# Running Local from external drive possible?

**URL:** <https://community.localwp.com/t/running-local-from-external-drive-possible/41310>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [February 10, 2024, 8:01pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/running-local-from-external-drive-possible/41310 "2024-02-10T20:01:57Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Eva](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/eva/32/20912_2.png) [@Eva](https://community.localwp.com/u/Eva)\
**Post date:** [February 10, 2024, 8:01pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/running-local-from-external-drive-possible/41310/1 "2024-02-10T20:01:57Z")

</div>

### What issue or error are you experiencing?

## I read in a support post from 2019 that in a beta version it might be possible to run Local from an external hard drive instead of the system drive with operating system. Is that indeed possible?

### What steps can be taken to replicate the issue? Feel free to include screenshots, videos, etc

* * *

### System Details

- **Local Version:** v 8.2.1

- **Operating System (OS) and OS version:** Windows 11

* * *

### Local Logs

Attach your Local Logs here ([Help Doc - Retrieving Local’s Log](https://localwp.com/help-docs/troubleshooting/retrieving-locals-log-file/))

* * *

_ **Security Reminder** _  
Local does a pretty good job of scrubbing private info from the logs and the errors it produces, however there’s always the possibility that something private can come through. Because these are public forums, always review the screenshots you are sharing to make sure there isn’t private info like passwords being displayed.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Nick-B](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/nick-b/32/16140_2.png) [@Nick-B](https://community.localwp.com/u/Nick-B)\
**Post date:** [February 10, 2024, 9:06pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/running-local-from-external-drive-possible/41310/2 "2024-02-10T21:06:12Z")

</div>

Hi @Eva

I think it can partially work but Local will still need space on the machine to be able to operate. See this comment from Ben for example:

> [@Using external SSD as Local site path](https://community.localwp.com/t/using-external-ssd-as-local-site-path/22463/2):
>
> I think it’s possible to get at least some of the site onto a different SSD, however Local will still create some of the infrastructure things (NGINX/PHP/MySQL) configuration on the main hard-drive (C:\ or ~/ depending on the OS) What operating system are you using? The permissions error you mention might have something to do with the permissions in the actual server software. Can you take a look at the Local log and see if there are any errors there? See this Community Forum post for instruct…

If you have a lot of projects in Local you could also backup and export them to move to your external hard drive for storage and simply remove them from Local when you are done. If you ever need to revisit you could import the zip file back into Local.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/system/32/1_2.png) [@system](https://community.localwp.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [May 10, 2024, 9:07pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/running-local-from-external-drive-possible/41310/3 "2024-05-10T21:07:05Z")

</div>

This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.