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ChumFusion
Participant
August 17, 2025
Question

Bring Back Keyboard Shortcut Sync in Photoshop

  • August 17, 2025
  • 3 replies
  • 181 views

Dear Adobe team and community,

I’d like to raise an important topic about workflow efficiency in Photoshop.
In 2025, many of us work across multiple devices and within teams, and it feels outdated that we still have to manually export .kys files to keep our keyboard shortcuts consistent.

Previously, Photoshop had Sync Settings, but it was removed. Right now, there’s no modern, intuitive way to automatically sync or share custom shortcuts through Creative Cloud.

👉 Please bring back and modernize keyboard shortcut synchronization via Creative Cloud.
It would save professionals a lot of time and frustration, and align with the cloud workflows Adobe is already promoting.

If you agree this feature is needed, please support this post so Adobe sees how important it is for the community.

Thank you 🙏

3 replies

Trevor.Dennis
Community Expert
Trevor.DennisCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 29, 2025

This would probably not work with multiple devices.  Leastways not if they have different screen sizes, and/or some used more than one screen and some didn't, but for a single user you can save shortcuts and toolbars in custom workspaces.

With other presets I keep them in a central location and place shortcuts to that location in the presets folders, but with Workspaces, I copy the updated .psw files to the other versions.

 

 

 

 

Trevor.Dennis
Community Expert
Trevor.DennisCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 29, 2025

I meant to add that the Summerize feature is very useful.  It creates a nicely laid out .html file that you can share.

These are Window > Arrange shortcuts that I got from a Michael Ninness workshop at MAX about ten years ago.  You'll notice that it uses the Free Transform > Step & Repeat shortcut, so I switch back to the Essentials workspace when I need that.  That is one of the things that makes saving shortcuts to workspaces so powerful.

 

Anshul_Saini
Community Manager
Anshul_SainiCommunity Manager
Community Manager
August 28, 2025

Hi @ChumFusion,


Thanks for reaching out. I’ve moved your post from Ideas to Discussions, since this isn’t a new feature request but rather a workflow question about how Photoshop currently handles keyboard shortcuts.


You might be thinking of Preset Sync, which existed in earlier Photoshop versions but was discontinued starting with Photoshop 25.0 (September 2023). That feature allowed the syncing of items like brushes, swatches, gradients, shapes, etc.


Keyboard shortcuts can still be migrated between machines, but it’s a manual process. Here’s how:
 • Save your custom shortcut set in Photoshop (Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts… > Save As). This creates a .kys file.
 • On macOS, place that file in:
~/Users/<your-username>/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop <version>/Presets/Keyboard Shortcuts/
 • On Windows, place it in:
C:\Users\<your-username>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop <version>\Presets\Keyboard Shortcuts\
 • Relaunch Photoshop and you’ll see the saved set available in the Keyboard Shortcuts dropdown.


Best,

Anshul Saini

C
ChumFusionAuthor
Participant
August 17, 2025

This feature request is relevant for both Windows and macOS users.
If you also find it frustrating to manually copy .kys files, please support this idea by clicking Upvote 👍 or leaving a +1 in the comments.

The more voices we gather, the higher the chance Adobe will bring back and modernize keyboard shortcut sync. 🚀

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