Dropbox Finder Extension doesn't work and I have no Dropbox context menu items on new installation

DROPBOX MACOS SYNC ISSUE with Dropbox Finder Extension missing on MacOS 26.1 : SOLVED!

Yes I DID HAVE old unlinked Dropbox folder(s) in ~/Library/CloudStorage! 

In order to solve Dropbox Finder Extension not working, 

1. Quit Dropbox.
2. Used AI to give me Terminal commands to remove all Dropbox related files.
3. Clicked the small "Delete - Dropbox - Personal" and "Delete Dropbox CompanyName" button in the Finder at the User/Library/Cloud Storage/.
4. Reinstalled Dropbox. Made sure "Online-Only" was selected in the Dropbox Preferences - Sync settings.  

Dropbox is indexing the Folders and Right-click menu items are present. I have no clue how this solved anything or how this came to be in the first place. The current install DID NOT create new directories in the User/Library/Cloud Storage/. No idea how this happened before. 

Thanks for taking the time to post how you resolved this, Helsinboring!

If you come across any other issues, let us know.

Have a great week ahead!

thanks VERY much, this solved the issue for me!

I’ve been fighting the “no sync icons in Finder” issue on macOS Tahoe. In my case, Dropbox was still using the old ~/Dropbox location instead of the newer ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox.

What finally fixed it was:

1. Completely removing the old install
   • Quit Dropbox, open Terminal and stop Dropbox/Finder.
   • Delete the old ~/Dropbox folder.
   • Remove all Dropbox support folders, caches and helper tools under ~/Library and /Library.
   • If a ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox folder already existed, delete that too.
   • Restart the Mac.
2. Reinstalling Dropbox with default settings
   • Install the latest version from dropbox.com.
   • On Advanced settings, leave the Dropbox folder location as “Default location”, keep “Save files as online only” if you want, and make sure “Dropbox on File Provider” stays enabled (don’t opt out).
3. Checking the new path
   • From the menu bar icon, choose “Open Dropbox folder”.
   • Now it opens in ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox.
   • After that, sync went back to normal and, after a bit, the Finder icons started showing again.

If your icons are missing and Dropbox is still in ~/Dropbox, doing this full clean‑out and reinstall, then letting it use the default File Provider location, is what finally solved it for me.

👍

Thank you, ajw31​. Your directions worked! 

I had this exact problem — garcon kept showing as disabled, reinstalling didn't fix it, pluginkit -e use didn't stick even with sudo. The root cause turned out to be a ghost FileProvider domain registration stuck in a broken state.

Check if you have one:

plutil -p ~/Library/Application\ Support/FileProvider/com.getdropbox.dropbox.fileprovider/Domains.plist

If it exists and shows "Disconnected" => true or "Path" => "FPFS_SHOULD_NOT_BE_USED", that's your problem. Dropbox sees this ghost domain on startup and disables garcon, expecting FileProvider to handle Finder integration instead — but the FileProvider domain is broken, so neither works.

The fix (quit Dropbox first):

rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/FileProvider/com.getdropbox.dropbox.fileprovider/
sudo killall fileproviderd
sudo pluginkit -e ignore -i com.getdropbox.dropbox.fileprovider
sudo pluginkit -e use -i com.getdropbox.dropbox.garcon
open /Applications/Dropbox.app

This directory is managed by macOS, not Dropbox — that's why reinstalling Dropbox never fixes it. Full writeup is here.