By default, Lightroom places its Catalogs in My Pictures folder (Windows). To find them, go to C:\Users\ [USER NAME]\My Pictures\Lightroom. If you’re a Mac user, Lightroom will place its default Catalog in [USER NAME]\Pictures\Lightroom folder.
The catalog also contains previews, which, in the simplest terms is Lightroom’s copy of your images. Since Lightroom works non-destructively, it makes a copy of your images (previews) and then stores them in the catalog. Is it safe to delete Lightroom catalogs?
Decide in advance where you want to store your Lightroom Classic catalog. You can’t store it on a network. You’ll probably store it on your computer’s hard drive or an external disk. After you decide where you’ll save the catalog, consider the specific folder or path where you’ll put it.
Since a catalog is a database that stores the location of our photos, we can have the catalog file; ending in the extension .lrcat, saved in one location and our photos stored in another. If you only access Lightroom on a single computer, create a folder on your local hard drive, name it Lightroom Catalog and save the catalog to this location.
Where are my Lightroom photos stored?
While Lightroom does not store your wedding photos within its software or on a Cloud drive that is supported by the software, it does allow you to decide where you want to store your photos. Lightroom is all about flexibility, customization, and personal preferences, which is perfect for you in your wedding photography workflow.
How do I backup my Lightroom files?
Within the Lightroom catalog folder, you should see a folder named “Backups”. If your situation is anything like mine was, it’ll have backups all of the way back to when you first installed Lightroom. Delete the ones which you don’t need anymore.
Should I delete old lightroom catalogs?
So…the answer would be that once you’ve upgraded to Lightroom 5 and you’re happy with everything, yes, you could go ahead and delete the older catalogs. Unless you plan on reverting back to Lightroom 4, you’ll never use it.
While researching we ran into the query “Can I Delete my Lightroom catalog backups?”.
Deleting Lightroom catalog backups is a different story. Apart from saving your catalog, Lightroom also offers to save a backup copy of your catalog to a (preferably) different location than your computer for redundancy. Over time, you might end up with multiple copies of your catalog, and many of them might be outdated too.
Which Lightroom files can I delete?
Thankfully, this article will tell you everything you need to know to clean up you Lightroom and answer the burning question once and for all which is: “Which Lightroom files can I delete?” As a general rule, Lightroom files which may be deleted include catalogs, catalog backups, temporary import data, previews and smart previews.
Another frequent question is “Is it safe to delete old Lightroom previews?”.
The most frequent answer is; i was recently cleaning out the storage on my computer, and realized that Lightroom’s files were taking up a pretty large chunk of space — about 20GB. After digging around a bit, I found that old previews and backups were responsible for a large chunk of that space, and could be safely deleted.
Should I delete old lightroom backups?
It is completely safe to delete old backups (just keep the last 2-3) to save space on your storage device. Can I delete my Lightroom Catalog and start over? You can delete a Lightroom catalog. A Lightroom catalog stores meta-data about the images, previews, and edits you’ve made. But, it does not include your original images.
What to do if Lightroom Classic doesn’t open?
However, if Lightroom crashed or the computer crashed, those files can be left behind, which can get in the way of opening the catalog again. If that ever happens to you, you can simply delete the . lock file and Lightroom Classic should open normally.
The easiest way to use your Lightroom Classic catalog on more than one computer (such as a desktop and laptop) is to keep the catalog and photos together on an external drive. Then, you can set that catalog as the default catalog in Lightroom Classic Preferences. Using multiple catalogs is not recommended.