Common FTP errors
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The most common FTP errors are related to incorrect login details supplied or an issue with the hosting server or the internet service provider. In most cases you will see Could not connect to server, but exact errors will vary depending on the issue.
“530 Login authentication failed”
The error shows that your FTP hostname, username or password are incorrect. Your main FTP login details are listed in your Site Tools > Site > FTP Accounts. Go to the kebab menu > FTP Credentials.
“530 Sorry, but I can’t trust you”
This error indicates that the directory which you are trying to access is no longer present on the server. You should check your FTP accounts from Site Tools > Site > FTP Accounts to see the exact path of your directory or create it if not present.
“EAI_NONAME – Neither nodename nor servname provided, or not known”
The specified server hostname (or IP address) is not correct and the connection could not be established. You should again verify your FTP login details in Site Tools > Site > FTP Accounts.
“ECONNREFUSED – Connection refused by server”
You can see this error if you are using an incorrect FTP port number. The FTP port number that you should use is 21.
“FTP connection timed out”
This happens when your Internet Service Provider is blocking the FTP port – port 21. More information on how to check if a port is blocked can be found here.
“421 – Too Many Connections”
This error indicates that your local FTP client is creating more than the allowed connections at a time – 8. You should review its settings and reconfigure it to match the limit.
Another cause for this issue is if you are not using Passive mode with your FTP client. You can refer to the documentation of your FTP client for instructions on how to change that.
Additionally, if you are using your domain as an FTP host to connect to, it might not be resolving properly. You can try to use your account’s IP. SiteGround customers can find it in the Client Area > Websites > Choose the domain name in question and click on the kebab menu > Website Settings > kebab menu > Server Details.
“Your bandwidth usage is restricted”
This message means that there is a bandwidth restriction for all FTP connections to the server.This restriction prevents FTP transfers from taking a big part of the network bandwidth and slowing down the rest of the connections to the server.
The server does not list files in FTP
In case files and directories are not listed in FTP, first, make sure that your FTP client is configured to use passive mode.
Find out how to set the passive mode setting on for some popular FTP clients here.
There might be also another reason for this issue. All shared hosting servers are configured not to list more than 10000 files in a single folder. If you have uploaded more than 10000 files in a folder you can use only the File Manager in Site Tools to manage them.