Disable Cloud Storage In Lightroom Classic and Photoshop

[Galena1]

Hi All - Had PS and LR Classic for some time but only recently starting to use them. Both are up to date.  OS is Win 11.

Is what follows an option?  I have thousands of photos and it would cost me far more than I want to pay to store them in the Cloud.  I want to use LRC to catalogue and manage my images.  Ideally I want to disable the Cloud involvement in both PS and LRC if this is possible.  Any information on how to disable the Cloud, assuming it's an option, would be very welcome in the simplest of formats as my IT skills are limited.  Step by step would be really appreciated.  I've tried following various post on this site but only become increasingly confuse.

Kindest Regards - Bob

Bob

[dj_paige · Accepted solution]

Ideally I want to disable the Cloud involvement in both PS and LRC if this is possible.

The default is that Lightroom Classic doesn't share photos with the Adobe cloud. This cloud sharing should not be enabled by default, it will not be on unless somehow YOU have specifically turned it on. Just using Lightroom Classic does not store your photos in the cloud, and even if you had accidentally turned this on without realizing it, these photos that are accidentally shared by Lightroom Classic will not count towards your 20GB limit, and so if you went over the limit with your Lightroom Classic photos, there is no charge.

Do not confuse Lightroom and Lightroom Classic, everything just said applies to Lightroom Classic (LrC icon). If you are using Lightroom (Lr icon), then you have a problem if your photos take up more space than allowed; probably you would get an error before they charged you more money. Sounds like the best thing for you is to not use Lightroom (Lr icon) — don't even bother installing it.

You can check to see if sharing photos in the Adobe Cloud enabled or disabled in your Lightroom Classic by clicking on the cloud icon at the top right (if it is not there, press F5) and make sure it says "Sync Paused".

Cloud icon shown here:

[Jim Wilde]

I have thousands of photos and it would cost me far more than I want to pay to store them in the Cloud.  I want to use LRC to catalogue and manage my images. 

By @Galena1

If you are going to continue to use Lightroom Classic, you can turn off cloud syncing as @dj_paige has explained. But do note that you can sync all the images in your LrC catalog to the cloud and it won't cost you a penny/cent. That's because LrC will only upload Smart Preview "proxies" of your images to the cloud, and these currently do not count at all against your existing cloud storage allowance. Smart Previews are 2560px on the long edge, which are generally good enouigh for viewing and light editing using any of the cloud-centric Lightroom apps.

I'm not advocating that you use the cloud in this way, just letting you know that if you want to use it in the future it is currently free when syncing from LrC.

[Galena1]

Firstly, Apologies for the delay in responding .... it's an age thing!  It is LR Classic I have.  Thanks very much to dj_paige and Jim Wilde for your very clear and helpful answers, they are appreciated.

Kindest Regards