Is It Safe to Delete ~/Library/CloudStorage on a Mac?
~/Library/CloudStorageNo, do not delete ~/Library/CloudStorage. This folder holds the live, synced copies of your Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive files, and deleting anything inside it deletes the same files from the cloud. If the folder looks huge, the fix is to make files online-only in each provider's own app, not to remove the folder.
What it is
Since macOS 12.1, cloud storage apps that use Apple's File Provider framework keep their synced files in ~/Library/CloudStorage. Each provider gets its own subfolder, named something like GoogleDrive-yourname@gmail.com, Dropbox-Personal, or OneDrive-YourCompany. The Google Drive or Dropbox icon you see in the Finder sidebar is really a shortcut into this folder.
The size can be misleading. Many of the files inside are placeholders: they show their full size in Finder but occupy almost no disk space until you open them. Files you have opened recently, or marked for offline access, are downloaded for real and do take space. That mix is why the folder can appear to be 50 GB or more while your disk usage tells a different story, and also why it genuinely balloons when a provider downloads everything for offline use.
Is it safe to delete?
Treat this folder as off-limits. It is not a cache. The files inside are your actual documents, and the sync engine watches it constantly. Drag a file from CloudStorage to the Trash and the provider syncs that deletion to the cloud and to every other device on the account. Delete a provider's whole subfolder and you risk mass-deleting your cloud drive, or at minimum breaking the sync app until you sign in again.
Diskmack deliberately does not scan inside this folder, because walking it could force macOS to download your entire cloud drive. The safe way to reclaim space here is eviction: telling the provider to keep a file in the cloud only, which removes the local download but leaves the file itself untouched. Every major provider has a one-click option for this.
How to check its size
In Finder: In Finder, choose Go > Go to Folder, paste ~/Library/CloudStorage and press Return. Select a provider's subfolder and press Cmd+I. Compare the two numbers in the Info window: the headline size counts placeholder files at full size, while "on disk" reflects what is actually stored locally.
In Terminal:
du -sh ~/Library/CloudStorage/*The ~ expands to your home folder. du reports real on-disk usage per provider, so it is often far smaller than what Finder shows. If a subfolder name contains spaces the glob still handles it.
How to clean it
- Open ~/Library/CloudStorage in Finder (Go > Go to Folder) and open the provider subfolder that is taking space.
- For Google Drive: right-click large files or folders and choose Remove Download, or set Offline access to "Online only". In the Drive app's settings, make sure it is set to stream files rather than mirror them.
- For Dropbox: right-click the item and choose Make Online-Only. On paid plans, Dropbox's preferences can also make files you haven't opened in a while online-only automatically.
- For OneDrive: right-click the item and choose Free Up Space.
- If you no longer use a provider, sign out and uninstall its app the normal way. macOS removes that provider's subfolder for you, and your files stay safe in the cloud.
- Empty the Trash afterward if you removed an app, since app bundles sit there until you do.
Never move or delete files inside CloudStorage to save space. The sync engine treats that as a real deletion and pushes it to the cloud. Eviction (online-only) is the only move that frees disk without touching your data.
Will it come back?
The folder stays as long as any File Provider app is installed, and it will grow again through normal use. Every file you open gets downloaded locally, and some providers keep recently used files on disk for speed. If you mark everything for offline access, the folder grows toward the full size of your cloud account. Making files online-only is something you will do occasionally, not once, unless your provider evicts unused files on its own.
Common questions
Why does Finder say CloudStorage is huge when my disk isn't that full?
Finder counts placeholder files at their full cloud size. A 4 GB video that lives online-only shows as 4 GB in Finder but uses almost nothing on disk. Run du -sh on the folder in Terminal, or check the "on disk" figure in Get Info, to see the real local footprint.
If I delete files inside CloudStorage, are they gone from the cloud too?
Yes, the deletion syncs. If you already did this, check the provider's web trash right away. Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive all keep deleted files for at least 30 days on personal plans, often longer on business plans, before removing them for good.
Can I move ~/Library/CloudStorage to an external drive?
No. macOS puts it inside your home folder's Library and offers no setting to relocate it. Some providers let you exclude folders from syncing or change cache settings in their own preferences, which is the supported way to shrink it.
What happens if I uninstall Google Drive or Dropbox?
The provider's subfolder disappears from CloudStorage, along with any local downloads. Your files remain in the cloud account untouched. Reinstall and sign in later and the subfolder comes back.