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Participant
July 17, 2026
Question

No access to smart previews in Cloud after deleting them locally

  • July 17, 2026
  • 2 replies
  • 9 views

Hello there,

I am syncing certain Albums in Lightroom Classic to the cloud and some of them have become too big and since I do not need all the smart previews stored locally all the time I deleted them to save space on my computer. But now these pictures are simply shown as not available when my server (where they are stored) is not connected even though these albums are in the cloud – so with Lightroom CC on my Mac, Lightroom on my iPad or even any browser I can still edit these pictures – obviously because they’re stored as smart previews within the Adobe Cloud. But only Lightroom Classic acts like it does not have access to it and needs the originals or at least needs locally stored smart previews to edit or even view these pictures without the original files… is that some kind of bug or am I not getting it?

 

    2 replies

    JohanElzenga
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    July 17, 2026

    Lightroom Classic always needs locally stored originals or smart previews to edit a picture, regardless of what’s in the cloud. Your screenshot shows you have neither. The original is missing and you deleted your smart previews. If you did not delete the originals as well, then you must ‘reconnect’ them: https://www.lightroomqueen.com/lightroom-photos-missing-fix/

    -- Johan W. Elzenga
    Sameer K
    Community Manager
    Community Manager
    July 17, 2026

    Hey, @felix_2993. Welcome to the Lightroom Classic Community. I'll help you figure this out.


    Were these images originally synced from Lightroom Classic to Lightroom Web? Do these images appear correctly when opened in the Develop Module? Where were these images deleted from? Within Lightroom, or Lightroom Classic? Or did you manually delete the folder contatining previews outside of Lightroom?


    If the images open correctly in the Develop Module, you can simply swtich back to Library Module > Library menu at the top > Previews & generate desired previews for selected images (standard, since storage is to be considered).


    Thanks!
    Sameer K
    (Type '@' and type my name to mention me when you reply)