Cannot find MobileSync folder on Monterey MacBook

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Level 1

28 points

Cannot find MobileSync folder on Monterey MacBook

I normally backup my iPhone 11 into the cloud but I wanted to try backing up onto my MacBook. I did this via Finder with a cable connection to the phone. The backup took and while but it seemed to go fine. But I then wanted to locate the folder, mainly to see how large the backup was. I tried searching for ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/. This failed because there does not seem to be a MobileSync subfolder in the Application Support folder. I must be doing something wrong. Any help appreciated!

MacBook Pro

Posted on Oct 5, 2022 7:52 PM

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Answer 1

Tesserax

Level 10

157,398 points

Oct 5, 2022 10:20 PM in response to elliotau

The MobileSync folder should be located at: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ ... as you indicated in your post.

FWIW, I typically back up my iPhone to my Mac and I just double-checked that the phone backups were at that location ... at least, on my Mac running macOS Monterey 12.6.

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Answer 2

Tesserax

Level 10

157,398 points

Oct 6, 2022 12:21 PM in response to elliotau

Hmm, didn't think of that, but you may be onto something there. I suggest you temporarily disable iCloud backups, and then, try backing up your phone to your computer. Again, in my case, I do not use iCloud backups. Anyway would be interested in your results.

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Answer 3

elliotau Author

Level 1

28 points

Oct 6, 2022 6:24 PM in response to Tesserax

Thanks! It is working now. But I have a feeling that the problem was even simpler. I had tried to open up a Finder window and navigated to "Application Support". For some reason this gave me a fairly limited view of the subfolders. Searching via the search button at the top of the Finder window did not give me any results. But using spotlight worked fine. I am unsure what the difference is!

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Answer 4

elliotau Author

Level 1

28 points

Oct 6, 2022 4:32 AM in response to Tesserax

Is it possible that the backups are still going to the cloud even though I selected the option to go locally? On the phone itself the icloud backup is still in the on position.

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Cannot find MobileSync folder on Monterey MacBook

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