P: How to fix Photoshop Scratch Disks Full Error?

[samarthsrivastav]

I am running Photoshop CC on my MacBook Air with macOS Sierra. Every time I attempt to open Photoshop through any means, the following message appears: "Could not initialize Photoshop because the scratch disks are full", and Photoshop does not open. I tried clearing space from my Mac in general including several GB worth of apps and removing several cache files, but nothing seems to work. I also tried holding down the command and option keys to reveal the Scratch Disk Preferences, and it lets me select the Startup and MacIntosh HD. Again, nothing worked. Anyone know how to fix this message, and/or clear scratch disk space?

{Moderator note: Edited the thread title PS-65057}

[Gast]

Hi

Do you have another disk that you can allocate as the scratch disk, how much free space do you actually have

[mollierut12]

thanks for replying, I have added a screenshot

[SJRiegel]

You can purge temp files with Photoshop open. Edit > Purge > All.

This might buy you enough space to allow the current file to be saved. Afterwards, you will want to clean up your drive so that you do not continually run into this problem.

[mollierut12]

forgive me for sounding stupid, but what will purge do?

[SJRiegel]

While you are working, Photoshop saves temp files on the scratch disk. Purge will clear them out, potentially freeing up enough disk space to allow the saving process to occur.

[mollierut12]

great, i will give it a go thanks!

[mollierut12]

LIFE SAVER, documents saved, now time to clean out the disk, thanks again!

[Gast]

You only have 3.8 GB of Free space

[Lumigraphics]

You need to buy an external hard drive pronto.

[neegedee]

Hi all.

I am trying to change the scratch disk to my external hard drive by going to preferences> Scratch disks etc but my External HD isn't showing as an option and it won't allow me to de-select the Mac HD option either. Even when I launch PS and press Command + option it doesn't show my external HD as an option.

I had to spend ages deleting a load of files from my HD in order to free up space, but I have an ext HD with tons of space so I would like to use that instead.

I'm using Photoshop CC 2020 - Macbook Pro Catalina v 10.15.2

Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

[happie_97]

Try restarting Photoshop while holding option and command (Mac) or CTRL and Alt (PC)

See if you can choose your drive.

[r-bin]

For windows, you can do this

For Mac, I don’t know where the registry analog is, where you can specify the parameters for Photoshop.

[lambiloon]

Hi check following video hope it helps you ..... Regards

Fix! Scratch disks are full in photoshop 2021

[andrey.noskov]

hey, i had the same problem - the external drive just won't show up in the list of possible scratch disks. what i found is that your external drive shouldn't be fat32 but os-x-extended, that's the reason. so you're left with two options: you either format your drive into mac's file system or give up. x

[g-harv]

Done and done.  Solved it for me right there ^^^.  Thank you.

[modelgig]

Both of my external disks are exFAT for my Mac and PS still won't recognize them to use as scratch disks no matter what I try.

[D Fosse]

You can't use exFAT with the newer versions of MacOS. You need to use APFS.

[modelgig]

Good to know, thank you so much.

[student Vince34494457zj5y]

Oh my god you are a savior dude, this saved my butt. So much pointless research that could've been avoided. 

To any adobe mofos reading this, your scratch disk tutorial sucks. 

Andrew, thanks again. 

[Mohit Goyal · Accepted solution]

Hi all,

We're sorry for the scratch disk issue. Take a look at the following troubleshooting article which can help you to resolve the "Scratch disk is full" error: Troubleshoot scratch disk full errors in Photoshop

Please have a look and let us know if that helps.

Thanks,

Mohit

[SAA ITD]

HI,

I am running PS 2020 on a Windows 7 and I seemed unable to select my scratch disk from the edit> Preferences>Scratch Disk. I even tried to rename the PS settings folder in the user roaming profile and did a clt-alt keystroke before launching the program, but alas to no avail. 

Anyone has any suggestions?

Appreciate any help.

Thanks

newbie here 

[D Fosse]

Do you actually have another disk? If so, what kind, how is it connected? How is it formatted? If external, are you reconnecting it so that the drive letter changes? (that can be avoided by assigning a high letter).

[SAA ITD]

HI ,

To refurish more info, my W7 has 1 SDD and 1 SATA. I am planning to use the SATA disk as scratch disk since it has > 800 Gb of free space. This disk is formatted as NTFS and as admin, I have full rights to the disk, meaning I am able to read/write and even format the disk. This SATA disk is a 2nd disk meant for storage and it is not holding any system files.

[Mohit Goyal]

Hi there,

We're sorry for the trouble. What is the external drive format that you are trying to use as a Scratch disk?

Do you see the drive is listed under Scratch disk in Photoshop preferences? The drive format should be one of these NTFS, exFAT, FAT32 to use as Scratch disk in Photoshop.

Thanks,

Mohit

[SAA ITD]

Hi,

I've managed to resolve my issue. Apparently, I need to change the Enviromnet variables under the Advanced system settings to route TEMP and TMP to my secondary disk and do a reboot before I get to see the scratch disk is routed to my desired drive.

Thanks