Dropbox files now take up double space on my Mac

Hi there!

So today, just out of nowhere, I noticed all my Dropbox files have gone online-only. So I click on the clouds with the arrow down to download them to my MacBook. However, I noticed that as it's downloading, it's taking up space as well!!!

I had 110GB of space with all the Dropbox files on my local computer. Now that everything shows online only and I'm downloading to my local computer, I'm losing space for things that were on my local computer. It's like every file is taking space twice.

This is an issue I had before, and with the Dropbox major update recently for macboks, that problem got resolved, and I ended up suddenly with 50GB extra space.

I'm using Macbook Pro M2 (2022).

MacOS Ventura Version 13.2.1 (22D68)

About Dropbox: V179.4.4985

I never use the online-only feature. I tried once last year, it moved my files online only but didn't make any space. And when I downloaded back to my computer, it started taking more space. GOD save me from this ....

This was on 'online only' and I returned it back to available offline. Yes, I'm 100% I didn't change that setting earlier today. I went online only automatically.

I removed the Dropbox and reinstalled it, that didn't change anything.

Early release feature is also off.

Desktop

Mac

Sync

Nancy
Dropbox Staff
2 years ago
Hi armin_alimardani, and thanks for posting here.

To check this further, I’d like one more screenshot of what you see here, and one more showing the space taken by the Dropbox folder on your Mac computer.

Also, can you clarify when exactly your desktop app started showing as beta, even though you’re on the stable app version? Did this happen after installing the latest Dropbox update for macOS?

Keep me posted!
- armin_alimardani
  Explorer | Level 4
  2 years ago
  Thanks Nancy. Here's the image you wanted:
  About the beta, I never noticed it until yesterday. Then I re-installed it, and still it's still there.
  I can't check the Dropbox file size, it says zero. I tried everything, I can't get it.
  My App folder it says it's taking 220GB, but I calculated it can max be 100GB. Then as I was writing this I checked again my Apps folder went down significantly, the System Data was went up, then in one second the numbers swapped again.
  
  I just read this on Dropbox page:
  Note: If your computer is low on hard drive space, these files can automatically change to online-only to free up space.
  
  Is this what happened? I read this is a bug that Dropbox gives wrong notification that your'l low on space. I'm pretty sure I had 110-120GB space.
  
  And this is how the status of folder in my Dropbox look:
  - azodl
    Helpful | Level 5
    2 years ago
    I had something similar happen to me starting a day or two ago. I now notice that many of my files are online only when I know they are on my mac (offline). And yeah, when I set them to offline again, they download again to my mac and take away space from my hard drive (doubling the size, like you said). I also have "beta" showing at the top of the dropbox window, like you do (and it's been like that for a long time).
    
    I don't believe it's hard drive space issue like you are asking, as I have 500 gigs available and there would be no need for files to suddenly start making themselves online only.
    
    I also am now getting green checkmarks for the suddenly "online only" files that I reset to "offline". After the official update to the cloud library thing, those didn't even exist. If I simply open a file to make it offline again, I don't get the green checkmark, though, it only happens when setting to "offline".
    
    Here is a screenshot of what I mean. Anything WITHOUT a green checkmark or WITHOUT the little cloud icon is simply is on my computer like it's supposed to be (offline). The one green checkmark item shown in the screenshot is the picture I had to set to "offline" again and now suddenly it shows with the checkmark. The one item showing with the little cloud icon is one of the pictures that is suddenly showing as "online only" when I never changed it to that, it is on my computer. If I were to set that to "offline" or simply open it it would take up double the space.