Here’s a funny thing about Apple: When they introduce new features—like Desktop and Documents syncing under Sierra, say—I think they’re not always the best at communicating what’s going to happen, especially considering that new options are often on by default. I’ve had a lot of users complain about being asked to buy extra iCloud storage because they didn’t understand what they were agreeing to when they clicked through Sierra’s installation screens and accidentally left the “Store files from Documents and Desktop in iCloud Drive” toggle on. Whoops.
If that’s the situation you find yourself in (or if you’re just not getting any use out of the feature!), you should know that there’s a simple way to turn this syncing off, but it’s a bit…weird…in how it works. To get started, you’ll click on the Apple Menu at the upper-left corner of your screen, pick “System Preferences” from that menu, and then click “iCloud.” When that opens, click on the “Options” button next to “iCloud Drive.”
On the next screen, you’ll see the choice we’re looking for right at the top.
If you turn that checkbox off, you’ll get a warning:
Here’s what I think is pretty odd. As that dialog box explains, turning off Desktop and Documents syncing will remove those folders from your Mac, leaving them only in iCloud Drive. As you can imagine, that’ll mean that the contents of your Desktop and Documents folders will vanish, and if you didn’t read what you were agreeing to there, this could mean a moment of panic. Or many moments of panic! But it’s all OK, because after we turn this off, we can still download all of our stuff and put it right back where it came from. So let’s do it! Click on “Turn Off” on that box and watch your files disappear before your eyes. Helpfully, though, you’ll get a reassuring pop-up afterward:
If you click “Show in Finder” there, you’ll be taken to the place where all your files went—under the “iCloud Drive” section in Finder’s sidebar.
From here, you can drag items out of those Desktop and Documents folders and back into their locations on your Mac (which will in turn remove them from iCloud Drive). Or if you’re regretting your decision, you can also go back to System Preferences > iCloud> iCloud Drive > Options and turn the feature back on, which’ll plop all the files right back into their original locations. (And just so you know, you can log in to iCloud.com to download your files as well if you’d rather do that for some reason.)
And now is a good time to point out that you should definitely have a backup or three before you attempt anything like this, right? Right. You should have a backup or three anyway, but I figure you all know how I feel about that by now.
In case you don’t, though: MAKE A BACKUP BECAUSE I SAID SO. RIGHT NOW. Okey-doke?
I have a 2010 Macbook Pro and a 2020 iMac. I went to look for some music files I thought I had on the laptop, but when I searched for them they were only to be found in “icloud->desktop->personal stuff->sound” so I tried to download the folder (I assume that icloud drive is cloud-based and not a local storage location). A message popped up asking me if I wanted to delete the folder from icloud drive indicating that it would be removed permanently from all locations, so I clicked “cancel.”
I could figure out no way to actually get these files onto the laptop (I tried dragging and dropping the folder) so I could work with them. When I went to my desktop to see if those files appeared in my icloud drive there, none of them appeared, although there was a whole other file structure with different files.
When I returned to the laptop I watched in horror as icloud drive automatically deleted folder after folder and replicated the files and file structure that were on my desktop and now I can’t find any of the files that were in icloud drive through the laptop. During a portion of this automatic rearranging process a tiny cloud appeared next to the folder on the laptop and when I hovered over the cloud it said “downloading” – until it was gone… I find nothing in downloads on my laptop…
Desktop and document syncing is not selected on either machine.
Any help or insight would be greatly appreciated.
Wow. Stumbled upon this site where looking for help to keep my docs and desktop out of iCloud. I kept having to re-assign access to every document I wanted to move or edit!
Concise clarity with confidence. Thank you so much !!
Thank you so much for this information—it helped me tremendously. I’ve been searching for an explanation like this for quite a while, and iCloud had completely disrupted my files. Your explanation finally helped me understand what was going on. You’re awesome, and I’m looking forward to checking out more of your content!