I can't open my desktop app on my Mac, only the Finder is accessible.

I had to restart my computer to get the Dropbox app to open (in order to get to preferences), but I was able to change it to opening on the Desktop app, so I am hoping that worked!

All comments

This is happening to me as well, as of this morning. I restarted my Mac and it opened the app, but once I clicked out of it, it never opened again. Let me know if you find anything out.

Hey @Daniella1 and @aewen, thanks for reaching out to us!

Can you try going to the Dropbox application's preferences and from the 'general' tab, change the 'open folders in' setting to 'Dropbox desktop app' and let me know if it works?

Thanks!

I had to restart my computer to get the Dropbox app to open (in order to get to preferences), but I was able to change it to opening on the Desktop app, so I am hoping that worked!

Thanks for the update, that's perfect!

You should be good now.

If you need anything else, make sure to give us a shout!

Alright, Hannah. Round two! I am on my laptop now and even when restarting my computer, I cannot get it to open the Dropbox app. Therefore, I cannot get to Dropbox preferences to change the setting to Desktop app. Something has to be wrong if it is continuing to mess up....

Hi @aewen, just to clarify, do you see the Dropbox icon appear in the menu bar near the clock? What message do you get if you hover over it?

@Jay

I was able to find preferences when I right-clicked my name in the menu bar icon Dropbox. Thanks for pointing me in that direction. I am usually very tech savvy and I have no idea why this was causing me so much trouble!

No worries, glad to hear you were able to change the preferences. Let me know if you have any further queries in future.

Enjoy your weekend!

dartie

Unfortunately none of the above is working for me. I am unable to get the Dropbox app to open and NO it's not appearing in the menu bar. I have tried many things including:

- restarting the MacBook Pro (M1 chip)

- adding Dropbox to permissions in system preferences

- deleting Dropbox and downloading a new version.

I've noticed that my OneDrive is also having the same issues.

meecs

I'm having this issue too! Anyone have ideas on how to fix it? When I go into preferences I don't get have "open folders in" as an option.

Mark

Unfortunately @meecs this is a change in the product - the Dropbox software you saw on the computer was depreciated on the 17th of Jan. As such the only choice and option now is to open finder.

meecs

Got it, thanks for the 411! Do you know if Dropbox plans to release a new version? The finder one is not as clean/intuitive 🙂

(And how did you find out this one was removed? I was digging but couldn't spot any notifications.)

They had a notification on the Dropbox App right before they made the change. It was just a heads up that the change was coming. Haven't heard of any future changes.

meecs

Strange, I never got it. Thanks! I hope they do release it again...

CarleySue22

THIS IS A HORRIBLE UPDATE! We need the app to act as an APP, not another file folder. Please revert back to the original @Dropbox

mf2022

Hello. My Dropbox icon in the tools bar (on Mac) does not have that "open in" option under Preferences- General. Please advise.

mf2022

Never mind. I see the conversations stating that the app no longer works and must be accessed through the finder. Bummer! Hoping they reinstate the app soon. Thank you for your help.

janetk

The finder-only option is rough. I have two dropbox accounts (a personal account and a work account). In order to change accounts via desktop, I had to uninstall and reinstall dropbox on my m1 mac. Is there any workaround to change accounts?

Marcellon

I was able to get to preferences by clicking the Dropbox icon on the top bar and clicking my picture and then selecting preferences. I deselected all the items and thought that would put all those items online only. They are still on my hard disk. Do I have to erase all these documents and folders?

Megan

Hi @Marcellon, welcome to our Community!

Can you clarify a bit more as to the settings and items you unchecked during this process?

Which feature are you referring to? Provided you're talking about Smart sync, you would need to follow these steps in order for your content to be online only.

Let me know more.

nicolelenadipaolo

This didn't work for me.

Megan

Hi @nicolelenadipaolo, welcome to our Community!

Since this thread a bit lengthy, could you clarify the exact steps you tried, that didn't work out for you?

Also, any additional info as to the issue you're experiencing, the OS on the device you're using, and Dropbox version are most definitely welcome. We need all the info we can get, in order to get to the bottom of this.

Keep me posted!

Achieved Media

Still can´t get this to work. There´s no option to switch from finder to desktop app under the preferences

Hi @Achieved Media, could you clarify if you're referring to the old Dropbox desktop application interface, which is no longer available, or just opening the app to view the preferences?

chrismast12

I'm also attempting to set my Desktop files to sync while being available offline. That used to be available in the Dropbox App. As a finder only, the option is not there. Meaning whenever I download a new file on my desktop, it syncs it but I have to open the file to make it available offline.

Hey @chrismast12, if you right-click on a file and choose to "make (it) available offline" it should stay available for you to access at any time, however thanks for your feedback on this.

I will make sure to pass it along to our team.

chrismast12

Thank you - but I'm referring to making the entire "folder" of my Desktop available offline. I realize I can click on a single file at a time to make it offline, I want the whole Desktop, by default, to be available offline -- like it used to be.

Hi @chrismast12, are you not able to mark the entire Dropbox folder as available offline on your device?

chrismast12

There is no dropbox folder. It's just a finder window with Dropbox default selected (in favorites column on left side) all of my files listed in their normal finder set of folders.