Before resetting your preferences, make sure to back up your preferences.

Using the keyboard shortcut or delete on quit preference to reset your preferences permanently deletes a subset of preferences files including settings from the preferences dialog, custom shortcuts, workspaces, and color settings. For a list of specific files that are deleted see these tables for preference file functions, names, and locations for macOS and Windows.

Manually restoring your preferences is a complete method for resetting Photoshop to its default state by ensuring plug-in preferences and any user presets causing a problem are not loaded.


USING A KEYBOARD SHORTCUT

    • Quit Photoshop.

    • Hold down the following keyboard shortcut and launch Photoshop:

      macOS: command + option + shift

      Windows: ctrl + alt + shift

    • Open Photoshop.

    • Click Yes in the dialog that asks "Delete the Adobe Photoshop Settings file?"

       

      New preferences files will be created in their original location.


    • USING THE PREFERENCES DIALOG

        • Open Photoshop's Preferences:

          macOS: Photoshop > Preferences > General

          Windows: Edit > Preferences > General

        • Click Reset Preferences On Quit

          Reset Preferences on Quit.

        • Click OK in the dialog that asks "Are you sure you want to reset preferences when quitting Photoshop?"

        • Quit and relaunch Photoshop.

           

          New preferences files will be created in their original location.


        • MANUALLY

          Manually removing preferences files is the most complete method for restoring Photoshop to its default state. This method ensures all preferences and any user presets which may be causing a problem are not loaded.

            • Quit Photoshop.

            • Navigate to Photoshop's Preferences folder.

              macOS: Users/[user name]/Library/Preferences/Adobe Photoshop [version] Settings

              Windows: Users/[user name]/AppData/Roaming/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop [version]/Adobe Photoshop [version] Settings

               
              Note:

              The user Library folder is hidden by default on macOS. To access files in the hidden user Library folder, see How to access hidden user library files.

            • Drag the entire Adobe Photoshop [Version] Settings folder to the desktop or somewhere safe for a back-up of your settings

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          Disable warning messages

          Sometimes you will see messages containing warnings or prompts. You can suppress the display of these messages by selecting the Don’t Show Again option in the message. You can also globally redisplay all messages that have been suppressed.

            • Do one of the following:
               

              Windows: Choose Edit > Preferences > General

               

              macOS: Choose Photoshop > Preferences > General

            • Click Reset All Warning Dialogs, and click OK.