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Relocated Items folder

I just migrated from an older MacBook Air to the newer M1 with Big Sur. I ended up with a folder on my desktop called RelocatedItems.nosync.


I read the Apple support document about the folder which suggested I "can move them to a new location, as long as it is different from their location before the...migration."


I don't know what that statement means. I do I know where a different location might be if I don't know where they came from? Most of the files I looked at in the subfolders are already on my M1 like drivers for my printers (which work) and some other things.


Can I just delete that folder?

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.5

Posted on Aug 15, 2021 9:31 AM

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Posted on Aug 15, 2021 9:58 AM

I personally just look through quickly it to make sure there aren't any pictures, documents, etc. -- That would be unlikely since it's usually just full of incompatible system files -- and then delete the folder. Sometimes you'll get a message that files are in use. So at the next restart I delete the rest. I've also just deleted the alias on the desktop and left the folder. I've never had an issue with deleting files from there. It's supposed to be incompatible files so there should be no harm.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 15, 2021 9:58 AM in response to Staynavytom

I personally just look through quickly it to make sure there aren't any pictures, documents, etc. -- That would be unlikely since it's usually just full of incompatible system files -- and then delete the folder. Sometimes you'll get a message that files are in use. So at the next restart I delete the rest. I've also just deleted the alias on the desktop and left the folder. I've never had an issue with deleting files from there. It's supposed to be incompatible files so there should be no harm.

Aug 15, 2021 3:36 PM in response to Staynavytom

For the most part, if you migrated from a much older OS, you may have been storing files on the root level of the hard drive (i.e., open Macintosh HD and save there). That is no longer allowed, so those file would have been moved into the Relocated Items folder.

The second possibility of files you might have need of is if you configure some of the underlying server software, like SMB or Apache. If you do, the upgrade/update may have moved those configuration files into Relocated Items.

If none of that applies to you, then you can pretty much always ignore the folder.

Relocated Items folder

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