OBS Studio Cleanup: Recordings, Cache and Crash Logs

Where OBS keeps its junk

Recordings and replays go wherever you pointed them in Settings → Output — by default that is your Videos folder, and only you know which takes are worth keeping. Everything else lives under %APPDATA%\obs-studio: logs, one text file per session, sit in the logs folder — tiny individually, hundreds in aggregate; crash dumps land in crashes, and a single .dmp file can run to hundreds of megabytes; the browser source keeps its own Chromium profile and cache under plugin_config.

That same config folder also holds your scene collections: basic\scenes contains the JSON files that ARE your setup. Deleting a cache costs you nothing; deleting the wrong JSON costs you hours of scene rebuilding. So the rule is simple: archives and disposable stuff live outside obs-studio, configuration lives inside it — handle with care.

• Recordings and replays — the folder set in Settings → Output; the default is C:\Users\<name>\Videos
• Session logs — %APPDATA%\obs-studio\logs, one text file per launch, safe to delete wholesale
• Crash dumps — %APPDATA%\obs-studio\crashes, .dmp files that can reach hundreds of MB
• Browser-source cache — %APPDATA%\obs-studio\plugin_config, Chromium profile data for docks and browser sources
• Scene collections — %APPDATA%\obs-studio\basic\scenes, your actual setup: back it up, never delete it

A cleanup that breaks nothing

Start with the recordings: watch them, move the keepers to an external drive or your NAS, delete the rest — this is where 90% of the space is. Then clear the crashes folder, keeping the newest dump only if you have an open bug report waiting for evidence. Logs can go entirely; OBS writes a fresh one on every launch.

Before touching anything inside %APPDATA%\obs-studio at all, export your scene collections from the Scene Collection menu — that gives you a portable backup you can restore in seconds. And if OBS suddenly misbehaves after an update, don't reinstall first; rename the obs-studio folder entirely, OBS will create a clean profile, and you will instantly know whether your config was the problem.

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