Save your files in Photoshop

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Introduction to file-saving options in Photoshop

You can use the Save commands in Photoshop to save changes to your documents based on the format you want to use or the way you want to access them later.

To save a file in Photoshop, go to the File menu and select any of the Save commands — Save, Save As, or Save a Copy. On selecting a save command, you can choose to either — Save to Creative Cloud or Save on your computer.

Watch this video to quickly learn more about the saving options in Photoshop. Read the article for more step-by-step details.

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To save changes to your document and save in the current format, choose File > Save.

Save As

To save a file with a different name,location, or format, do the following:

Default Save As

Updated in Photoshop 24.1 (December 2022 release)

With the December 2022 release of Photoshop 24.1, the default is to save your files locally on your computer instead of saving to the Creative Cloud.

You can set the Default File Location as On your computer to see the local path while creating the new documents from any of the below locations:

• Windows: Edit > Preferences > File Handling
• macOS: Photoshop > Preferences > File Handling

If you wanted to save your documents as cloud documents, select Creative Cloud as the default file location.

If you have a question to ask or want to share your issue with this setting, notify us on the Adobe Photoshop community. We'd love to hear from you!

Revert to legacy Save As options

With Photoshop 22.4.2, you can both revert to the legacy Save As workflow and/or omit the addended “copy” when saving as a copy if desired. 

To find these new preference options, navigate to: 

• (macOS) Photoshop > Preferences > File Handling > File Saving Options
• (Windows) Edit > Preferences > File Handling > File Saving Options 

• macOS: The Save As and Save a Copy options will now both open the legacy save dialog enabling the Save As options that were available in Photoshop v22.3 and earlier, including the As a Copy checkbox. With the legacy workflow enabled, if you use the Save a copy option to save your Photoshop file, the As a Copy checkbox will be turned on by default. When selecting the Enable legacy "Save As” option in preferences on macOS, you will receive a warning dialog alerting you to the risk of overwriting files that arises when using the legacy Save As workflow, as “copy” will no longer be interactively appended to the filename. Because of this, when selecting the Enable legacy “Save As” preference the Do not append “copy” to filename when saving a copy preference will automatically become enabled and cannot be turned off unless the Enable legacy “Save As” preference is turned off.

Do not append ‘copy’ to filename when saving a copy

macOS and Windows: The Do not append ‘copy’ to filename when saving a copy preference controls whether “copy” is appended to the filename of your Photoshop document in situations where the user is exposed to the risk of overwriting files. By selecting this preference, the term "copy" will no longer be automatically appended to file names when you save as a copy, both in the new Save a Copy and the legacy Save As (macOS and Windows) options.

Additionally, when you turn on this preference, you will see alert dialogs to warn you of the potential risk of overwriting your Photoshop file in absence of "copy" in the filename on both macOS and Windows. 

Save a Copy

If you’d like to save a layered file as a flat file, you’ll need to create a new version of the document. Also, if you don't see a desired format like JPEG or PNG, use Save a Copy option for all formats and create a preserved version of your document.

To do so, choose:

• File > Save a Copy 
• Save a Copy button under the Save As dialog box

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File saving properties

You can set a variety of file saving options under the Save As and Save a Copy dialog box. The availability of options depends on the file you are saving and the selected file format.

Saves alpha channel information with the image. Disabling this option removes the alpha channels from the saved image.

Preserves all layers in the image. If this option is disabled or unavailable, all visible layers are flattened or merged (depending on the selected format).

Saves notes with the image.

Saves spot channel information with the image. Disabling this option removes spot colors from the saved image.

Creates a color-managed document.

Saves thumbnail data for the file.

Makes the file extension lowercase.

Saves thumbnail data for the file. Thumbnails appear in the Open dialog box.

Specifies the format for file extensions. Select Append to add the format’s extension to a filename and Use Lower Case to make the extension lowercase.

File saving preferences

macOS image preview options

In macOS, you can select one or more of the following preview types (to speed the saving of files and minimize file size, select only the previews you need).

Uses the preview as a file icon on the desktop.

Saves a 72‑ppi version of the file for use in applications that can open only low-resolution Photoshop images. For non‑EPS files, this is a PICT preview.

Displays the preview in the Open dialog box.

Saves a preview that Windows systems can display.

Save large documents

Photoshop supports documents up to 300,000 pixels in either dimension and offers three file formats for saving documents with images having more than 30,000 pixels in either dimension. Keep in mind that most other applications, including versions of Photoshop earlier than Photoshop CS, cannot handle files larger than 2 GB or images exceeding 30,000 pixels in either dimension.

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Export layers to files

You can export and save layers as individual files using a variety of formats, including PSD, BMP, JPEG, PDF, Targa, and TIFF. Layers are named automatically as they are saved. You can set options to control the generation of names.