Lightroom Library.lrlibrary - getting bigger and bigger

[pawjan-gxsxtt]

Hi there,

I am in the phase of testing new LR CC.

My existing folders with pictures are close to 500GB on my HDD.

Although I set up 0% in "Target Available Disk Space Usage" in preferences of LR the file "Lightroom Library.lrlibrary" that is in Pictures folder is getting bigger and bigger during import of photos.

I don't want to end up in having 500GB photos in original folder as well as 500GB size of "Lightroom Library.lrlibrary" file.

What is wrong or where is my mistake?

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Has it finished syncing to the cloud? It can't delete them locally until it's done so.

[pawjan-gxsxtt]

so I am testing still

the results:

1- synchronize folder size: 11GB

2- Lightroom Library.lrlibrary file size: 830MB

that is 7.5% of the initial size of pictures, and 830MB is far from 0% disk space usage

is this normal?

why does LR need close to 1GB stored info in the home folder?

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

"Synchronize folder size" ? Where are you seeing that?

Lightroom will never actually be 0%. It's a target disk space (use as little as possible) rather than a limit. It needs to keep a local copy of the cloud database and some previews because otherwise you'd have nothing to look at.

[pawjan-gxsxtt]

size of the folder I have pictures in - it is easy to see in properties of the folder the size of it

yes, I understand LR needs some data locally stored, but I am seriously afraid what will be the LR library size on HDD in case I send all 500GB to the cloud - considering 7.5% as now it will come to 35GB - is that correct? is it linear?

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

I'm sorry, I'm still not quite understanding which folder you're referring to.

But perhaps this will help... I have 631.75GB photos in the cloud. My Lightroom Library.lrlibrary file right now is 70.41GB.

[pawjan-gxsxtt]

the folder where the source pictures are on my computer

but now I think I understand: LR will keep the information locally that could be close to 10% of the initial pictures size - and if it has to be like that let it be.

I will mark the topic closed - I believe I got all the answers.

One more: if I install LR on new computer where there are no source pictures, will it recreate the library by itself based on information in the cloud?

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Yes on both counts.

[breeoxd]

I have 80 gigs in the cloud and my CC library is over 100 gigs, so yes, something is not right with how this installs.

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Do you have it set to store a copy of all originals locally?  The other 20GB would be smart previews, used for performance and when the originals aren't available.

[breeoxd]

I do not believe so. I haven’t changed any settings other than when the other tech changed it to only take 0% of my drive in settings. Can you tell me where to find that setting, just to be sure?

Also, when I edit something in CC it is saving a full size copy locally even though I’m not exporting anything.

Additionally still having the issue of it having to resync the whole library each tome I open, even with this massive library taking up hard drive space. Shouldn’t it just be able to regency its library and open? The program is unusable if it has to wait to sync 144k photos every time I benthough I haven’t changed my library.

Thanks!

Sent from my iPhone

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Grab a screenshot of Preferences > Local Storage for me please?

Syncing 144k images each time definitely sounds like something's wrong. I open and it's ready in seconds.

[breeoxd]

Hi there! Yeah, see in the first shot, I don't have copy originals checked,  and also that its still showing no photos- this is it syncing again when I open it. Then the next you can see how my LR library is 114 Gigs (and counting- everytime I open up LR again it seems to add a few gigs, even when  I havent added new photos and it is just
resyncing the original 144 K photos). Also you can see how it shows I have just under 80 gigs backed up- thats it. thats ALL of my photos- and it's showing synced, so why does it have to slowly reload them all when I open up again? I have a brand new imac with 32 g of ram lol. Any ideas would me so appreciated- I have tried to use CC on two different macs and have had the same issue both times. I can't figue out why it seems to just double my photos somewhere.

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

breeoxd  wrote

I have a brand new imac with 32 g of ram lol.

That middle screenshot - what does it show when it's finished calculating?

You mentioned it's a brand new iMac - that could be key. How did your Lightroom Library get on there from the other computer?

[breeoxd]

Hi there-

It shows about 280 gigs free on my computer.

the new Mac thing I doubt is an issue. It did the same thing on my old mac, which is why I have never been able tor really use the software. Even still, I had installed CC completely on my old mac. I didn’t transfer anything Adobe from one computer to another. I just made a new catalog.

Thanks for the help. We are now at 117 gigs for this library lol

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

So you didn't transfer the old Lightroom Library or any of the Application Support files, perhaps using the Mac's migration assistant. You just set it up as a brand new machine and signed in and let it download from empty?  Hmm, that was my prime suspect.

I think it's time to report to the engineers so they can figure out what's going on. Here’s instructions on how to report it to Adobe: https://www.lightroomqueen.com/send-bug-report-feature-request-adobe/

[jeffreyp91318676]

Hi!  I'm sorry to open a subject that may be considered closed, but I have a similar issue with the size of this file.  I only have about 43GB of files in the cloud, but this .lrlibrary file is 90+GB on my Macbook's HD.  I looked at the settings for the photo cache and it was set to 25% with no local storage.  I reduced that to 10%.  Shouldn't this .lrlibrary file shrink down?  Why is it twice the size of my cloud storage?  Any thoughts you may have are greatly appreciated.

[SVShooter]

Yep, this is a bit of a problem for me as well.  I have a Macbook Air with a 250Gb SSD drive in it.   Light room is set to Not store files or smartpreviews locally.   And it is taking up 80Gb of my HDD.  I am out of space now.   All was running fine and it was using 5GB until a few days ago, then something happened.  I opened it up, and I hadn't added any new pictures, and it started sycning a couple thousand photos.   I had assumed it was doing some type of house cleaning.   But I came back the next day and the sync stopped and said the harddrive was full.  Now I only have < 1GB left.

What I'd like to know is can I just delete the LightRoom CC file and start fresh.   I am not sure what that will do to my online library, and finding that answer seems to be impossible because the only thing I find on it is for LR Classic CC.

FWIW, I opened Classic on my desktop for the first time in a few months as I wanted to try and pull out some of my older files so that I don't go over a TB.   It started downloading my whole online catalog, all 850GB of it.  I went in and changed the online sync location to an external drive, shutdown LR Classic, deleted the local file, and restarted.   It continues to try and download the whole online catalog to my local drive, even though I specified a valid external drive.    It seems like Adobe has some sync issues.

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Yes, you can delete the Lightroom Library.lrlibrary. That'll just delete the local cache, and then download it afresh.

[SVShooter]

Thanks.  Unfortunately that did not fix my issue either.  LR CC is set to cache 0% of my free hard disk space at this point.   I deleted the file and have 80GB free.  As soon a I turned on LR CC it created a new file and synced down 80GB worth of stuff until the HDD was full again.  

Im hoping this is a bug they address with a future release. 

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

SVShooter  wrote

Im hoping this is a bug they address with a future release. 

Here’s instructions on how to report it directly to the engineers, so they can confirm the expected behavior and consider improvements: https://www.lightroomqueen.com/send-bug-report-feature-request-adobe/

[breeoxd]

I’ve already spent literally months going back and forth only to be told by adobe’s highest level tech team that this is a known issue that they see as a normal part of the software and they have no intent on fixing it.

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

There were some changes in the last release to be more respectful of the threshold, rather than downloading all of the smart previews, which previous versions did. So they are listening, but they obviously haven't got the balance quite right yet, so it's worth continuing to push on that feedback forum. The biggest benefit of the feedback forum is that other people can also vote on requests, and that holds a lot more weight than individual requests from the support teams. When one of you have posted there, add the link to this thread to start to gather more votes on the request. The more votes, the higher up the priority list it moves.

[scottwright87]

I'm sorry to be bringing this old thread up again. I am having the same issue in 2020. Is there a fix yet?

I have a measley 16 photos in my Lightroom CC (totalling 265mb of my 20gb Cloud allowance) however my .lrlibrary file is 43GB. I permanently deleted my delete folder within CC but this did nothing. I use CC on my MacBook Air as I like having the capability of storing a small amount of photos on the cloud to edit whilst on the road due to my tiny 500gb harddrive on this machine. However I might as well use Classic on this as my lrlibrary file is massive!?

[joachimt65511070]

Bumping the thread on this part, discovered this file while investigating for disk space issue. It takes roughly 10% of the total of my photos in the cloud!!! How is this acceptable for a cloud solution?!