Offloading and restoring an app

Offload packs an app and its data away on your external drive and removes both from your Mac. It frees more space than a move, because the app's settings, caches and other files go too. The trade-off is that an offloaded app can't open until you restore it. Restore copies everything back to where it was. Nothing is deleted along the way.

Offload or move?

See Moving an app to your external drive for the other option, and Offload for a short definition.

Offloading an app

1. Connect your external drive. Offload is greyed out while it isn't.
2. In the Apps window, open the Internal tab and click Offload on the app. (On the Moved tab, Offload works the same way for an app you've already moved.)
3. Read the message and click Offload to NVMe to confirm.
4. A progress panel shows each stage. Keep the window open until it finishes.

You can also right-click an app on the All Apps grid and choose Offload to Fast Drive. From the grid, the offload starts straight away, without the confirmation.

%% caption: How an offload works, and why a failure changes nothing
flowchart TD
  A[You confirm the offload] --> B[The app is quit if it's open]
  B --> C{Is there room on the drive, and can every item be removed safely?}
  C -->|No| N[It stops. Nothing was changed]
  C -->|Yes| D[The app and its data are copied to the drive]
  D --> E{Does every copy check out?}
  E -->|No| R[The copies are removed. Your originals are untouched]
  E -->|Yes| F[The originals are removed from your Mac]
  F --> G[The app appears on the Offloaded tab]

What goes with it: the app, plus the files it keeps in your Library, such as its support files, caches, preferences, sandbox container, saved window state, logs and website data. A few items are protected by macOS so that no app can copy them. Those stay on your Mac, and Job Insights notes how many stayed behind.

If the app was installed by macOS as a protected app, you may be asked for your administrator password.

Restoring an app

1. Connect your external drive. While it's disconnected, an offloaded app shows Reconnect your fast drive to restore.
2. On the Offloaded tab, click Restore. On the grid, right-click the faded app and choose Restore to This Mac.
3. Storage Studio copies the app and its data back, checks every copy, and only then removes the archive from the drive.

Restore won't overwrite anything. If you reinstalled the app while it was offloaded, or some of its data is already back on your Mac, Restore stops and says what's in the way. Remove the existing copy first (drag it to the Trash or use Uninstall), then restore again. Restore also checks that your Mac has enough free space first.

Removing an offloaded app for good

If you don't need the app any more, click Remove on the Offloaded tab (or right-click it on the grid and choose Remove from Fast Drive…), then Move to Trash. The archive goes to the Trash, and the app can no longer be restored from the Offloaded tab. The drive must be connected.

Offloaded apps on the grid

On the All Apps grid, an offloaded app has a faded icon and a small tray badge. Clicking it only selects it; it can't open. Right-click it to restore or remove it.

If an offload keeps failing

If an app can't be offloaded twice in a row, its Offload button changes to Can't offload and the row explains why, for example "This app can't be offloaded on this Mac." along with the reason. If the reason is data that macOS protects, Uninstall is the alternative the message suggests.

An offload is made for apps and their data. It doesn't keep everything a folder move keeps. See What a move keeps if that matters for your files.

See also: Why some apps can't be moved · Moved apps when the drive is disconnected · Uninstalling an app completely