How to stop automatically syncing SharePoint when I restart my computer

Question

I have stopped syncing a shared folder on SharePoint for Business, because it is too large and I don't need to access the files. However, when I restart my computer, SharePoint automatically re-syncs all the files in this folder and gets backed up again. Is there a setting that allows me to restart my computer without re-syncing the folders I don't need?

Answer 1

Hi Mhenry982,

Thanks for the clarification, it seems that there is something wrong with your OneDrive application, because, if we choose to “stop sync” (not “pause”)a synced SharePoint folder, actually, it will unlink your device.

If we need to re-sync the SharePoint folder, we should go to the browser and link it manually, however, you said that your SharePoint folder will re-sync automatically after rebooting the device, I speculate that the operation of “stop sync” is not actually completed.

In this case, you can try to reset your OneDrive application and check whether it will re-sync automatically.

Best Regards,

Arck

Answer 2

Thank you. I unlinked my device and uninstalled OneDrive. This removed all the sites and document libraries from my file explorer. However, when I downloaded OneDrive again and resynced a site that I wanted from the SharePoint browser, it said that these folders already existed on my computer. So I selected to "use the same folder" to avoid duplicates. My file explorer repopulated with all of the sites available on SharePoint, even though I hadn't chosen to sync them all yet.

At this point I looked in my file explorer and all of the sites were there, but they only began syncing when I synced them through the SP browser. So, the one site that I don't want is still in my file explorer. It is not currently syncing, but I am worried that it will automatically resync when I restart my computer again. It seems like I am in the same situation as before. Back to square one.

Should I just delete the site from my file explorer completely? And only access it through the browser when I need to? At this point it seems like the only option to just totally remove it from my file explorer and prevent it from automatically syncing.

Answer 3

I forgot to say from the very beginning: whenever I select "stop syncing," the site document library still remains in my file explorer. It just doesn't update with the browser version and all of the cloud symbols next to the documents disappear.

Is this part of the issue? Do I just need to delete it from my file explorer after I stop syncing it?

Answer 4

Hi Mhenry982,

The files still kept on your device are ordinary local files, which due to you previous downloaded them, you can delete these local files, and only the files have “cloud symbols” or “check mark” are the syncing files.

Best Regards,

Arck

Answer 5

As I keep on saying here: don't use the sync client!! There are better ways to access SP content via file explorer.