Should I have a single Lightroom Classic catalog, or should I have more than one?
That was the first question I asked back in 2006 when I received a beta version of Lightroom. Like many, I was sailing in uncharted waters. At first, someone started a rumor and said Lightroom can handle a maximum of 15,000 images before the performance was affected.
Everyone started to repeat that rumor. This caused many, including myself, to split my images into several Lightroom catalogs. Before we begin, let me take a step back for a moment and explain what a catalog is.
What’s a Lightroom Classic catalog?
Adobe describes a Lightroom Classic catalog as a database that stores a record for each of your photos that contains three key pieces of information about each photo:
- A reference to where the photo is on your system
- Instructions for how you want to process the photo
- Metadata, such as ratings and keywords that you apply to photos to help you find or organize them
This means when you import photos into Lightroom Classic, you create a link between the photo itself and the record of the photo in the catalog. Then, any work you perform on the photo such as adding keywords or an edit is stored in the photo’s record in the catalog as additional metadata.
Lightroom Classic never changes the actual photos captured by your camera. In this way, editing in Lightroom Classic is non-destructive. You can always return to the original, unedited photo.
A case for multiple catalogs
Being a generalist photographer, my photography spanned a wide range. One week I would photograph a sporting event, the following week a child’s portraits. One catalog was sufficient until I started working with models.
My modeling assignments ranged from simple headshots to building their portfolios. Some of these images were not appropriate for all to see. By creating a separate catalog, I could keep these images private. To ensure the main catalog opened when starting Lightroom Classic, I changed the default preference, load the most recent catalog to prompt me when starting Lightroom Classic found by clicking on Edit > Preferences. Then click the General tab. This gave me the option to open the correct catalog and to avoid embarrassment.
Flaws with multiple Lightroom Classic catalogs
As Lightroom developed, flaws with multiple catalogs grew, for example …
- When I searched for an image, I would have to open each catalog, Lightroom Classic can’t span a search across multiple catalogs.
- Having extra catalogs mean extra catalogs to backup, just one more task to worry about.
- Sometimes I would become confused and import images into the wrong catalog.
- When a major update rolls out, all catalogs have to be updated.
- Synchronizing Publish services become complicated. For my workflow, this flaw sealed my decision to switch to a single catalog.
The single Lightroom Classic catalog solution
Since I switched to a single catalog solution, my Lightroom Classic experience has become effortless. After a photoshoot, I fire up Lightroom Classic, create a new folder and import my images. Create a collection set of my favorite edited images then upload them to places like SmugMug, Facebook and the Photofocus Community.
To solve my modeling dilemma, I created two new folders — adult models and children models. I created subfolders with the names of the models under the appropriate folder. Now when I browse for a model in front of a client, age-inappropriate images are hidden.
Since switching to a single catalog solution, my workflow is fast and simple.
My question, though, still remains – is there a point at which the size of a catalog impacts Lightroom performance/speed? My catalog backup exceeds 1.3 gb, and I now have difficulty with my computer bogging down with both LRCC and PSCC open – I have just ordered a new computer, but the question at the back of my mind is always whether my LR catalog is too large. Any ideas?
Your catalog and your images don’t have to be on the same drive. I have my images on a Drobo, then mirrored to a second and backed up in the Cloud. The catalog is on emu internal and also gets mirrored and backed up.
Thanks Richard – my images are on an external drive (and mirrored) and I back up to my internal hard drive. Still wondering how large a catalog can get before it affects Lightroom performance – is there a “best practice” scenario for that.
Not really…. It’s just a database. I’ve got 9 TB of photos in mine and it works fine
How does one ensure and maintain the snappiest performance from Lightroom when using a single, potentially very large, catalog? Is there a practical size limit in the current version?
Make sure you backup frequently. Every couple of weeks use the File –> Optimize Catalog feature to optimize the catalog efficiency. There is no official size limit to your catalog but large catalogs do tend to slow things down and do need to be optimized more often. When you optimize you will see this message in the dialog box – “If your catalog is large and has been running slowly, optimizing may improve performance.” I think this answers your question but if not let me know.
Alan,
I checked with Lightroom Guru and Photofocus author Rob Sylvan and he confirmed…..No limit to catalog size, but hardware always makes the most difference performance wise.
My catalog size is currently 3.2 gb My oldest photo in my catalog is dated October 16, 2004. There is a total of 195,000 photos. I don’t see a lag in LR performance. Hope that helps.
Thanks!
Hey Robert! But what if you keep all your photos on external drives and the drives change with years? What’s the point of keeping the catalog so big? You won’t be able to just instantly find your photos on an external drive, you will have to show lightroom the path first, so it has almost no sense keeping these photos in your catalog. Example – I work on a small ssd drive for speed, then I transfer my photos to an external drive for backup and delete them from my working ssd drive. So what photos will lightroom catalog show… Read more »
Serj, I’m also a writer for Photofocus. Catalogs can keep track of external hard drives as well. If one were to keep all their 2016 photos on an external hard drive that is labeled 2016 and keep them organized safely, that person could relatively easily find the photo in the catalog and plug in the extenal drive. The issue with your workflow is that you’re moving the images from outside of Lightroom, thus breaking the link made by Lightroom to those pictures and the catalog and also introducing all those issues you’ve stated. In your workflow, if you were to… Read more »
I went through the same path. Originally multiple catalogs because LR had problems with large catalogs. The headaches there caused me to move back to a single catalog once LR could handle it. I now use a single catalog, and think that is the only way to go (at least for my workflow). Like Richard, I have my images on a Drobo. That is backed up hourly via TimeMachine to a second RAID. It is also backed up (via CrashPlan) to my sister’s house, 10,000 miles away, and then also backed up (again, via CrashPlan) to the cloud. I currently… Read more »
I do this a little bit different. I have one master catalog and then have a catalog for specialist things, like “Yosemite”, “Joshua”…..it works for me, but each his own.
Thanks. This was very helpful for me. I’ve been working with several catalogs, but I’ll change this now so the photos will be easier to find.
Do you know if it’s possible to import photo settings from my old catalogs when I create a new one? I wish to keep my settings on the photos that I’ve already processed…
I need to join together two catalogs. I’ve got one that has 250,000 images. No slowdown at all. I just go between PC and mac, and I have been doing it the lazy way, bringing over DNG files when I need my old photos for a post. With my 250,000 image catalog, I haven’t had any issues with speed. But, Sometimes, what I do is, when shooting a wedding, create a catalog for that, edit the photos, save that catalog with the raw files, and then, when I’m finished, the wedding has been delivered, I fold that catalog into the… Read more »
I don’t understand keeping catalogs of hundreds of thousands of photos. I’ve been culling the heck out of my catalog… from over 115k to 50 k. I want to be at 5k photos. And even that’s probably too many…
Dave.. try being a timelapse shooter. Or having a client you’ve shot with for 10 years. Just because something doesn’t fit your needs doesn’t mean others are like you.
It’s true I haven’t considered every scenario. I certainly didn’t want to offend anyone. For me, where I have client or model shoots, I deleted all the ones I didn’t deliver to the client after a year or so.
I guess I’ve been thinking about what happens after I’m gone. I don’t want anyone to have to sort through the dross to find the stuff I cared about. If anyone will even care…
Those old shots often come back to life. My suggestion is to simply apply ratings or move your best stuff into collections or smart collections
Could you explain this part?
—
To solve my modeling dilemma, I created two new folder, Adult Models and Children Models. I created sub folders with the names of the models under the appropriate folder. Now when I browse for a model in front of a client, age appropriate images are hidden.
—
Not completely sure what you mean :)
Thanks
File structure would be
c:\Photography\Model-Adult
then under the folder would be the date plus model’s full name
ex:
Model-Adult
– 20160806 Alec Vanelli
– 20160901 Joe Johnson
The children would be the same
Thanks :) It’s just like already do it good to know.
My question, though, still remains – is there a point at which the size of a catalog impacts Lightroom performance/speed? My catalog backup exceeds 1.3 gb, and I now have difficulty with my computer bogging down with both LRCC and PSCC open – I have just ordered a new computer, but the question at the back of my mind is always whether my LR catalog is too large. Any ideas?
Your catalog and your images don’t have to be on the same drive. I have my images on a Drobo, then mirrored to a second and backed up in the Cloud. The catalog is on emu internal and also gets mirrored and backed up.
Thanks Richard – my images are on an external drive (and mirrored) and I back up to my internal hard drive. Still wondering how large a catalog can get before it affects Lightroom performance – is there a “best practice” scenario for that.
Not really…. It’s just a database. I’ve got 9 TB of photos in mine and it works fine
Could you explain this part?
—
To solve my modeling dilemma, I created two new folder, Adult Models and Children Models. I created sub folders with the names of the models under the appropriate folder. Now when I browse for a model in front of a client, age appropriate images are hidden.
—
Not completely sure what you mean :)
Thanks
File structure would be
c:PhotographyModel-Adult
then under the folder would be the date plus model’s full name
ex:
Model-Adult
– 20160806 Alec Vanelli
– 20160901 Joe Johnson
The children would be the same
Thanks :) It’s just like already do it good to know.
How does one ensure and maintain the snappiest performance from Lightroom when using a single, potentially very large, catalog? Is there a practical size limit in the current version?
Make sure you backup frequently. Every couple of weeks use the File –> Optimize Catalog feature to optimize the catalog efficiency. There is no official size limit to your catalog but large catalogs do tend to slow things down and do need to be optimized more often. When you optimize you will see this message in the dialog box – “If your catalog is large and has been running slowly, optimizing may improve performance.” I think this answers your question but if not let me know.
Alan,
I checked with Lightroom Guru and Photofocus author Rob Sylvan and he confirmed…..No limit to catalog size, but hardware always makes the most difference performance wise.
My catalog size is currently 3.2 gb My oldest photo in my catalog is dated October 16, 2004. There is a total of 195,000 photos. I don’t see a lag in LR performance. Hope that helps.
Thanks!
Hey Robert! But what if you keep all your photos on external drives and the drives change with years? What’s the point of keeping the catalog so big? You won’t be able to just instantly find your photos on an external drive, you will have to show lightroom the path first, so it has almost no sense keeping these photos in your catalog. Example – I work on a small ssd drive for speed, then I transfer my photos to an external drive for backup and delete them from my working ssd drive. So what photos will lightroom catalog show… Read more »
Serj, I’m also a writer for Photofocus. Catalogs can keep track of external hard drives as well. If one were to keep all their 2016 photos on an external hard drive that is labeled 2016 and keep them organized safely, that person could relatively easily find the photo in the catalog and plug in the extenal drive. The issue with your workflow is that you’re moving the images from outside of Lightroom, thus breaking the link made by Lightroom to those pictures and the catalog and also introducing all those issues you’ve stated. In your workflow, if you were to… Read more »
I do this a little bit different. I have one master catalog and then have a catalog for specialist things, like “Yosemite”, “Joshua”…..it works for me, but each his own.
I went through the same path. Originally multiple catalogs because LR had problems with large catalogs. The headaches there caused me to move back to a single catalog once LR could handle it. I now use a single catalog, and think that is the only way to go (at least for my workflow). Like Richard, I have my images on a Drobo. That is backed up hourly via TimeMachine to a second RAID. It is also backed up (via CrashPlan) to my sister’s house, 10,000 miles away, and then also backed up (again, via CrashPlan) to the cloud. I currently… Read more »
I don’t understand keeping catalogs of hundreds of thousands of photos. I’ve been culling the heck out of my catalog… from over 115k to 50 k. I want to be at 5k photos. And even that’s probably too many…
Dave.. try being a timelapse shooter. Or having a client you’ve shot with for 10 years. Just because something doesn’t fit your needs doesn’t mean others are like you.
It’s true I haven’t considered every scenario. I certainly didn’t want to offend anyone. For me, where I have client or model shoots, I deleted all the ones I didn’t deliver to the client after a year or so.
I guess I’ve been thinking about what happens after I’m gone. I don’t want anyone to have to sort through the dross to find the stuff I cared about. If anyone will even care…
Those old shots often come back to life. My suggestion is to simply apply ratings or move your best stuff into collections or smart collections
I need to join together two catalogs. I’ve got one that has 250,000 images. No slowdown at all. I just go between PC and mac, and I have been doing it the lazy way, bringing over DNG files when I need my old photos for a post. With my 250,000 image catalog, I haven’t had any issues with speed. But, Sometimes, what I do is, when shooting a wedding, create a catalog for that, edit the photos, save that catalog with the raw files, and then, when I’m finished, the wedding has been delivered, I fold that catalog into the… Read more »
Thanks. This was very helpful for me. I’ve been working with several catalogs, but I’ll change this now so the photos will be easier to find.
Do you know if it’s possible to import photo settings from my old catalogs when I create a new one? I wish to keep my settings on the photos that I’ve already processed…