GoMount + Wasabi Low-Cost Object Storage Setup Guide

Why Wasabi?

Wasabi is an S3-compatible object-storage provider built around one simple idea: storage should be billed by the terabyte, not hidden inside a complicated membership plan. There is no monthly subscription tier, no per-user seat fee, and no upfront commitment. You pay a flat rate per terabyte stored, with no egress fees and no API request fees.

For Mac users who want an off-site archive for photos, videos, design assets, or Time Machine backups, that predictability makes budgeting easy. A consumer cloud drive often charges a fixed monthly fee regardless of how much you use. With Wasabi, if you store 500GB you pay half a terabyte's worth; if you delete data, your bill drops. You are not forced to buy a 2TB plan just because you need more than the free tier.

In the previous article we compared S3-compatible object storage with paid cloud drives. Wasabi emerged as a strong choice for backup-style workloads where you want simple, membership-free pricing. In this guide we will configure a Wasabi bucket from scratch and mount it with GoMount.

Prerequisites

• A Mac running macOS 13 or later.
• GoMount installed. If you have not set it up yet, start with the Getting Started guide.
• A Wasabi account. New accounts receive a free trial bucket for testing.

Create your Wasabi account

1. Visit wasabi.com and click Start Free Trial.
2. Fill in your email, company name, and a password. Wasabi will send a verification email.
3. Verify your email, then sign in to the Wasabi Console.

During signup you will choose a default region. Wasabi regions include us-east-1, us-east-2, us-west-1, eu-central-1, and ap-northeast-1. Pick the region closest to you for the lowest latency. The region determines your endpoint.

Create a bucket

1. In the Wasabi Console, open Buckets from the left sidebar.
2. Click Create Bucket.
3. Enter a globally unique bucket name, for example gomount-mac-archive-2026.
4. Select the same region you chose during signup.
5. Leave default settings for versioning unless you have a specific policy in mind.
6. Click Create Bucket.

Bucket names are global across Wasabi, so common names are likely taken. Use a descriptive prefix that includes your project or name.

Create access keys

GoMount needs an access key pair to talk to Wasabi's S3 API. It is best to create a dedicated key pair rather than reusing your console credentials.

1. In the Wasabi Console, open Access Keys from the left sidebar.
2. Click Create New Access Key.
3. Give the key a descriptive name, such as gomount-macbook.
4. Copy the Key and Secret Key. The secret is shown only once.

Configure GoMount

Now add the Wasabi bucket as a cloud-storage connection in GoMount.

1. Open GoMount and go to Settings > Cloud Storage or click the + button to add a new connection.
2. Choose S3-Compatible as the provider type.
3. Fill in the following fields:

Wasabi uses path-style addressing by default, so keep Path Style enabled. If you disable it, GoMount may fail to resolve the bucket.

Verify the mount

1. Click Test Connection in GoMount to confirm the credentials and endpoint are correct.
2. Once the test succeeds, click Mount. The bucket will appear as a volume in Finder and in the GoMount file browser.
3. Create a small test folder and upload a file to confirm write access.

If the connection test fails, double-check the endpoint spelling, region, and that Path Style is enabled. Also verify that the access key has not expired and that the bucket exists in the region you selected.

Add an auto-mount rule

Wasabi is cloud storage, so it is available from any network. Most users want it mounted automatically at login rather than tied to a home network. In GoMount:

1. Open Rules for the Wasabi connection.
2. Add a rule that triggers on Any Network or when your Mac Joins a Specific Network if you only want it at home or in the office.
3. Enable Mount at Login if you want the bucket available immediately after startup.

For a deeper explanation of network rules, see the auto-mount rules deep dive.

Tips and pitfalls

• No membership, no tiers. Wasabi does not sell plans. You are billed only for the storage you consume, with no per-user fees or upgrade treadmill. This makes it easy to start small and let costs grow with your archive.
• No egress or API fees. Downloading your own files does not add to the bill, and neither do API calls. The flat per-terabyte price is the headline cost, which simplifies budgeting.
• Do not use S3 as a scratch disk. Object storage has higher latency than a local SSD or NAS. Keep active projects on fast storage and move finished assets to Wasabi.
• Avoid millions of tiny files. Each object carries overhead. Archive many small files as a ZIP or tar archive before uploading, or use a sync tool that bundles uploads efficiently.
• Watch the 30-day minimum retention. Wasabi bills in 30-day minimum retention units. Deleting and re-uploading the same data can cost more than expected, so plan retention before moving large amounts of data.
• Use bucket policies for safety. Restrict the access key to the specific bucket and limit permissions to what GoMount needs. Read-write is required for full file-browser use.
• Enable versioning for important data. Wasabi supports object versioning, which protects against accidental overwrites and ransomware.
• Compare total cost. Because there is no subscription lock-in, you can run Wasabi alongside another provider for a month, compare real bills, and move your data if another service fits your workflow better.

Next in this series

Wasabi is just one option. The next guide covers Backblaze B2 and Cloudflare R2, two other popular S3-compatible providers with their own pricing and egress advantages.

If you are new to GoMount, review the Getting Started guide for general setup tips, or return to the guides index for the full list.