Tahoe aerial screensavers storage location?

There are 79 available Landscape screensavers. Settings/Wallpaper/Screen Saver/Landscape.

Most have the downward arrow displayed on the thumbnail that you click to D/L that one. A few, apparently, are already downloaded.

I had already used a few in rotation with Sequoia, b4 I upgraded to Tahoe.

I went through the list & D/L all the ones with an arrow!


I cannot find where they are stored on my mac! I want to see how much space each one takes up. I think ~ 500MB. They probably all .mov files.

I searched & found several sources saying they are located here:

Macintosh HD/library/application support/com.apple.idleassetsd/customer/4KSDR240FPS


But I see only 5 .mov files there. I cannot find the other 74 files!

The other 2K & 4K folders in "Customer" folder are empty.


Where are they?


My current screen saver (I set it to rotate every 12 hrs.) is NOT one of the 5 in that 4KSDR240FPS folder.



Mac Studio

Posted on Sep 25, 2025 2:43 AM

Reply
16 replies

Sep 25, 2025 3:02 PM in response to growler62000

For what it's worth, I found all .mov files on my Mac using EasyFind, including the ones for screensavers. There are 86 .mov files. Some are audio only. Most do not have the name of the screensaver but have names such as 00BA71CD-2C54-415A-A68A-8358E677D750.mov. The screensavers seem to be mostly in '/Library/Application Support/com.apple.idleassetsd/Customer'

Sep 25, 2025 2:32 PM in response to dialabrain

I don’t think those are the Aerial screensavers. I think those are the preinstalled wallpapers or probably the thumbnails.

Most are tiny file sizes ~ 500 bytes. “.madesktop” Also a few “.HEIC” & “.png” all are tiny files.


However, I do not have

'/System/Library/Desktop Pictures/.wallpapers’

My file path:'/System/Library/Desktop Pictures/’

No .wallpapers folder


I was looking in: Macintosh HD/System/Library/Desktop Pictures


I will try my user name..nope


I tried to reveal hidden files by pressing: “shift/Cmd/.” From “Macintosh HD”


Now I DO see (greyed out) other files/folders!


Macintosh HD/System/Library/Desktop Pictures/.wallpapers


3 folders:

Sonoma

Sonoma Horizon

Tahoe Day

The Sonoma folder has 4 .MOV files but they are not anything I have ever used and they are just some moving colors.


Sonoma Horizon has three files; two PNG and one HEIC. All are just static pictures.


Finally, Tahoe day has only one file and it is a .MOV file.

I think it's one of the moving wallpapers rather than a screensaver.


However, my search for my 70+ .MOV aerial screensavers is unsuccessful to date!


Sep 26, 2025 9:11 PM in response to dialabrain

Thanks but, I’ve looked there several times & still only 5 .MOV files with long, alpha numerical names & they are all old, Aerial screen savers that I was using with macOS Sequoia.


My Current Aerial Screensaver is not there (You can highlight & press space bar to see a preview) & the other 70+ I supposedly D/L are not there.


I think they are residing somewhere on my Mac because I checked my storage capacity before and after I downloaded so many and it drastically reduced!

But, doing Mac Spotlight searches for ".MOV" does not find them either.


Also, on a related subject, the screensaver does not rotate!


I had selected ‘rotate every 12 hours,’ but I'm looking at the same screensaver from more than a day ago when I first posted here.


These aerial screensavers are gorgeous, but… the ability to download many or to have them change every day or every 12 hours seems problematic.

Tahoe aerial screensavers storage location?

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.