Can I safely delete old catalogs?

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
August 21, 2024
2 replies
1807 views

My Lightroom catalogs folder has a number of older versions within it.

eg Lightroom Catalog.lrcat; Lightroom Catalog-v13.lrcat; Lightroom Catalog-v13-4.lrcat.

Can I delete the earlier versions, with their data, without impacting on the latest version?

Thanks

Steve

macOS

This topic has been closed for replies.

Correct answer Michael J. Hoffman

You can safely delete the older ones without impacting the current one. However, be sure you have a backup of your current version.

S

Stretchini

Participant

I'm newish to Mac and have heaps of LRC files etc. Not sure what I can delete from this list. Latest cat is v13-3-3. Thanks for any advice!

Rob_Cullen

Community Expert

Wow, @Stretchini You really need to keep a closer eye on your catalogs and any upgrades to the catalog that happen.

In your screen-clip your current master catalog seems to be { Lightroom Catalog v13-3-3.LRCAT }, but you also have other catalogs like {BIRDS FROM PC.LRCAT}

{ Lightroom Catalog v13-3-3.LRCAT } is the catalog that was recently upgraded with Version 14 of Lr-Classic (it has that 14th Oct dated backup ZIP), and it appears to be the largest of all your catalogs.

(Note: The v14 upgrade does not rename your catalog- that is now done from a Menu item in LrC.)

So two suggestions-

1) MOVE and STORE all your ZIP backups to another separate physical disk. They MUST NOT be on the same disk as your working catalog.!

2) KEEP any file that ends with "v13-3-3" in the filename, in its current location.

3) MOVE anything else to an archive location that can be deleted later when you are certain that all your photos and edits are contained in { Lightroom Catalog v13-3-3.LRCAT }. Decide if you want to keep the other Catalogs like {BIRDS FROM PC.LRCAT}.

Regards. My System: Windows-11, Lightroom-Classic 15.0, Photoshop 27.0, ACR 18.0, Lightroom 9.0, Lr-iOS 10.4.0, Bridge 16.0 .

S

Stretchini

Participant

Hi Rob,
Thanks so much for your clear and erudite suggestions. I had a bit of a
brain fade when I switched to Mac! I'll let you know how I go. Cheers!