Please clean up Adobe's folder structure on macOS – it's a mess

[.random..]

Could you please reconsider how Adobe software distributes its configuration, cache, libraries, and support files across the macOS user account? Right now, it’s a complete mess.

Some files are dumped into:

• ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/

• others into ~/Library/Preferences/

• and yet more into ~/Documents/Adobe/, ~/Documents/Shared/, and so on.
  
  

Even within Application Support, there's no consistent logic—some products create deeply nested folders, some split their data between multiple hierarchies (e.g., Media Encoder vs. Premiere), and shared libraries like color profiles, swatches, LUTs etc. aren’t even centralized. Where’s the global Color directory that should exist for shared ICC or .ase files? Instead, we have cryptically named or duplicated folders all over the place.

And then there's the Creative Cloud Files folder… with a 200+ character identifier in its name. Why?

This isn’t just about aesthetics. It:

• Breaks automation

• Makes backup and migration harder

• Wastes time for power users trying to locate or edit configs

• Violates basic UX consistency on the platform
  
  

I’m not asking for a full redesign—just consolidate, document, and standardize folder locations. If there’s a global Shared folder (like ~/Documents/Shared/Adobe/), use it for shared libraries. If user prefs belong in Preferences, keep them there. And please stop mixing local and cloud-related content in one unstructured heap.

Shouldn’t be that hard to write correct paths into the code.

Thanks for listening.

[Srishti Bali]

Hi @.random..

Thanks so much for taking the time to share this. We understand your concern; however, folder organization and file extensions on macOS are often more complex than they appear, as they involve a range of dependencies, legacy support, and integration points across different Creative Cloud apps. That said, we’ll pass this along to the product team for review and consideration in future improvements.

Appreciate your input, it helps us build a better experience.

Regards,

Srishti

[D Fosse]

Just as a basic distinction, you need to have the files in your user account separate from the application program files. If they weren't separate, it would be a proper mess. As a rule of thumb, anything to do with application configuration (which goes beyond simple preferences) needs to go a separate way from the basic program files. 

Wiping the user account files opens the application in fresh, out-of-the-box factory state.

[.random..]

I understand all of that, but honestly, the mess and utter lack of structure in the directories and the overall system is just indefensible. No other company even comes close to Adobe when it comes to cluttering up the system like this.

As I said, this has basically become a running joke among my colleagues. Whenever we need to find something, we end up sending each other these completely insane screenshots—because it’s nearly impossible to locate anything. I genuinely don’t understand why, for example, swatches can’t just have a single folder for all the programs. Or ICC profiles. Or, frankly, all preferences in one place.

Honestly, if Adobe still can’t sync personal settings to the cloud—which, frankly, is something I would absolutely expect in 2025—at the very least, everything should be in one directory that we can easily back up and edit. Why can’t keyboard shortcuts, panels, actions, scripts, ICC profiles, etc. all be managed from one location? Just now, I had to manually copy Pantone swatches to three different places.

And why do empty folders from old versions linger on like squatted houses full of ghosts and empty memories? It’s honestly embarrassing.

Most software manages to pack all this into one neat program bundle—and it just works.

And just to preempt the usual argument about “compatibility”: frankly, this doesn’t hold water, because Adobe only allows us to roll back two versions anyway. So the idea of needing to preserve compatibility with much older versions doesn’t make sense—since we’re not even allowed to use them anymore. If that’s the argument, it’s a weak one.

[.random..]

That’s not what I’m talking about. Of course, user-specific files need to be kept separate from application files—nobody’s asking for one giant folder mixing everything together, that would be chaos.

But even within the user’s profile, there should be order and consistency. Right now, configuration files, presets, swatches, scripts, etc. are scattered across multiple folders, many of them version-specific and duplicated for each app. That’s the real mess.

Some might argue that keeping preferences and settings separate for each version (like for beta testing) is an advantage. But honestly—in what universe is that what users actually want? The vast majority of us don’t want to reconfigure our entire setup every time we install a beta or a new version. If anything, it’s the opposite: we want all versions to draw from the same folder, so our workflow just works. Having to manually recreate or copy over workspaces, actions, scripts, and swatches for every new version is just unnecessary friction.

Most modern software manages to keep user data organized in one clear location within the user profile—making backup, migration, and editing much easier—without mixing it up with program files or losing the ability to reset to factory state. If there are compatibility issues between versions, the software can simply prompt the user or handle it gracefully, instead of forcing everyone to duplicate everything.

My whole point: it’s not about where the files live relative to the application—it’s about making user configuration organized, accessible, and consistent across all versions. Right now, it’s not.

[D Fosse]

Settings need to be separate for each version.

These settings contain a lot more than your own user settings. It's the whole application configuration, including lots of hidden and version-dependent parameters. In a new version with new code, settings may not mean exactly the same thing - or not be applicable at all because the underlying code has changed.

You can choose to migrate settings during install, in which case they should be adapted to the new version when necessary. I'd still advise against that. Settings are rewritten on every application exit, so are prone to corruption by irregular shutdowns. Errors accumulate. Corrupt preferences usually look like application bugs and are frequently interpreted as that.

In any case, I really don't understand the problem? This is all neatly collected in two master folders, one for installation files, and one for settings in the user account.