Dropbox for Mac OS Smart sync not working on Big Sur 11.0.1

Google is my friend! Following these instructions appears to be doing the job that I expected it to do!

How to clear the Dropbox cache folder

https://help.dropbox.com/installs-integrations/desktop/cache-folder

Clear your cache on a Mac

1. Open the Finder and select Go to folder... from the Go menu (or press Shift-Command-G).
2. A dialog box should appear. Now copy and paste the following line into the box and press the return key: ~/Dropbox/.dropbox.cache
3. This will take you directly to the Dropbox cache folder
4. Delete the files in your cache by dragging them out of the Dropbox cache folder and into your Trash.

jdwasser wrote:

Hi,

I use Dropbox and have a large amount of huge files that I am uploading. I have 2 TB of space on dropbox so not a problem there, however, my hard drive is filling up with these files even though I have set the files to be online only through Smart Sync. I have also set the Smart Sync Update for Mac to ON on the website.

The files still are registered as being on my computer. Has anyone come across this issue and how to fix it? I even uninstalled and reinstalled Dropbox but still same issue. Thanks!

Jared

If updating your third party software does not resolve the issue— then you can wait, or contact the developer—

sometimes there are pre-release betas available as third party come up to speed to match the macOS.

I am experiencing the same. I also think it happened after BigSur update, as before I had no issues. I recently moved all my files from OneDrive to Dropbox because I had the same issue with OneDrive and MacBook (lots of complaints from other users too, OneDrive is not responding). When I read that Dropbox had a work-around for this issue with Smart Sync for MacBook, I moved all my files to Dropbox (online only). So I had no issues anymore until I upgraded to BigSur - at least I guess this is why it's an issue now.

Also Smart Sync is toggled on at the website and Dropbox has full disk access on my Mac.

I am in contact with Dropbox about it, if they come with a workable solution I will let you know.

Update: for me it turned out that my Dropbox Cache was not being emptied automatically. So I had over 66GB of files I once deleted still in cache. This should normally be deleted every 3 days but somehow this did not happen. Dropbox did a great job helping me to figure my issue out.

But I think it has after all nothing to do with Big Sur update. Might be worth checking your cache though....

I'm experiencing similar problems - recently updated to Apple OSX 11.1 Big Sur; I've found that the dropbox setting Smart Sync update for Mac had defaulted to being off (although I've had this selected in the past). I've cleared the main caches for my Mac Book Pro (' ~library/caches'), but I still have about 200gb of files that should be online only still taking up space on my Mac Book Pro. I've restarted dropbox a couple of times, and even re-installed dropbox, but not changes

Is there a different location for the dropbox cache that is different to the main caches (' ~library/caches')?

THANK YOU! This is what was causing the error for me. Really appreciate your post :)

Great that this helped you - glad I could give something back!