How Do I Make OneDrive Sync Only Specific Folders?

No. And I’m willing to bet a lot that there is no solution otherwise it would have already presented itself. A big disappointment form Microsoft on this one. How could it not allow you to specifically select which folders to sync to the cloud?!! Insane! Things like this keep Microsoft subpar behind the competition in my opinion.

Hi, Microsoft has changed how to manage your backup re syncing folders. Click on the OneDrive Icon on the taskbar>Settings>Settings>Top left hand side>Account>Choose Folders. You can choose exactly which folders you want to sync with OneDrive.

I'm afraid you didn't answer the question adequately because perhaps you didn't understand the question. Your method of clicking the "choose folders" setting above let's you choose which files OneDrive syncs to your PC, not the other way around. The question is how you limit which folders or subfolders syncs to OneDrive from the local PC, not the other way around.

The problem here is that if you unselect a subfolder with your method, it KEEPS it in OneDrive but deletes it from the local PC. The question is the opposite: how do you KEEP it in the PC but not allow it to sync to OneDrive. Does that make sense?

It's actually kind of amazing that Microsoft doesn't allow this customization of which folders and subfolders to sync to OneDrive. It only allows a few broad folders including "Documents", "Pictures", and "Desktop". Amazing since it's not particulary inexpensive to gain more than 100GB of storage.

If there's something I'm not getting correct, let me know by all means!

I feel the same on this one. Especially if your PC is predominantly a gaming PC, all your games create endless folders and backups in "Documents" which dont need to be there. So I create a "Personal" folder in Documents which is the only one of 100+ folders I want to sync, but I can't. So where I want 1 folder of maybe 400mb to synch, instead it will only synch all Documents at 11GB and 100+ folders.

Microsoft, please sort this out. It's very basic functionality which many people want, which shouldn't be hard for you to program!

Thanks

Hi, Microsoft has changed how to manage your backup re syncing folders. Click on the OneDrive Icon on the taskbar>Settings>Settings>Top left hand side>Account>Choose Folders. You can choose exactly which folders you want to sync with OneDrive.

It seems OneDrive wants to backup/sync everything in your OneDrive folder. Now, understand that I've been working with PCs since about a year after the first ones came out. (Yeah, I'm an old guy.) In those days, folder structures made sense, everything about a file or folder name just showed up; you didn't have to override settings that hide extensions or certain types of files. And you didn't have documents showing up in something called "Documents" unless you actually named a folder "Documents". And you didn't have picture files showing up under something called "Pictures" unless you actually named a folder "Pictures". It was really easy. Nowadays, the OS seems to think it knows what everybody wants and automatically creates folders and groups and what-not regardless of what the user wants. As such, it automatically creates a folder under your name called OneDrive.

Here's my solution, base on some speculation and testing:

1. I created a folder directly under my name and named it "Documents". Now there are file paths as follows (among many others):

• C:\Users\Gregory\Documents\
• C:\Users\Gregory\OneDrive\Documents\

2. I copied everything from the .Gregory\OneDrive\Documents\ folder into .\Gregory\Documents.
3. Many (if not all) of your apps will have a setting for a default storage location. You'll need to change them.

That also means any shortcuts that got saved pointing to documents in the OneDrive path need to be deleted (or changed if you can do that). You'll have to open the files from the new location manually so new shortcuts point to the new location.

4. I double and triple checked that all of the documents, pictures, music, and etc. were in their proper and respective folders under the .\Gregory\Documents\ folder.
5. At this point I went to my .Gregory\OneDrive\Documents\ folder and deleted a few items I knew I didn't need. Then I double checked that they were still in my .\Gregory\Documents folder, and they were. I deleted a few more subfolders that I was pretty sure I didn't really need, and double checked everything again.
6. I rebooted my system and double checked everything again.
7. At this point I tried to delete the OneNote folder and the system said I had to go to the web OneDrive location to delete that. It gave me the link to go there and I proceeded to delete files from the web location. Now, there is a bit of a safety net here called the Recycle bin. You can put everything into the recycle bin and it'll stay there for 30 days.

I can't stress enough - BE CAREFUL AND PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT'S WHERE!

There may be some documents, pictures, and the like that you DO want backed up. Keep those in a suitably named folder under the OneDrive\Documents folder, and they should be safe.

Also, note the various icons next to the folder names. You might see a "Documents" with an icon that looks like a document page, but the folder you create named Documents should have an icon that looks like a file folder.

Go slow and check that everything you want to keep on your local drive is safe and sound frequently.

Hope this helps,

Gregory

Disclaimer - I will not be responsible for your files. BE CAREFUL!