Where apps hide your files

Finding Affinity's recovery files

Updated 2026-10-28 · 6 min read

After a crash, Affinity Photo, Designer and Publisher offer to recover your document, and if they do not, the file is probably still on disk. Here is where to look and how to turn it back into a document.

Where to look

For the current Affinity app (the single app that replaced Photo, Designer and Publisher), replies on Affinity's own forum give this folder:

~/Library/Application Support/Affinity/autosave/

Affinity 2 and version 1 apps keep their data in a folder named after the individual app, either in the same Application Support folder or, for Mac App Store copies, inside a sandbox container under ~/Library/Containers. Serif's help pages do not publish any of these paths, so check your Mac rather than trusting one. These two commands only list names and change nothing:

find ~/Library/Application\ Support -maxdepth 4 -iname "*autosave*" 2>/dev/null | grep -i -e affinity -e serif
ls ~/Library/Containers | grep -i -e affinity -e serif

If the first prints a folder, open it with Go > Go to Folder (⇧⌘G) in Finder. If the second prints a container name, open ~/Library/Containers/ plus that name in the same way and look for an autosave folder inside its Data/Library/Application Support.

What an autosave file looks like

Forum posts describe the files as ending in .autosave. Open the folder in list view and sort by Date Modified: the newest one is almost always the document you lost. The file name may not resemble the original document's name, so the date is the reliable clue.

Turning it back into a document

The method Affinity's forum gives is consistent across versions:

1. Copy the .autosave file to your Desktop before you relaunch Affinity. Work on the copy, never the original.
2. Rename the copy's extension to the one your app uses: .af for the current Affinity app, .afphoto for Photo, .afdesign for Designer, .afpub for Publisher.
3. Double-click the renamed copy. It opens as a normal document. Save it straight away under a proper name.

Finder asks whether you are sure about changing the extension; choose to use the new one. If the file does not open, it was probably being written when the app crashed; try the next older one.

The built-in recovery route

Before touching folders, let the app do it. Affinity's help for version 2 describes the File Recovery Interval setting as saving temporary data for open documents "allowing a document restore to be offered at startup" after a crash. So relaunch the app and accept the restore if it is offered.

Two details from the forum explain a missing prompt. For a document that was already saved, the prompt may only appear when you open that same file again. And the General settings include Reopen document on startup; with it off, a named file you crashed on may not be offered until you open it.

The interval setting

In Affinity 2, open Settings from the app menu (⌘,) and choose Performance: File Recovery Interval sets how often that temporary data is written. Forum users describe the same setting in the current app. A shorter interval loses less after a crash, at the cost of more disk writes with large documents.

Space: autosaves can grow

Autosaves are full document snapshots, so a file with many high-resolution layers produces a large autosave. One forum user reported tens of gigabytes accumulating over a few months. Check the size:

du -sh ~/Library/Application\ Support/Affinity*

If the folder is large and you have no unsaved work, quit Affinity and move old .autosave files to the Trash in Finder. Delete only files inside the autosave folder, never the rest of Affinity's folders, which hold your settings, brushes, swatches and macros.

If nothing shows up

Work through these in order:

• Quit the app first, so you look at the last autosave it wrote.
• Run the find command again with -maxdepth 6.
• Check the container listing above, since a sandboxed build keeps its data there.
• If the document was never saved and the app crashed, the autosave may be the only copy, so copy the whole folder in Finder before you try anything else.

Other Affinity files you may meet

Next to the autosave folder, the same location holds user assets such as brushes and swatches. Each app can also have a preferences file, found with ls ~/Library/Preferences | grep -i -e affinity -e serif. Leave both alone unless you are moving to a new Mac.

Why you cannot find it in Spotlight

Spotlight does not show results from ~/Library or app containers, and .autosave is not a document type it lists. Typing the document name into Spotlight returns the original only, never its recovery copy.

Locating autosave files next time

Type .autosave into Everywhere to list every Affinity recovery file in Application Support, whichever version wrote it, and ⌘↵ reveals one in Finder; an autosave written in the last few minutes can wait for the next scan, so sort the folder by date once you are there. For a Mac App Store copy, whose autosaves sit in a container under ~/Library/Containers, Everywhere needs Full Disk Access first, because macOS shields containers from other apps. It finds the file by name only; copying and renaming it is still up to you.

Common questions

Where does Affinity store autosave files on a Mac?

Affinity's forum gives ~/Library/Application Support/Affinity/autosave for the current Affinity app; older Photo, Designer and Publisher builds use an app-named folder or a container. Run a find for autosave under Application Support to confirm on your Mac.

How do I open an Affinity autosave file?

Copy the .autosave file, rename the copy with your app's extension such as .af or .afphoto, and double-click it. Save it under a new name immediately.

Why does Affinity not offer to recover my file?

The restore may only be offered when you next open the original document, or when Reopen document on startup is switched on in General settings. If no prompt appears, look for the autosave file manually.

Can I change how often Affinity autosaves?

Yes. In Affinity 2, open Settings with ⌘, and change File Recovery Interval in the Performance section. A shorter interval loses less work after a crash.