Dropbox folder right-click options disappeared on macOS Tahoe

UPDATE > Solution for my situation > hope it helps you / someone.

First—  Dropbox support has been on a spectrum of abysmal to nonexistent. Jay and others on pages like this one at least reply occasionally, but I'm not clear whether they're paid Dropbox employees or folks from the general public trying to lend a hand. In my case, for example, Jay provided me a link to what he referred to as the "support team." I was encouraged thinking my issue was being escalated—  but nope, it was a link to a chat bot—  which turned out to be useless. Very frustrating.

Second—  Last night I keyed the following prompt into Chat GPT and the solution it provided resolved the issue I was having. My Dropbox issue was:

"On my M1 Macbook Pro Dropbox appears to work as intended.
The Dropbox folder lives in the “Users” folder. There is no Dropbox folder at ~/Library/CloudStorage. This seems odd because my research suggests there SHOULD BE a Dropbox folder at ~/Library/CloudStorage. True? False?

"On my new M4 Mac Studio where I’m having the issue, there are two Dropbox folders. One is located in the “Users” folder and no contextual menus appear here when right-clicking on files and folders, which indicates something is broken. The second Dropbox folder lives at ~/Library/CloudStorage and this folder is operating as it should.

Both Macs are running the most recent Dropbox app
Both Macs are running Tahoe 26.3

Here is the abbreviated version of what Chat GPT suggested:

• delete the Dropbox app from both Mac's
• install the fresh/current version of the Dropbox app on both Mac's
• go to Mac menu bar > Dropbox >  Account (icon bottom left)
• go to Preferences > Sync
• if your account appears eligible—  enable File Provider
• if you're unable to enable File Provider, this solution isn't for you
• you'll be prompted through a few windows
• the syncing of your account after making this change will take time 
• mine took about 45 minutes on each Mac
• monitor the menu bar Dropbox icon to see when everything becomes "Up to Date"

Once complete—  your real/primary Dropbox folder will live at ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox

A "symlink" or alias Dropbox folder with a tiny arrow on it will live in your users folder on each Mac.

I have contextual menus now when right-clicking on files and folders on both Macs.

Good luck!

Thank you for the support team link, Jay!

Hi DropRox1, thanks for your message. Given that you've already taken a lot of steps to resolve this, at this point it might be better for the support team to look into this in more detail.
You can contact them directly via this link, and they'll be able to investigate further.

Hello Nancy > Dropbox Community Moderator

I left a detailed post yesterday and I see you responded to another person's post but not mine… Which is perfectly fine, of course.

Just wondering if you or someone be responding to my post? Should I begin a new post rather than piggybacking on this one?

Please let me know—  I'm in the dark here. Thanks!

Glad to hear that did the trick! 

Can you send me a screenshot of the online-only files that you mention, and a visual of how much space they’re taking up on your device? 

Is your Dropbox app stuck syncing 2 files, even if you restart your computer? 

Also, when saying that you closed the Dropbox app and it’s still running, do you mean that you followed these steps to quit it?

Thanks, that has partially worked. I can now see the context menu and the syncing icons next to files, but there seems to be certain files that still appear as "online only" even though they are full size files on my drive. The "syncing..." status in the tray menu is also permanently saying "2 secs" and the data it is apparently downloading is constantly changing (both larger and smaller) in size. I've also noticed that even if I close Dropbox completely in the task bar it disappears but continues to run.

4thAndFifteen​, can you please follow these steps and let me know how it goes?

-Click on the Dropbox icon from your Desktop and quit the application
-Open your Activity Monitor from your Mac Utilities folder
-Force quit out of the instances of the Dropbox application that are running by searching for "Dropbox" in the search bar, then clicking on the "x" force quit icon on the top left
-Re-start Dropbox from the applications folder by double clicking on the Dropbox application
-Click on the Apple icon in the top left of your screen
-Click on "force quit"
-Relaunch the finder

If they don't work for you, I'd also like to know if you're only missing the right-click context menu options from your desktop app, or if you can't see any syncing icons next to your Dropbox files either.

Dropping a comment here to follow as I am having the exact same issue.

Hello Dropbox Community Moderator—

Hello—  I’m a Dropbox subscriber of many years and Dropbox currently has me scratching my head. I just stumbled upon this post and thought I'd jump-in since I'm having similar issues/questions as those of the OP.

M1 Macbook Pro Max > Dropbox works as it should.
M4 Mac Studio Max (new) > Dropbox contextual menu items missing
Both Mac’s running OS Tahoe 26.3
Dropbox app 242.4.5815
The menu bar Dropbox reports my files are up to date

I’ve read online from a variety of sources:

- the missing contextual items issue can be caused by a switch toggling itself off in Mac System Settings > General > Extensions > Dropbox—and this is happening in my case

To restore Dropbox contextual menu items I’ve tried:

- multiple reinstallation’s of the Dropbox app
- multiple Mac restarts
- multiple toggles-ON of the switch in Settings > General > Extensions > Dropbox
- lots of online research
- sending an empty test folder from MacBook Pro to Mac Studio. It works
- sending an empty test folder from to Mac Studio to MacBook Pro. It works
- cursing

Related Question
Another twist is that a new Apple File Provider system change moves the Dropbox folder to ~/Library/CloudStorage. Does this mean I should delete the Dropbox folder that lives in my “Users” folder? It’s the folder that is missing the contextual items. But why is the Dropbox folder in that same Users location on the Macbook Pro working as it should?

Related Question
- Dropbox menu bar Preferences says my account is eligible to begin using File Provider but I’m hesitant to do so because I don’t understand what it is or how it might help or hinder the behavior of Dropbox. From what I understand File Provider is an Apple thing—  and not something Dropbox created or implemented. Should begin using File Provider?

Related Question
- it appears that some users can relocate their Dropbox folder onto an external drive, which I would like to do, but doing so appears to come with some limitations— such as, drives needing to be encrypted. Is relocating my Dropbox folder onto an external drive considered safe to do?

There are many things about how Dropbox functions I don’t understand and don’t want to understand. I’m paying for the Dropbox service with the understanding that it will safely and reliably store my files with no fuss. Please assist me and anyone else who might read this, to get Dropbox working properly.

Thank You

Hey elixtasy​, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

This doesn't sound like a compatibility issue; the Dropbox app should work fine on your Mac computer, so let's see what we can find out about this.

Apart from the right-click options in your Dropbox folder that are missing, is the Dropbox app working and syncing as normal?

Meaning, if you add a file to your Dropbox folder, will it sync to your account online?

Also, what do you see when you hover over the small Dropbox icon in your menu bar with your mouse?

Let me know what you find and we'll go from there.