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Confusion about Dropbox folder and CloudStorage Folder (MacOS)

I'm using Dropbox on a MBP (26.2) and have started having hard drive space issues. In trying to troubleshoot I come across the CloudStorage folder in the Library folder which appears to be occupying almost the same amount of space as my Dropbox folder which is currently in my User Folder.

How does the CloudStorage folder function? It appears to be a mirror of the Dropbox folder, but I'm confused as to why it's occupying so much hard drive space. It almost appears as though the Dropbox files on my computer as opposed to being in the cloud are being stored twice.

Thanks for your help.

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Rich

WaxMillians wrote:
... I come across the CloudStorage folder in the Library folder which appears to be occupying almost the same amount of space as my Dropbox folder which is currently in my User Folder.

Are you sure they're not the same folder? In the newest update for Dropbox, Apple requires that the Dropbox folder be located within the Cloud Storage folder (Apple File Provider API). If you're running the latest update your files would be in Cloud Storage/Dropbox.

Right-click each folder and select Get Info. Check where each folder is actually located (full path). Are they both real folders or is one just an alias to the other?

WaxMillians

This is going to sound bizarre, but when I want into my hard drive to verify the paths, the Dropbox folder in the CloudStorage folder has since disappeared. I use DaisyDisk to scan my hard drive and it was finding both the Dropbox folder in my User folder as well as the Dropbox folder in the CloudStorage folder.

Before I posted my question, I could clearly see both folders with the one in my User folder showing roughly 143GB used and the one in the CloudStorage folder showing a slightly different total. I'm not currently using the Apple File Provider API. Apparently I'll need to update for that to happen.

WaxMillians

It gets odder is that my personal MBP (the other was my work laptop) also has duplicate Dropbox folders in my user folder and the CloudStorage folder in the Library folder. I'm wondering if that one will disappear as well. I'm thinking I'll carve out the time tomorrow to update Dropbox to shift to File Provider.

Alex7000

Im experiencing this exact same problem and now my computer is over full and things are crashing. is there any advice on how to deal with this? im considering full reinstall of OS X I really dont want to do that but cannot see how or why my dropbox is trying to double up its disk space

Alex7000

ive also used daisy disk to find files.. could that be the culprit?

elbo1

This is happening to me too and I'm now going to follow this thread.

All of a sudden there is a spike of storage usage (500gb!) in a seemingly temporary Library > CloudStorage > Dropbox folder.

May be a processing problem with cloud services from Apple/Mac. When it's done processing, the folder disappears and the storage comes back.

The problem has gone away now, but I will report back if it happens again and I find a fix.

Second time it happens in 2 days and I can't tell if it's a corrupt file or corrupt cloud service processing...

DRC42

I'm observing the same thing on my M4 Mini with Sequoia 15.7.5. I had about 1 TB of free space on a 4 TB drive, but I ran out of disk space suddenly yesterday afternoon, which caused applications to start crashing. I looked at the disk usage, and ~/Dropbox was taking up 1.7 TB as expected. However, a new ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox folder was taking up 1.2 TB. I rebooted, and the ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox folder disappeared after a few minutes. However, now the issue is back this afternoon.

My hypothesis is that Dropbox is trying to move its folder into ~/Library/CloudStorage in the background, is running out of disk space, and is handling the issue very poorly. There is a word for computer programs that do stuff like that without your input. It's called a "virus", and I sincerely hope that the Dropbox programmers realize how offensive it is to their users when a service we are paying for does this without obtaining our consent or even notifying us.

DRC42

Update: I logged out in the app, restarted it, and logged back in. Now ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox is gone, and my disk space is back to normal. Note that I have not opted into Dropbox on File Provider, which is what moves your Dropbox folder into ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox. Perhaps a buggy app update tried to move the Dropbox folder as if I had opted in, even though I hadn't.

elbo1

Weird, Dropbox offers me to sign up for File Provider, which indicates that I am not already signed up, yet I was having these problems.... Maybe I will avoid it all together just in case.

I did what you did and signed out of Dropbox, restarted it, and reselected files for sync from scratch and the problem seems to have gone away for now, which is good.

I also uninstalled and reinstalled Adobe Creative Cloud and all of the relevant software because Photoshop was triggering the problem for some reason.

Also (safely) deleted a heavy cache folders in my library from an old version of After Effects which helped clear 100gb of storage.

Hoping it's fixed now 🤞🏽

DRC42

I am also a Creative Cloud user. How do you know that Photoshop was triggering the issue?

elbo1

I don't know for certain, but both times my laptop all of a sudden depleted itself of storage and started crashing, I noticed it was when I had just started using Photoshop. And I had other Adobe software open at the same time.

I think because Photoshop uses a lot of memory maybe, it just tipped everything over the edge when there was a problem present.

Doing an uninstall/reinstall/refresh of everything to do with Dropbox and Adobe included, and a clearing of unneeded storage across my whole laptop, I think, is what really solved it for me (so far...).

Remaining hopeful.

kateparker7788

It definitely looks like you’re seeing double, but don't worry your files aren't actually taking up twice the space. This is a common point of confusion with the newer macOS updates and how Dropbox had to change its file structure.

Here’s what’s happening and how to handle it:

The "Mirror" Effect: To comply with Apple's latest security requirements (the File Provider API), Dropbox moved its "real" location to ~/Library/CloudStorage/. The folder you see in your User Folder is now just a symlink (a shortcut) that points to that new location.

Storage Reporting: macOS often struggles to calculate the size of these linked folders correctly. It might report that both folders are taking up 50GB, but the system's "purgeable" logic knows it's only one set of data.

The Solution: If you genuinely need to free up space, don't try to delete one of the folders manually. Instead, right-click your Dropbox folder or specific subfolders and select "Make Online-Only." This removes the local data while keeping the file visible in your Finder.

If you check your "About This Mac" storage breakdown, you’ll likely see the actual "Available" space is higher than what those two folders suggest when added together.

DRC42

No, in both cases we have not opted into Dropbox for File Provider. ~/Dropbox is not a symlink. It's our actual Dropbox folder. We are not "seeing double." Our Macs are actually running out of space and causing apps to crash. When this happens, I have verified that ~/Dropbox and ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox have different inodes, i.e. that they are different directories.

DRC42

The other reason I know that I'm not "seeing double" is that ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox doesn't contain all of the contents of ~/Dropbox. It really does behave as if something was trying to move ~/Dropbox into ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox behind the scenes and ran out of disk space. My Dropbox folder is 1.7 TB, but there is 1.1 TB of free disk space, so not enough to copy it. Whatever was causing this issue copied 1.1 TB of the data from ~/Dropbox to ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox, ran out of disk space, and stopped. Then it eventually removed ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox after I rebooted, logged out of Dropbox, then logged back in.

thomashighbaugh

Depending on how we define buggy, essentially yeah.

They were being lazy and bundled the symlink command into it not realizing that Apple was also equally lazy and doesn't optimize the file manager central to its OS to account for symlinks (which are you go to a location and its a portal to where the file actually is you fall through, huge part of Unix based systems).