Where apps hide your files

Finding Loom recordings and temporary files

Updated 2026-10-28 · 5 min read

Loom is a cloud service: a finished recording lives in your Loom Library, and the Mac keeps only temporary parts while you record or upload. Here is where those parts are, how to rescue a stuck upload, and how to get a real file copy.

The location

For the Loom desktop app on a Mac, Loom's support article gives this folder for the video parts it stores while recording and uploading:

~/Movies/Loom/Temporary/

Inside it, each recording gets a folder named after its video ID, something like 1234abcd5678efgh. The ID is usually the last part of the video's share link (loom.com/share/<video ID>). Loom says the desktop app stores these parts temporarily, and that they disappear as an upload succeeds.

Open it from Finder with Go > Go to Folder (⇧⌘G), or from Terminal:

open ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary

To list names and sizes without opening anything:

ls -lh ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary

What this folder is, and is not

This is not a library of your recordings. Loom keeps finished videos in your Loom Library in the cloud, and its documentation describes no permanent local copy. An empty Temporary folder is normal. You will usually find a recording folder there only while a recording is in progress, an upload is still running, or an upload failed. The article applies to the desktop app; Loom's disk-space article notes that its space check does not apply to the Chrome extension.

Get a file copy of a finished recording

The supported route is the download option in your Loom Library:

1. Go to the video in your Library.
2. Open the menu above the video.
3. Choose Download.

Loom's help says the file is an MP4, and that downloading depends on plan and role. On Business and Business+ AI plans, admins and creators can download; on Education plans, admins only; on Enterprise, admins and members. Admins and creators on the free Starter plan cannot download, and Creator Lite and Viewer roles cannot download on any plan. If your role is the problem, Loom's advice is to ask a workspace admin to change it to Admin or Creator.

What the file keeps: trims carry over, but call-to-action buttons, filler-word and silence removal, chapters and captions do not. Videos that use variables cannot be downloaded, only the organiser can download a meeting recording, and videos over 20GB need Loom Support. The download keeps the aspect ratio you recorded in, which can look stretched compared with the web player.

A recording is stuck uploading

Loom's article for stuck desktop recordings gives these steps:

1. Open ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary and find the folder named after your video ID. Check that it contains files.
2. Fully quit Loom: right-click its menu bar icon and choose Quit.
3. Reopen Loom and wait a few minutes. Auto-recovery tries to upload the stored parts, and the files disappear as they upload, after which the video appears in your Library.
4. If that fails, right-click the video-ID folder and choose Compress, upload the zip to a cloud storage service, and send the link to Loom Support with your video ID and a description of the problem.

Do not delete that folder before the upload finishes. Those parts are the only copy of a recording that never reached the cloud.

Disk space while recording

Loom writes recording files to your disk temporarily as you record, and checks free space before it starts. Loom's article gives these thresholds for the Mac app: a "Low on disk space" warning with less than 16GB free when SCK (Screen Capture Kit) is enabled, or less than 2GB with it disabled, and "Cannot start recording" with less than 2GB free (SCK on) or 1GB (SCK off).

If you cannot free space, Loom suggests turning SCK off: click the three-dot menu in the desktop app, go to Settings, open the Video & audio tab and switch off Enable SCK screen capture. You lose hiding the recording controls and speaker notes while it is off.

Backing up your recordings

Because the cloud copy is the real one, a Mac backup does not protect finished videos: they are not on the Mac to back up. If a recording matters, download the MP4 from the Library and keep it with your other files. A Mac backup only helps with parts still waiting in Temporary.

Other places a recording can hide

If you cannot find a recording at all, check the web first. A video can sit in your Library under a different workspace, or in a folder you forgot. The Mac only ever holds a finished copy if you downloaded one, and that file lands wherever your browser saves downloads, usually Downloads.

Why searching misses it

The Temporary folder is inside Movies, which a Finder search covers, but its subfolders are named with IDs and are usually empty. Downloaded MP4s are named after the video title and usually land in Downloads, so searching for a clip's title is the better route.

Finding a downloaded copy later

Downloaded Loom videos carry the title you gave them, so typing a few words of that title into Everywhere finds the MP4 wherever you saved it, even on an unplugged drive it indexed earlier. Typing the video ID from the share link finds its folder in Temporary while an upload is pending. Movies and Downloads are protected folders, so Everywhere finds them once it has Full Disk Access. It searches names only, not what is said in a video.

Common questions

Does Loom save recordings on my Mac?

Not as finished files. Loom keeps recordings in your cloud Library; the desktop app holds only temporary parts in ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary while you record or upload.

Where are Loom temporary files on a Mac?

In ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary, in a folder named after the video ID from the share link. Loom's support says they disappear as the upload succeeds.

How do I download a Loom video to my Mac?

Go to the video in your Library, open the menu above it and choose Download to get an MP4. Loom limits downloads by plan and role: Creator Lite and Viewer roles, and Starter (free) plan users, cannot download.

Why is my Loom recording stuck uploading?

Check ~/Movies/Loom/Temporary for the video ID folder, then fully quit Loom from its menu bar icon and reopen it, which runs auto-recovery. If that fails, compress the folder and send a link to it to Loom Support.