Keyword issue with thousands of photos

Forum|Forum|3 hours ago
October 7, 2026
4 replies
19 views

Hello, Can somebody help me with this. In the beginning, with several thousand photos, I entered keywords without commas, separating the keywords with spaces. In preferences - interface were set to "separate keywords with comma." Now, when exporting to platforms like SmugMug, these photos appear with a bunch of keywords that aren't separated from one another. Is there a way to fix this for multiple photos at once? I tried changing in preference - interface to "separate keywords with space," but that didn't work for existing photos; for new ones, it separates the keywords with commas.
I tried adding new keywords to multiple photos, but it separated the newly added ones with a comma, whereas the previous keywords were not.
Many thanks, Robert

R

Robert33533740pb77Author

Participant

Hi,

I found this. What do you think about ExifTool? Would it replace spaces with commas in the keywords?

Kind regards, Robert

CORCTON34033231

Community Expert

Hi Robert, good questions — on both points:

Folders: the Keyword List panel itself is catalog-wide and cannot be limited to one folder, but you can limit the photos you work on. Click the folder in the Folders panel so the Grid shows only that folder, then open the Library Filter bar (backslash key) > Metadata > Keyword column and select the long keyword there. Now only that folder's photos with that keyword are shown — select all, add the correct separate keywords, and repeat folder by folder. Tip: only delete the old long keyword from the Keyword List once you have finished every folder, because deleting it there removes it from all photos at once.

ExifTool: it edits the keyword tags in the files themselves, and just turning the spaces inside one long keyword into commas does not reliably create separate keywords — in Lightroom a keyword is a list entry, and commas are delimiters, not characters stored inside a keyword. You would have to split that single entry into several separate entries, and Lightroom would not see file changes until you read metadata back from the files, which can overwrite catalog edits. If you test it, back up the catalog and try a few copies first. Honestly, the folder-by-folder fix inside Lightroom above is slower but much safer.

Hope that helps!

R

Robert33533740pb77Author

Participant

Hi,

Thank you very much for the very quick reply; it is greatly appreciated. I just wanted to ask if it is possible to limit the keyword list to a specific folder of photos rather than applying it to all photos in Lightroom. That way, I could organize individual folders separately.
I am using Windows.
It is a pity there isn't a "find and replace" option to replace spaces for commas.

Kind regards, Robert

CORCTON34033231

Community Expert

Hi Robert,

That is exactly what happened: with the separator set to commas, a string typed with only spaces between the words was stored as one single keyword containing spaces. Changing the preference afterwards does not re-split keywords that are already stored — it only affects keywords you enter from then on.

There is no one-click split for existing keywords, but you do not have to fix thousands of photos one by one. Fix it once per distinct long keyword instead:

1. In the Library module (Grid view), find one of those long keywords in the Keyword List panel and click the white arrow on its right. That filters to all photos carrying that keyword.

2. Select all of those photos in the Grid, then in the Keywording panel add the correct individual keywords one at a time (press Enter after each word). Keywords entered this way are applied to all selected photos at once.

3. Only after the new keywords are in place, right-click (Windows) / Control-click (Mac) the old long keyword in the Keyword List and choose Delete. This removes that old keyword from all of those photos at once.

4. Repeat for each distinct long keyword, then re-export the photos.

Official details on applying keywords to multiple photos, filtering by a keyword, and deleting a keyword: https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/help/keywords.html

Hope this helps!

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