Lightroom CC keeps local originals that have been deleted from the cloud

[four12]

Hi -

I am finding that Lightroom CC is keeping copies of my original photos in my local backup after deleting them from the cloud.  Is this normal?

I have "Store a copy of all originals at the specified locations" enabled, so I expect to see copies of my original RAW files stored locally, but after importing a bunch of photos and only keeping one, the deleted photos are still in the local backup.

[JP Hess]

That is the expected behavior. You must manage your local backups separately.

[four12]

Hmm.  Thanks for the info.

What a massive pain, though.  I'll upload 100+ photos from a day's shooting and only keep 3 or 4.  The bloat in the "originals" directory will quickly become untenable.  Wish I'd known that before switching from Classic to CC. 

[JP Hess]

In Lightroom Classic, if you were choosing the option to store a second copy, I think you will find the behavior was the same. The second copy is not managed by Lightroom Classic at all. It is only a unattached backup of everything that you downloaded from the card/camera. It is designed that way so that in case you inadvertently delete something you can recover from the backup. Otherwise, If you mistakenly delete from your working folder you wouldn't be able to recover from your backup. After all, that is what the backup is for, besides protecting against hard drive crashes.