topic Re: Changing the Cache location in Desktop (Windows)

Changing the Cache location

Nigmo — Wed, 29 May 2019 21:25:49 GMT

Plan

Premium

Country

United states

Device

Desktop (pc)

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

Recently I've been looking through my D drive and I see a bunch of 2 digit folders some containing nothing others containing a file that is named gibberish. Upon further search I learned that it was created by spotify and that it was a cashe file. Looking on reddit and such people have told me that you can change the location of the cache file. But my spotify app I got off the microsoft store doesn't have that option.

Re: Changing the Cache location

OneByBoo — Thu, 30 May 2019 05:16:43 GMT

Hey there @Nigmo,

thanks for posting !

Have you tried the steps provided on this help page ?

Let me know and we'll move forward 😃

Re: Changing the Cache location

uncajesse — Thu, 12 Sep 2019 22:30:37 GMT

You can't change the cache location with Spotify's settings, even if you're supposed to be able to, it just doesn't work, and they don't care about fixing it.

You need to use command line to create "symbolic links" from the directory it's actually using for cache, to the directory you're trying to use for cache. Yes, you literally need to alter the operating system to accomplish what's supposed to be a feature of the app. That's how bad this app ahs become. Oh.... and it's been that way for around 10 years now.

Re: Changing the Cache location

fernandogolive — Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:40:49 GMT

This is just unbelievable! Actually the settings allow you to change "Offline songs Storage" which is different from Cached songs (I guess).
Got 8gb of cached songs and can't move them to my big disk.... what a shame.

Re: Changing the Cache location

Alex — Mon, 31 Aug 2020 09:54:36 GMT

Hey there folks,

Thanks for reaching out about this in the Community!

Currently it's not possible to change the Cache folder location on Desktop. You should be able to change the location where downloaded songs are stored from the app settings though. If you cannot see this option in the Advanced Settings > Offline songs storage, we recommend you perform a clean reinstall of the app by following the steps in this article. Make sure to download the app from our website. You can check this thread for more info on how to clear your Local files folder if it's taking up too much drive space.

If you would like to see the option to change the Cache folder location in the future, go ahead and create an idea on the relevant idea board. We always take new ideas and feedback into consideration to improve the app. Here you can read more on how ideas work.

We also suggest checking this help article for useful tips on how to submit an idea.

Let us know if you have more questions.

Have a great day!

Re: Changing the Cache location

Longoon — Thu, 23 Sep 2021 13:07:18 GMT

This, or an option to clear the cache, is urgently needed.

Re: Changing the Cache location

Elena — Fri, 24 Sep 2021 14:32:37 GMT

Hey @Longoon,

Thanks for reaching out and welcome to the Community!

We appreciate you taking the time to share this feedback here. Spotify always aims to improve the experience of users, as well as the functionalities of the app's features. To get your ideas into consideration, you can follow the suggestions given earlier by @Alex. You'll also find all the relevant info about our Idea Exchange and how the Community feedback gets implemented here if you'd like to know more about the topic.

Hope you find this useful. Keep us posted if you have any questions.

Re: Changing the Cache location

Habsy — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 15:07:45 GMT

I ran into severe technical issues on my windows installation and had to use a third party app to scan my system drive to see what is actually taking up all this space. Spotify used up 10 GB with it's Cache in Appdata, of course the offline storage folder setting is completely irrelevant.

This is absolutely unacceptable for a service this expensive.

Re: Changing the Cache location

Alling — Fri, 23 Aug 2024 09:04:20 GMT

As @uncajesse mentions, you can fix this with a symbolic link.

Close Spotify and open 'cmd' with admin privileges and type the four following commands (with your own username and new cache location):

cd C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Spotify rmdir Data mkdir D:\Spotify_cache\Data mklink /d Data D:\Spotify_cache\Data

This will delete your current cache and create new cache folder on another drive and lastly create a symlink called 'Data' that points to the location on the other drive.

Desktop App cache issue

Bubbahyde — Sun, 03 Nov 2024 15:06:41 GMT

Plan

Free

Country

Canada

Device

Operating System

Windows 10

Question or Issue

The spotify app from the microsoft store keeps using the cache from its default location even though i moved/set it for a different drive. how do i make it use the location i told it to?

Changing cache location doesn't work

Thommie0208 — Sun, 05 Jan 2025 14:53:00 GMT

My Question or Issue

I have changed the location for offline storage to a different drive, but only downloads are saved to that new location (see the images). How can I get the location of the cache changed?

Plan

Premium

Country

Netherlands

Device

Operating System

Windows 10

Re: Changing the Cache location

haywire727-ca — Sun, 12 Oct 2025 18:26:27 GMT

The location has changed after a spotify update.

Re: Changing the Cache location

barpap42 — Thu, 29 Jan 2026 11:16:24 GMT

This still is the best solution, as the client in Windows still does not have an option baked in.