Anki for Mac - “unable to create data folder”

Anki Help
1

I am trying to Download Anki for Macbook Pro (intel) but keep having problems.

Download is fine, I save it to documents but when I launch the application it says “unable to create data folder”.

I have tried deleting and re-downloading and have made sure Anki has full disk access but still coming up with the same error message.

Please help!

2

Have you moved the application into your applications folder?

3

Yes tried that and it still doesn’t open

4

MacOS install instructions – Install & Upgrade - Anki Manual .

  • Is the Intel version the right one for your device? [And did you download it from Anki’s main site or Github?]
  • Can you give us the exact (full) text of the error, or a screenshot?
  • Is this a fresh install, or an upgrade?
  • The “Anki2” data folder that it is trying to create will go here – Managing Files - Anki Manual – by default. Is that already created?
5

I double checked that the Intel version is the right one for my device - it’s a 2019 MacBook Pro. I downloaded it from main site
The exact message that appears when I try to launch the application is “Unable to create data folder”
This is a fresh install
No Anki2 folder has appeared and I also looked in documents and no folder there either.

I followed the installation instructions exactly but the error message is still coming up

6

Please run anki-console.bat in Anki’s install folder, which should give some extra debugging info to indicate what’s going wrong. Please paste it here.

7

No folder was downloaded - I have taken a screen shot of what was downloaded from the main site

Screenshot 2025-06-18 at 10.42.40
Screenshot 2025-06-18 at 10.42.40280×336 17.7 KB

8

You cannot download folders (except if they are part of an archive, like a .zip).

I don’t use Mac, but after you ran the install file (that you already downloaded), there should be anki-console.bat in the very folder where anki was installed – that’s how I understand daes comment.

And if you run that, then you might get useful output for debugging, which in turn might help people here to solve your problem.

9

Not sure how I managed to think you were on Windows there :sweat_smile:

Please open Terminal.app, then paste in the following and press enter:

/Application/Anki.app/Contents/MacOS/anki

(this is after dragging the Anki app to your applications folder, if you haven’t already done so)

10

It says “no such file or directory”

I have definitely dragged the Anki app to my applications folder

11

Please try ~/Application/Anki.app/Contents/MacOS/anki instead.

If that doesn’t work either, please try the following:

ls -l /Applications/Anki*
ls -l ~/Applications/Anki*
12

The Applications folder is named /Applications not /Application

@caitiym In the Terminal try /Applications/Anki.app/Contents/MacOS/anki

2 Likes
13

So this triggered something as the previous ones came up with “no matches found”

Anki starting…
Initial setup…
Starting Anki 25.02.6…
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “aqt”, line 638, in _run
File “aqt.profiles”, line 362, in get_created_base_folder
File “pathlib”, line 1323, in mkdir
PermissionError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: ‘/Users/caitl/Library/Application Support/Anki2’

1 Like
14

My apologies for accidentally leaving that letter off. Looks like we got there in the end though - your permissions are set wrongly. I asked AI to provide you some instructions:

Fixing “Permission denied” for Anki on macOS

  1. Open the Application Support folder
  • In Finder, click the Go menu in the top menu bar, then choose Go to Folder…
  • Paste this and press Return:
~/Library/Application Support
  1. Fix permissions on the Anki2 folder
  • In the window that opens, find the Anki2 folder
  • Right-click it and choose Get Info
  • At the bottom of the info panel under Sharing & Permissions:
    • Make sure your user account has Read & Write access
    • If not, click the :locked: padlock to unlock, then update the permission
  • Click the gear icon (⋯) and choose Apply to enclosed items…, then confirm
  1. If that didn’t fix it: go to the parent folder manually
  • In Finder, press Command–Up Arrow once to move up to the parent folder (Library)
  • Then click Application Support again to select it
  • Right-click Application Support, choose Get Info, and repeat the same permission steps:
    • Ensure your user has Read & Write
    • Unlock with the padlock if needed
    • Use Apply to enclosed items… from the gear menu
  1. Done
    You can now try opening Anki again.
1 Like
15

Have tried this but there is no Anki2 folder anywhere on my laptop. So I tried fixing permissions on the Anki App as the instructions say to but once done, it still says unable to create data folder

16

Gah, a one-character mistake again. Please use /Library/Application Support

17

No, I shouldn’t multitask. The location was right the first time. The fact that you see no Anki2 folder indicates the permission problem is on the Application Support folder, so please follow step 3. I’ve edited step 3 to say ‘click’ instead of ‘double-click’, as that may have led you astray.

18

@dae you are amazing thank you so so much! That has fixed it!!!

1 Like