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Transitioning to Box Drive; question about offline storage limits

  • August 20, 2026
  • 1 reply
  • 11 views
J

I currently use BoxSync for MacOS—it has been too convenient to switch over to BoxDrive, which I will have to do by December this year.

I’m concerned about the limits on the availability of files that I can access through the Finder once I transition to Drive. (This was never an issue with BoxSync.) Is it possible to make 600GB available offline with Drive? the 25GB or .50% of your HD space, whichever is the lower figure, makes it sound like I cannot mark all the folders I want immediate access to given caching or other limits.

It’s all very new and scary at this point. Any insights would be appreciated, especially from users who have experience with amounts larger than those posted by Box? tx

1 reply

J
  • Jill
  • Community Manager
  • August 21, 2026

Hi ​@jipnet,

 

Welcome to Box Community and glad to assist! 

 

It is completely understandable to feel cautious when transitioning from Box Sync to Box Drive, especially when managing large amounts of important data. I am happy to reassure you and clarify how Box Drive handles offline files.

 

Yes, absolutely. You can make 600GB available offline on your Mac, as long as your local drive (or a supported connected external drive) has sufficient free disk space.

 

There is an important distinction between Box Drive's streaming cache and the Make Available Offline feature:

  1. Streaming Cache Limit (25GB or 50% of free disk space): This limit applies only to on-demand temporary streaming when opening or editing online-only files without explicitly downloading them. It allows you to browse all files in Finder without consuming hard drive space.

  2. Marking Folders for Offline Access (Make Available Offline): Files and folders you explicitly mark for offline access do not count against the 25GB or 50% streaming cache limit. You can mark as many files and folders as you need for offline access until your hard drive has approximately 2GB of free space remaining.

 

Key Tips & Best Practices for Your Transition

  • Disk Space Requirement: To store 600GB offline internally, your Mac hard drive simply needs at least ~602GB of free disk space.
  • External Drive Support: If your Mac's internal drive has limited storage, Box Drive on macOS supports locating your Box folder on a supported external drive, allowing you to store large volumes of offline content externally.
  • Managing Space: Whenever you need to free up local disk space, simply right-click any offline folder in Finder and select Free up space to revert it to online-only without deleting the files from Box.
  • Quitting vs. Logging Out: If you need to stop Box Drive, choose Quit Box Drive rather than logging out. Logging out performs a clean logout that clears local offline files and resets them to online-only.

Please let us know if you have any questions. 

 

Thanks for posting!

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