HELP – Why Does Lightroom Look SO Different?!?

Confusion Over Lightroom Names

Every week someone comes to me panicking – you open Lightroom and see that just about EVERYTHING has changed – the Folders panel isn’t there with your nicely organized folders, there are no keywording panels on the right, there are no Library, Develop or other modules, etc – or you experience the opposite – you’re not expecting these elements and they are there – everything looks more busy and complicated than you are used to. Of course this tends to happen when you’re under tight deadlines to process images. Why would Adobe go and change everything??

I’ve written about the existence of two Lightroom applications and the confusion it creates before, but since the question is still so common I’m addressing it again.

You may expect this:

Lightroom Classic

and see this:

Cloud-based Lightroom

or you may expect and see the opposite.

Fortunately there’s no need to panic though – you’re just in the wrong Lightroom program. If you’re looking for the one shown in the first screenshot – Lightroom Classic – with Library, Develop, Map and other modules along the top, then close the cloud-based “Lightroom” application you’re in and either look for one of the Lightroom logos below (the left one is the old one, the right is the new one) in your dock or taskbar or on your desktop, or go to your Applications folder (Mac) or Program Files (Windows) and find and open Adobe Lightroom Classic.

Old and new logos for Lightroom Classic

If you’re looking for the streamlined cloud-based Lightroom, close Lightroom Classic and either look for one of the logos below in your dock or taskbar or on your desktop, or go to your Applications folder (Mac) or Program Files (Windows) and find and open the Adobe Lightroom CC folder and the Adobe Lightroom application within it with one of these logos.

Old and new logos for the cloud-based “Lightroom”

The cloud-based Lightroom and Lightroom Classic aren’t really meant to be used together – while some people do use them together, there are complexities that most of you will not want to deal with. I recommend that most of you uninstall the application that you’re not using so that you don’t accidentally end up in it again. (You can always reinstall it later from the Creative Cloud app if you want to reconsider using it.)