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simone_zini97
Inspiring
January 29, 2026
Answered

lrcat-lrdata corrupted, cannot save ai edits

  • January 29, 2026
  • 3 replies
  • 120 views

My lrcat-lrdata folder is corrupted, online i read to delete it and lightroom would reacreate it but it did not fix the issue. Now if I open the pictures in the develop module i see an uknown error shown but my edits are loaded as the values are shown on the slider but they are greyed out. I contacted support but they told me to remove and reimport the pictures but it’s quite useless as I would lose all my work and all the settings since they are not saved as xmp. I cannot export the xmps now and it says I/O error if i try to do so.

    Correct answer simone_zini97

    Issue fied after the last update

    3 replies

    Anshul_Saini
    Community Manager
    Anshul_SainiCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    February 23, 2026

    Hi @simone_zini97,

     

    Sorry for the delayed response, and thank you for the detailed explanation.

     

    Before doing anything destructive, please check the following:

    • Ensure the catalog and image files are on the internal or health drive

    • Confirm the drive is not full and not set to read-only

    • Make sure you have full read/write permissions on the .lrcat file, .lrcat-data / .lrdata folders and the image folders.

     

    Next steps to try safely

    • Close Lightroom

    • Make a copy of your current .lrcat file (backup manually)

    • Open Lightroom and run File > Optimize Catalog

     

    And you did the right & important thing of not reimporting images at this stage.

     

    If Optimize fails or you still get I/O errors. Please let me know:

    • Copy & paste system info from the help menu.

    • Whether the catalog & images are on an external drive, internal, or network drive/ server

    • Whether this started after a crash or update

     

    Let’s approach this carefully.

     

    Regards,

    Anshul Saini

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    simone_zini97Author
    Inspiring
    February 23, 2026

    Thank you, however the issue was probably a bug that got fixed with an update as I wrote in the other reply 

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      simone_zini97AuthorCorrect answer
      Inspiring
      January 29, 2026

      Issue fied after the last update

        JohanElzenga
        Community Expert
        JohanElzengaCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        January 29, 2026

        That does not sound like a corruption of lrcat-data, but possibly of the catalog file (.lrcat) itself. Do you have a recent catalog backup that you can use to replace both the .lrcat and the .lrcat-data?

        -- Johan W. Elzenga
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        simone_zini97Author
        Inspiring
        February 23, 2026

        No I did not because it was a recent catalog, however I recreated the same issue with an other catalog and his backup and was not helpful. An update fixed the issue so it was probably a bug in handling the missing lrdata. Also I did not had backups because they include the lrcat-data and I had no space for the lrdata. 

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