sarah, here is the direct link to download the 12GB video cut: [ButterShare Link]'.

When the recipient clicks the link, their browser opens directly into the private transfer room. They click 'Accept', and the file streams directly to their computer without requiring a Google account or permission requests.

If you are sending an email to a client in another time zone who will not open the message until tomorrow morning, peer-to-peer streaming requires both devices to coordinate. In this case, an ephemeral transfer service is an acceptable workaround.

WeTransfer allows you to upload up to 2GB for free and gives you a download link to paste into your email. Smash offers a similar link-generation flow without a hard size cap, though uploads over 2GB are queued during busy hours.

If your recipient is under strict military or government IT policies where all external download links are strictly prohibited, you can physically split a large file into multiple 20MB chunks using open-source tools like 7-Zip.

In 7-Zip: Right-click your file > Add to archive > in 'Split to volumes, bytes', enter '20M' > click OK. 7-Zip will split a 100MB file into `project.7z.001`, `project.7z.002`, up to `.005`. You then send 5 separate emails.

While reliable, this workflow is tedious and risks spam filtering or anti-virus quarantine of numbered archive extensions.

Many law firms, financial institutions, and architecture studios maintain dedicated SFTP (Secure File Transfer Protocol) servers or Nextcloud self-hosted instances.

The IT department provisions a dedicated client folder and generates a secure HTTPS upload/download token. While secure and compliant with corporate audits, setting up SFTP accounts requires IT administration and is unsuitable for quick, informal transfers.