GameSave Manager vs SideSave
GameSave Manager
gamesave-manager.comSideSave
github.comSide by side
| Figure | GameSave Manager | SideSave |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | — | Free |
| Free plan | — | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| Linux | — | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 0 | 1 |
| Spec score · Game Save Managers | 7.2 (#21) | 7.9 (#12) |
| History | The maker says the project began as a personal BAT script and was introduced to the world in 2009 with its first GUI. | It stores versioned snapshots with branches and supports restoring saves or individual files from snapshots. |
| Pricing | The project says GameSave Manager has always been completely free and donations are its only source of revenue. | The project describes itself as free and open source, and its user guide says it has no subscriptions. |
| Purpose | GameSave Manager is described as a way to back up, transfer, and share PC save data. | SideSave syncs save data for non-Steam games added to Steam as shortcuts between two specific machines, peer-to-peer. |
| Support | The site links to a forum for community support. | The user guide directs users to the SideSave Discord for help and GitHub Issues for bug reports. |
Plans
In their own words
GameSave Manager
GameSave Manager has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.
SideSave
SideSave is free, open-source software that synchronizes save data for non-Steam games added to Steam as shortcuts. It pairs two approved machines and transfers tracked saves over a local network or an internet relay, sending only changed content blocks. Versioned snapshots and branches preserve history, while lineage-based conflict detection asks whether to keep the local copy, remote copy, or both. Saves can be restored individually or as complete versions. Detection reads Steam’s shortcuts.vdf file and offers Proton save locations for tracking. The scan excludes real Steam Cloud games, emulator saves, repack-wrapper detection, and portable installs. Optional backups can mirror snapshots to Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, WebDAV, a webhook, or local/NAS storage. SideSave has no accounts or telemetry; relay traffic is encrypted but not end-to-end. The project publishes no releases, so users build the CLI, desktop app, relay, or Steam Deck components from source.