You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.

Forum Discussion

ajbentley's avatar
ajbentley
Explorer | Level 3
6 years ago

Can't switch to online only

I've got a file that's pretty big and I've put it up to dropbox with selective sync. The original version of the file is on an external hard drive. When I switched the dropbox folder to online only (...
Desktop
Sync
  • Walter's avatar
    Walter
    6 years ago

    Hey there ajbentley - sorry to hear about this; let's take a look now.

    When using Selective Sync, and choosing to sync a folder you had previously excluded on the desktop client, you may notice the files appearing with a grey cloud icon beside them. This means that the files are ‘online-only’. You can see and interact with these files as normal, but they take up practically no space on your computer.

    Through our Smart Sync feature you now have greater control and can sync only the folders or files you need by right clicking, choosing Smart Sync and then selecting 'Local'. This helps optimize your hard disk usage.

    Once we have returned these 'online-only' files/folders through Selective Sync you can now see the files and folders and then proceed with re-downloading only the content you need and want.

    If a file has been synced locally that you would prefer to have online-only, simply right click on it and select online-only from the Smart Sync menu.

    Let me know how this goes Joshua.

thedragan's avatar
thedragan
New member | Level 2

I tried right-clicking and selecting "Online Only"... nothing changes :/

Walter's avatar
Walter
Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
6 years ago

Sorry to hear that thedragan. 

Could you send me a screenshot of this and the exact status of the desktop app so I can investigate further?

Spoiler

You can always look at the Dropbox icon in your taskbar (Windows) or menu bar (Mac) and see if it is done syncing. When Dropbox is fully synced then you should see a tick followed by the words “Up to date” on the menu.

If you do not see this then can you please let me know what the message being displayed reads?

Thanks!

  • Tinkerman's avatar
    Tinkerman
    Helpful | Level 5
    6 years ago

    Same problem, what's the answer???

About Create, upload, and share

Find help to solve issues with creating, uploading, and sharing files and folders in Dropbox. Get support and advice from the Dropbox Community.

Need more support

If you need more help you can view your support options (expected response time for an email or ticket is 24 hours), or contact us on X or Facebook.

For more info on available support options for your Dropbox plan, see this article.

If you found the answer to your question in this Community thread, please 'like' the post to say thanks and to let us know it was useful!