Lighroom end external SSD problem

[Doykov]

Hi, can you tell me why lightroom can't write to my new ADATA 1TB external ssd that I use for all my photo storage. The catalog is on the internal storage of my Macbook Air m1 laptop. The main problem is with the files I am trying to sync with my other devices as you will see from the lightroom message

[JohanElzenga]

How is that disk formatted? Are you perhaps using it on a Windows PC too and is it formatted in NTFS? MacOS can read NTFS, but it cannot write to it.

[Doykov]

The drive is brand new and formatted in exFAT. Mac and Windows both write and read from it.

[JohanElzenga]

The error message is clear. Lightroom does not have permissions to write to the chosen folder. You need to change the permissions of that folder, and all its enclosed items. Try read & write for everyone: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mchlp1203/

[Doykov]

Thank you very much! Your comment was extremely helpful.

[JohanElzenga]

Your screenshot shows that Lightroom Classic has access to 'Files and Folders', but that is not enough these days. Apple changed the security requirements in MacOS Monterey and later. Go to MacOS 'System Settings - Security & Privacy' and add Lightroom Classic to "Full Disk Access" if it is not in there yet or not enabled. See Quick Tips: How to give Full Disk Access to Lightroom Classic on macOS

Do note that full disk access does not mean that Lightroom can override disk or folder permissions, however. So if you still have a problem after this, then check the permissions of that particular disk. You don't do that in System Settings, but by selecting the disk and then type Cmd-i to get the info for that disk, as shown below.