How to change or move local storage to a different drive?

Hey there, 
Just had the same problem trying to upload new pictures to Lightroom.
You can change it pretty easyily now. Just go to the tab "Edit" --> Then click on to the Default settings button on the bottom. Then a Window opens up an there you can change the location of where it safes the pictures.

As mentioned on here by others, LR CC doesn't allow you via settings to change where the "previews" folder is (aren't able to set it to a non C drive). I did find a workaround by setting up a symlink (called a directory junction by windows). A symlink (short for symbolic link) is like a shortcut for files and folders. Basically you create a "previews" folder on a different drive, delete your "previews" folder on your C:\ drive then you you create the symlink via the windows command prompt (have to run in administative mode).

Detailed Instructions:

1) Delete your current "previews" folder. Should be located in similar type path:

C:\Users\John Doe\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom CC\Data\e96316ca204f4c848aac8ac9a0f7955a\previews

2) Create a new "previews" folder in your non C: drive. Here's where I created mine:

E:\Program Files\Adobe Lightroom CC\previews

3) Open a command prompt in admin mode. In windows 10, the easest way is to search for CMD in the search bar, right click and run as Administrator

4) Run this command (updating the pathnames to match where your "previews" folders were/are stored:

mklink /J "C:\Users\John Doe\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom CC\Data\e96316ca204f4c848aac8ac9a0f7955a\previews" "E:\Program Files\Adobe Lightroom CC\previews"

You should see a "Junction created" message in the command window. You should also see in your app data folder on your C: a "previews" folder show up with a small arrow to show it's a junction. Now Lightroom will rebuild your previews and store them on the othe r drive.

As stated, there is no way to do this in the Lightroom settings. However, it is possible to set up symbolic link to redirect Lightroom's directory to another location. I found the solution here:

https://techgenix.com/folder-redirections-in-windows/

I recommend reading this page before trying this so you understand how it works!

Here's what I did.

1. I created a new folder on my 😧 drive:  D:\Lightroom\Appdata\Local

2. I navigated to Lightroom's directory, which on Windows is:

C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom CC\Data

3. I copied the contents of the Lightroom directory to my new folder on the 😧 drive

4. I renamed the Lightroom directory from ...\Data to ...\Data.Save

5. I opened an "elevated" (run as admin) command prompt and entered this command:

mklink /J "C:\Users\greyn\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom CC\Data" "D:\Lightroom\Appdata\Local"

Now Lightroom thinks I have a very large C: drive.

The MacOS equivalent of mklink is ln, but I don't know how it's used. Maybe a Mac user can add the procedured here.

I know this is an old question, but I will answer it for posterity. 

While you cannot turn off cloud storage, it is helpful to remember that you can export photos to a local folder once you have edited them then delete the photo from Lightroom itself. 

If you want to process a batch of RAW photos into JPGs and never see them again, you can do a batch edit, send them to a local drive, then delete the Lightroom copies. Deleting the photo from Lightroom will not affect a file that you exported.

Any news on it? Is there any chance that this problem will be solved? LR is absolutely killing my C drive and I have multiple additional drives half empty.