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Sync is getting stuck and won't complete

Sync never finishes, Every morning I check the status in the Dropbox app. It's the same 26GB that never completes. I am only using 32% of my Dropbox account, so it's not the size. I'm up to date on payment.

Is there a way to see a single concise list of the files/folders it is trying to sync? Either in the Dropbox app or via a browser at the Dropbox site?

Thank you, Peter

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Walter

You could try finding and moving it out of the Dropbox folder @petrusrung22 - renaming it might also help.

Have you rebooted your computer at all lately by the way?

All comments

Walter

Hi @petrusrung22, sorry to hear about your syncing issue.

Could you let me know the app's exact status and version as shown in your system tray/menu bar?

Also, can you click on your avatar in the app's preferences and then on the 'View sync issues' option?

Are there any files listed there?

Let me know what you find, Peter.

petrusrung22

There are no sync issues

I am on a Mac

Dropbox app version I think is 145.4.4921

Thanks

Walter

Could you also post a screenshot of the app's exact status @petrusrung22?

Is it 'up to date' or stuck at syncing a specific number of files?

petrusrung22

It is stuck on a 1.51 GB media file....stuck, meaning it is frozen on this file. That status of it has been frozen for days. If I could cancel the sync of this file I would.

Screen Shot 2022-04-07 at 2.43.07 PM.png

Walter

You could try finding and moving it out of the Dropbox folder @petrusrung22 - renaming it might also help.

Have you rebooted your computer at all lately by the way?

DGr

I have a similar issue but only for larger files (1MB and larger). Just started yesterday. I am using the Apple Mac version and have plenty of storage space.

Walter

Hey @DGr, sorry to hear about this.

Could you send me a screenshot of the app's exact status as shown in your menu bar?

Also, have you done any of the troubleshooting mentioned in this discussion?

DGr

Screen Shot 2022-04-08 at 10.35.33 AM.png

The attached shows you what I am seeing. It is very strange as nothing like this has happened in the years I have been using Dropbox. All of a sudden, larger files are not syncing. If I remove the larger files, then smaller files will start syncing but if a large file is not syncing, smaller files behind it will not sync. I have rebooted and even reinstalled Dropbox.

Walter

Thanks for the screenshot @DGr - much appreciated!

Could you try unlinking and relinking your account through the app's preferences?

Let me know if syncing gets stuck again!

DGr

Thank you. That worked.

Walter

Glad to hear that @DGr - thanks for keeping me in the loop too!

See you around the Community and have a lovely weekend!

MikeA2523

I ma having a similar issue. Except it's 2 files that won't finish syncing, and I cannot see what they are nor how large they are. But it does bog down my Mac. Sometimes I get the spinning wheel of death. When I go to pause the sync that will usually solve the slow problem, but it comes back after the sync is unpaused. This just started happening a couple weeks ago. Up until then, Dropbox worked like a charm.

Screen Shot 2022-11-13 at 6.58.28 PM.png

Walter

Hey @MikeA2523, could you try fixing your hardlinks and permissions as outlined here and let me know how it goes?

Thanks so much!

Hueme

Hello,
I have problems to delete my trash on Mac after macOS Ventura update and only if my Mac is in syncing with Dropbox .the sync symbol doesn’t stop to sync as well. Do you guys have a solution. Sorry for my bad English. Cordially Hugo .

Megan

Hi @Hueme, let's jump right into this!

In regards to your trash, can you let me know if you get any errors? Also, are you trying to empty your trash from Dropbox related files?

As for your app, can you let me know more, since I am not sure I understood the precise issue? Is the app stuck syncing content? If so, what is its syncing status at the moment?

Let me know more!

AlsubaieMohammed

Hello All,

I am using Dropbox on my macOS at it latest update and still it is showing some syncing files stuck. It seems to be stuck because I use all the suggested steps on the previous articles regarding this subject. Please help me to resolve this issue.

Regards,

Megan

Hey there, @AlsubaieMohammed, welcome to our Community!

Can you please check the exact sync status and version of the app for me?

If you also click on the Dropbox icon, then on your initials/profile pic and then on "view sync issues", do you see anything listed there?

Let me know more, and we'll take it from there!

AlsubaieMohammed

Hello Megan,

The sync status is showing " Syncing 2 files" and also no listed issues on "view sync issues'

the version is : 163.4.5456

Kind regards,

Mohammed Alsubaie

Megan

Hi @AlsubaieMohammed, have you checked to make sure that there are no 'invalid characters' that could be preventing your files from getting synced?

If I were you, I'd also try to sign out, then back into the app.

AlsubaieMohammed

Many thanks to you Megan, issue is now resolved

Regards,

joyce9282

Hi,

I have been trying to sync my files locally to dropbox, but see these 149 files to be synced for a few days. Even though it says only needs 43 min with 33MB files to be synced. The syncing process is going on and on with no progress. In the meanwhile, my newly added files to the dropbox folder are not automatically uploaded online, but I still can see in the shared folders, files added by other people are added to my folder locally.

Could you please help me with this? I have been driven nuts. I have an account with 2TB of space and I am only using 1 TB so far.

Megan

Hi @joyce9282, sorry to see you're having trouble with our desktop app.

Can you please check the exact sync status and version of the app for me?

If you also click on the Dropbox icon, then on your initials/profile pic and then on "view sync issues", do you see anything listed there?

Let me know what you find and we'll go from there.

joyce9282

Hi Megan,

I can see that dropbox is "syncing 163 files" and the version of my app is v165.4.4300.

I don't see any issues in "sync issues," please see the photo:

Jay

Hi @joyce9282, does it show how much time is remaining for the files to get synced in the bottom right of the desktop app, and how much data needs to be transferred, like in your first image?

joyce9282

I have now fixed the problem by: clicking Preference-Account-SignOut, and then sign in again, indexing. Thanks everyone for helping me!

Kang1943

I moved a folder containing thousands of files into the DropBox folder, then DropBox said "Syncing 9551 files". After two days, it is still "Syncing 9551 files" or "Syncing 9552 files" or something else like that. I thought maybe I shouldn't move so many files into the DropBox folder at one time, so I moved some files out of the folder, but it didn't change anything. I wonder how I can solve the problem. My system is mac OS Monterey. Thank you for your time and help.

Megan

Hi @Kang1943, welcome to our Community!

Could you try to sign out of the app, then back in? Just make sure you have a backup of the content that hasn't yet been synced to your Dropbox account online, just in case.

Keep me posted on the results!

Kang1943

Hi Megan, thanks for your reply. I didn't think about that before ... I tried restarting the app or computer and they didn't work. I tried sign-out-sign-in the app just now, and it worked! The number of "syncing files" became much less after that. However, it stuck at "syncing 147 files". Then I check the syncing files which had been taking a long time, and deleted them (not to worry, they are not important to me), then the problem was solved.

On the other hand, I suppose if I have got some important file with the long-time-sync problem, I can just make a copy before deleting them. So that wouldn't be a problem.

Thank you for your help!

Megan

That's what I like to hear (or read in our case) @Kang1943!

Amazing news. If you need anything else, don't hesitate to reach out to me.

mskogly

Followed this but there is no cache folder. I am struggling to get some folders to update to make the files available locally, not online. Been having lots of problems with Dropbox the last few days. It says syncing but nothing happens. Local changes not reflected on dropbox.com. Tried reinstalling, tried changing selective sync, even tried copying out the files and . Seems super unstable. Would love to have more verbose command line option to view exacly what the osx app is working on at any given time.