Finding things in Finder · Reveal in Finder across the app

Why did Storage Studio open a Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive file in Finder instead of freeing it?

Short answer: macOS only lets a cloud service's own app free its downloads, so for Google Drive, Dropbox and OneDrive Storage Studio opens the file in Finder: right-click it and choose Remove Download. The file stays safe in the cloud.

Because macOS lets only a cloud service's own app free that service's downloaded files. For iCloud, Storage Studio can make a file online-only right away; for Google Drive, Dropbox and OneDrive it opens the file in Finder so you can do it in one step yourself:

  1. Right-click the file Finder has selected.
  2. Choose Remove Download.

The file stays safe in the cloud and downloads again when you open it — freeing it is never a delete. For Google Drive you can also switch its app to Stream files so it stops keeping local copies.

See iCloud and online-only files.

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