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SmartTech
Participant
May 13, 2025
Answered

Solving "Scratch Disk Full" Error in Photoshop

  • May 13, 2025
  • 3 replies
  • 3411 views

Hey Photoshop users! Have you encountered the dreaded “Scratch Disk Full” error? It can seriously slow down or even crash your workflow. I’ve compiled a few tips to fix it:

✅ Free Up Space – Delete unnecessary files to clear storage.

✅ Change Scratch Disk Location – Go to Edit > Preferences > Scratch Disks and select a drive with more space.

✅ Clear Cache Files – Use Edit > Purge > All to remove temporary data.

✅ Limit History States – Reducing undo steps in Preferences > Performance can free up memory.

✅ Upgrade to SSD – If possible, an SSD dramatically speeds up scratch disk usage.

 

Have you found other solutions that work for you? Drop your thoughts below!

Correct answer Ged_Traynor

@SmartTech the above looks like it was just copied and pasted from somewhere

3 replies

S
sprout_shadow@yahoo.com
Participant
September 16, 2025

What do  you do when you can't get to edit>preferences, etc? I can't open  PSE

 

Ged_Traynor
Community Expert
Ged_TraynorCommunity Expert
Community Expert
September 17, 2025

@sprout_shadow@yahoo.com try the Photoshop Elements forum

J
jasmine_alexandra_8736
Participant
May 16, 2025

I also have the same issue. I'm trying to change the scratch disk location in Photoshop from Macintosh HD to my external SSD, but the option is LOCKED and won't let me UNCHECK the Macintosh HD drive. How can I unlock this option and set my external SSD as the new scratch disk location?

 

Please there must be something I can do. I just can't seem to change it. I was able to do that with Illustrator and the PremierPro, but I can't seem to do it with PSD. 

Ged_Traynor
Community Expert
Ged_TraynorCommunity Expert
Community Expert
May 16, 2025

@jasmine_alexandra_8736 you can only uncheck it if there's another disk available, how is the external SSD connected and formatted

https://helpx.adobe.com/ie/photoshop/using/scratch-disks-preferences.html

You should really try to free up space on your main disk

Ged_Traynor
Community Expert
Ged_TraynorCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
May 13, 2025

@SmartTech the above looks like it was just copied and pasted from somewhere

    Park Street Printers
    Park Street Printers
    Known Participant
    May 16, 2025

    In my over 25 years of using Photoshop, I have never experienced this problem. For the last 7 years, I have been working primarily on many-layered individual area color corrections for high-resolution artwork, now up to 12GB in size, with a pretty hefty amount of history states. I don't mean to be rude, but how common is this problem? Even my coworker's 10 year old iMac has sufficient storage for him to have never run into this issue. It seems that adding external drives for caching is just begging for trouble. I know that I must be wrong, but... I am genuinely confused. Are people running on sub-1TB drives?

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