Photoshop brushes disappeared

[rubyxcube]

I had a few hundred brushes on my Photoshop. But today when I opened photoshop, all the brushes were gone, except for the default ones and the ones from the last set that I imported in. When I last imported that set of brushes, I clearly remember the rest of the brushes still being there as I was using some new and old ones together, so I don't think I clicked "reset brushes". Also, I can't change the hardness of the brushes, except for the default ones. I already started re-importing some of the lost brushes, but it'll take too long to do all of them so I would really appreciate it if you could help me with this problem

[Tradeview · Accepted solution]

It's now 2020 and the problem is still here. What is going on? I can't recover any of my hundreds of brushes, only the default brushes are there!

[GGPSonoma]

2022. Brushes are STILL Disapearing! UGH! 9:15 at night. I have HOURS of work left and now I have to create 10 new brushes... grrrrrr.

[AyekCela]

[Possible Solution for some but not the greatest]
This method worked for me. Just to context the my situation for others, I basically logged in (PS 2020) and found all my brushes gone and the default brush folders sitting there. All my personally created custom brushes were pretty much gone.

I tried out this method and searched the file directory (Win10):
C:\Users\(user name)\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop 2020\Adobe Photoshop 2020 Settings
*search bar %appdata% to open hidden appdata folder*

Note that in there is the Brush.psp. If you've been using PS for a long time you'll have older folders of Photoshop, ie Adobe Photoshop 2019 Settings, sitting in the Adobe folder.

I noticed that my PS 2019 brush.psp, a couple months old due to me not updating often, is bigger in filesize and fairly recent. I decided to do a hail mary and copy and paste the old brush.psp in the Adobe Photoshop 2020 Settings. And voila, my brushes were all back.

This is not the greatest solution since this is highly dependent on when that previous brush.psp file was last updated. I was lucky to have my 2019 brush.psp file being only a few months old due to lack of updating but it may be farther back for some. But if you're like me who didn't have abr/backup files of their personal brushes, this may be your last hope. Hope this helps and lesson learned to just back up your brushes.

[patsoo]

Im so thankful for this!!

Its 08.2022 and it just happened to me. I was about to break down and cry - everything gone! No patterns, no brushes, no custom shapes, not even the basic ones! And the preset files were empty.

This is so awful but I managed to copy brush.psp from the 2021 version and replaced the one in 2022 just like you recommended and it worked. The bush.psp from 2022 version was 1 KB size (other files like patterns too)... it really got totally reset somehow, and it was working normally just yesterday... I thank you, really!

[Glenn 8675309]

In photoshop elements I just put the abr files i nthe correct location- they never disappear, 18 means this is the location for PSE 2020-- PSE 2021 is 19.

[Zcotty]

I suffered through this as well, but then the solution (for me at least) was to set PS to start as admin. After that, my brush groups were there every time.

[Hussein22795224248t]

2022 and the problem is still here 
I had 1000+ brushes. they vanished!

[Glenn 8675309]

Put the abr files here:   (restart the editor for them to show up)

C:\Users\User\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Photoshop Elements\20.0\Presets\Brushes

[KimNoDeity]

Same problem

currently 2025 and this just happened, came here looking for a solution that seems non-existent, I had a lot of brushes that were passed to me by a professor I'm no longer in contact with, tried everything and still can't find my brushes or load them. What now?
Can I download more brushes? yes, but its not the same, they were MY brushes, the one thing I worked well with

WHAT NOW? :c

[Aleke]

Hi @KimNoDeity! I'm really sorry to hear your brushes disappeared — that sounds super frustrating, and I totally get how annoying that can be.

Since this thread is a bit older, it might be a good idea to start a new one with all the details of what’s going on. That way, your post won’t get buried and you’ll be more likely to get quick and helpful responses. We're here to help!

Thanks so much!
Alek

[iKlaudi]

I am not afraid to say problem solved!! It was around the time of Covid that I noticed some of my brushes we're not functioning, they were installing even using 'Preset Manager, but I kept on getting a pop-up every time I tried to invoke almost all of my own homemade brushes. Well I've been going through my discs because I put together a brand new computer about three weeks ago and my husband had gifted three discs since 2008 and I installed the one from 2014 my second disc.  I think I have to get to my point really fast I wouldn't doubt words are limited here. I do use an app on Windows 11 I've been using it for years it's called MysticThumbs, Not only does it let you see every image that could be converted to a thumbnail, But it also lets you see your Photoshop brushes (ABR). I just reinstalled my MysticThumbs today and it has a neat little converter in the context menu if you write click on it you can go to thumbnails and you could even choose to convert any any huge picture into an icon or  JPEG or PNG file or bitmap or tif. And the app is not a separate app from Windows it makes it so that you can view all your thumbnails from within Windows Explorer. I went to look at some of my older brushes and they're not very old even some new ones would not open, I thought maybe due to some partition crash which has happened but I don't know what the cause is and I've tried every solution that I read none of which worked. Today, I thought all right click on one of those blank white squares and go to thumbnail scroll down convert convert to JPEG. It invoked something that felt right. at the time I had highlighted three thumbnails that were my most important and as I waited within a minute the three I had created JPEG came up pitch black, but the brushes materialized before my very eyes, and not just the ones that I had converted to JPEG: all of them!! 

so if you have some sort of image converter that will tackle ABR files, DO GIVE IT A TRY!!

it was a pretty lengthy day of discovering brushes that took me hours to create I don't know about patterns I haven't gone through my patterns yet but my brushes was the one thing (I so rely on) & the first thing I noticed that picked up some incompability - I went through all of them today and I think I might've lost a total of four or five brushes, but that's nothing compared to the gigabytes of brushes that I've made [like with the moon, dark clouds at night, my signature,  it's just amazing and everything is back and in the same tree folder in Windows Explorer,.   I might want to change that, maybe  just back it all up on some other SSD.  I'm elated beyond belief,  a really happy camper today and now it's 2025 - back in 2021, a student spilled a drink overtop my tower and fried it.  I had to scrounge and save since 2021 (same year my husband passed away) and it's just about a month that I have everything together and I  finally installed the application, the plug-ins,  the presets, ATNs, ASLs, PAT files, TEX . . . and I'm nowhere near done, GRD &  materials are next, displacement maps the list goes on and on. Just before the water spill I had purchased a copy of Exposure  X7, I highly recommend it, so that's tomorrow's project!  truth be told, it's a passion of mine. Best wishes to you all!!  Maybe a simple and free photo converter, even an online one can dig you out of nonworking brushes. And for about $100 you can get yourself a copy of MysticThumbs, by MysticCoder. One purchase is all you need unless you find yourself with a fried computer and have to buy new parts, then you have to buy another copy and that's something else I had to deal with I'm out of here nice talking with you guys and I just wanted to share my pleasure with you because I remember the pains that I went through the panic I swear I've got about $20,000 infested in time only creating those brushes :cross_mark::heavy_large_circle:️:cross_mark: