Where apps hide your files

Finding Terraria's Players and Worlds folders

Updated 2026-10-28 · 6 min read

Terraria stores your characters and worlds as small files in two folders under Application Support, unless you have moved them to Steam Cloud. Here is where they are, what the files mean, and how to back them up.

The location

~/Library/Application Support/Terraria/Players
~/Library/Application Support/Terraria/Worlds

Characters (players) go in Players and worlds go in Worlds, both inside the Terraria folder in Application Support. The official Terraria wiki gives the Worlds path for macOS and puts the Mac settings file in the same Terraria folder; the Players path comes from the Terrasavr save editor's documentation and matches the layout the wiki describes for Windows.

~/Library is hidden in Finder. To get there, choose Go > Go to Folder (⇧⌘G), paste the path and press Return, or use Terminal:

open ~/Library/Application\ Support/Terraria

If a character or world is missing from these folders, it may be stored in Steam Cloud (see below), or you have not created one on this Mac account yet.

What is in the Terraria folder

Item	What it is
Players/*.plr	A character: inventory, stats, appearance
Players/<character name>/	That character's minimap data, as .map files named after each world's internal ID
Worlds/*.wld	A world: the map, buildings, chests and NPCs
.bak files	Backups of the previous version, such as Name.plr.bak
config.json	The game's settings
Captures	Images taken in Camera Mode
ResourcePacks	Resource packs you have added

The file name is the name you chose, such as MyWorld.wld. The wiki notes that two characters with the same name are told apart by a number, as in Player.plr and Player2.plr.

Copying a character or world

To share a world or back it up:

1. Quit Terraria.
2. Copy the .plr file from Players, or the .wld file from Worlds, to somewhere safe, such as a folder in Documents.
3. Copy the character's folder of the same name as well if you want to keep its explored map.
4. To restore, put the files back in the same folder with the game closed.

Take the matching .bak file as a fallback. Community guides report that the same files work between Mac and Windows, so copying is the usual way to move a character or world to another computer.

Steam Cloud

Terraria's cloud saving works per character and per world. The wiki lists Move to cloud and Move off cloud options in the character and world selection menus, and says cloud saves can be reached from your other devices. Answers on Steam's community forums add that a file you have moved to the cloud is kept by Steam rather than in the local Players or Worlds folder, so use Move off cloud first when you want a file you can copy. The game's config.json also has a CloudSavingDefault setting, off by default, that sends new characters and worlds to the cloud.

Steam lets you switch cloud sync off for a single game in that game's Properties. If Steam keeps replacing a file you restored by hand, turn it off for Terraria while you work, then turn it back on. Steam keeps its own copies under ~/Library/Application Support/Steam/userdata, in a folder per Steam account; let Steam manage those.

tModLoader

tModLoader, the separate mod-enabled version, does not use your normal characters and worlds. Its own guide says it copies them for modded play and keeps modded saves in a tModLoader folder inside Terraria's save folder, with older 1.3-era versions using ModLoader instead. The guide gives Windows paths, so on a Mac list ~/Library/Application Support/Terraria and look for either folder beside Players and Worlds. Characters and worlds made with mods can need the same mods installed to load again.

Check before you copy

List the folders first, so you know what you are about to move:

ls -la ~/Library/Application\ Support/Terraria/Players
ls -la ~/Library/Application\ Support/Terraria/Worlds

Each listing shows file names, sizes and modification times; the newest is usually what you played last. The ls command only reads, so it is safe to run while the game is open. Copy files only once the game has quit, because Terraria writes to them when you leave a world.

Space and cleaning up

Saves are modest. A world file grows with the world's size and a player file is small, so they rarely matter for disk space. Keep .bak files until you are sure the current file loads. To remove a world, use the delete option on the world selection screen, or quit and move the .wld file and its .bak to the Trash.

Why searches miss these

~/Library is hidden in Finder, and Spotlight and Finder searches leave out results from it. File names are the world or character names you picked, so searching only works if you remember the name exactly and look in the right place.

Finding a world or character again

If you remember part of the world's name, typing it into Everywhere finds the .wld file along with its .bak, and typing .plr lists every character on the Mac, including copies you made elsewhere. Application Support is indexed without any extra permission, and ⌘↵ reveals a file in Finder before you copy it. It matches names only, so it cannot repair a damaged world or reach files that live only in Steam Cloud.

Common questions

Where does Terraria save on a Mac?

Characters are in ~/Library/Application Support/Terraria/Players and worlds in ~/Library/Application Support/Terraria/Worlds. Library is hidden, so use Go to Folder (⇧⌘G).

What are .plr and .wld files?

.plr is a Terraria character and .wld is a world. A file with .bak added to the name is a backup of the previous version, and a folder named after a character holds its minimap .map files.

How do I back up my Terraria world on Mac?

Quit the game and copy the .wld file, and its .bak, from the Worlds folder to another location. Copy the .plr from Players for the character.

Why is my Terraria character missing from the Players folder?

It may be in Steam Cloud: characters and worlds you have used Move to cloud on are kept by Steam rather than in the local folder. Use Move off cloud in the selection menu to bring one back.