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Home → Post Processing

How to Completely Remove Adobe Creative Cloud Software

By Nasim Mansurov 48 Comments
Last Updated On August 23, 2019

If you decide to move to another post-processing tool and you want to completely uninstall and remove all Adobe Creative Cloud applications, you might come across some issues. In this article, I want to share the process of completely removing Adobe software from both PC and Mac hardware.

I recently transitioned my laptop to another family member and I wanted to completely remove all unrelated software, including Adobe Creative Cloud. Something that was supposed to be an extremely simple task of software uninstallation turned out to be a long and painful process. The good news is, I was able to successfully remove all Adobe software from the laptop. The bad news is, it took me much longer than I anticipated, thanks to all the bloatware Adobe installed on my computer without my permission.

Table of Contents

  • How to Remove Adobe Creative Cloud from Your PC
    • Sign in to Adobe CC Desktop App
    • Remove All Adobe Creative Cloud Apps
    • Remove Adobe CC Desktop App
    • Download and Run Adobe CC Uninstaller
    • Remove Adobe’s Bloatware
    • Remove Adobe GC Invoker
    • Reboot Computer and Manually Remove Remaining Adobe Folders
  • How to Remove Adobe Creative Cloud from Your Mac
    • Sign In and Remove Adobe CC Apps
    • Remove Adobe CC Desktop App
    • Remove all Adobe Folders

How to Remove Adobe Creative Cloud from Your PC

The process of removal of Adobe Creative Cloud (CC) software should be simple, according to Adobe. You should first remove all Adobe apps from the CC desktop app, then remove Adobe CC desktop app itself. In reality, the process of removing Adobe software turned out to be much more complicated. Here are the steps you might need to go through:

  1. Sign in to Adobe CC desktop app.
  2. Remove all Adobe apps such as Photoshop and Lightroom using the Creative Cloud desktop app.
  3. If any of the software fails to uninstall, go to Control Panel and remove it from there.
  4. Once all Adobe apps are removed, uninstall Adobe CC desktop software from the Control Panel.
  5. If Adobe CC desktop software does not uninstall, download and run Adobe CC uninstaller software.
  6. Once Adobe CC desktop software is completely removed, remove all other Adobe bloatware present on the computer using the Adobe CC Cleaner Tool.
  7. Reboot the computer.
  8. Remove all Adobe folders in local storage.

Sign in to Adobe CC Desktop App

I have to admit, requiring one to sign in to the Creative Cloud desktop app just to remove all Adobe apps is already ridiculous. I cannot think of a single piece of software I have used in the past that made me type in my username and password just to start the software removal process.

While you technically can remove individual Adobe software components using the Control Panel, it is not the recommended practice, since the Adobe Creative Cloud desktop app must be in sync with what is installed or removed from the computer. Therefore, it is best that you sign in and remove all the apps using the desktop app:

Adobe Creative Cloud Sign In

I am not sure what Adobe expects people with no Creative Cloud credentials to do when removing Adobe software. In my case, my family member does not have an Adobe CC account, so if I did not sign in and remove the software for them, they would have to go through a different process of software removal.

Remove All Adobe Creative Cloud Apps

Once you log in, you will need to remove all Adobe Creative Cloud apps like Photoshop and Lightroom using the same desktop app. Click on the “Apps” tab, then “Installed Apps”, then scroll down to the installed app and click the little down arrow next to “Open” or “Update”, then click “Manage” -> “Uninstall”. If you are not planning to use Adobe Creative Cloud software in the near future, select the “Yes, Remove App Preferences” option when you are prompted. This should start the process of app removal.

If nothing happens after more than 10-15 seconds, close out of the Adobe CC desktop app, then manually remove the Adobe app using the Control Panel.

Remove Adobe CC Desktop App

The Adobe CC desktop app is the main piece of software that allows you to install and remove Adobe apps. Once all Adobe apps are removed, the next step is to remove the Adobe CC desktop app itself.

You can do so by visiting “Add / Remove Programs” (also known as “Programs and Features” in Windows 10) in Control Panel and uninstalling the Adobe Creative Cloud App component manually. You will be presented with a pop-up screen like this:

Adobe Creative Cloud Uninstaller

Unfortunately, thanks to all the bloatware that Adobe installs on most PCs, the process of removing this app will most likely end up with the below error:

Adobe Creative Cloud Couldnt Uninstall

Although I knew for a fact that there was not a single Adobe Creative Cloud applications left to uninstall, I still could not remove the desktop app. Here is a screenshot of the Adobe CC desktop app, which shows nothing is installed:

Adobe Creative Cloud Uninstalled

And here is a screenshot from “Programs and Features”, which shows there is nothing Adobe-related left on the computer:

Add Remove Programs No Adobe

Despite this, the Adobe CC desktop app still failed to uninstall, so the next step was to download and run the Adobe CC uninstaller software.

Download and Run Adobe CC Uninstaller

Once again, requiring anyone to download and run a separate tool just to remove software is ridiculous – it only shows how poorly Adobe software is developed. Software vendors usually do that as a last resort when software gets corrupted. And as you will see further down below, you might need more than one tool to completely get rid of everything.

To download the Adobe CC Uninstaller, visit this page, scroll down and download the ZIP file. Once the file is downloaded, open it up and run the Uninstaller.

If everything goes well, you should see the following screen:

Adobe Creative Cloud Uninstall Successful

Adobe Creative Cloud desktop app is now removed.

Remove Adobe’s Bloatware

The next step is to remove the rest of Adobe’s bloatware that gets installed without your permission. That’s right, Adobe silently installs a bunch of software that you might not know about. Some of this software runs continuously in the background, even if you have zero Adobe apps left on the computer, as you will see further down below.

Download the Adobe CC Cleaner tool using this link. Make sure to run the tool as Administrator by right-clicking it (the tool won’t be able to clean everything up without the right privileges), and selecting “Run as Administrator”. You will be presented with a screen that looks like this:

Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner

You will see two options: English and Japanese for selecting the language. Type “e” and press Enter. You will then see the following screen that requires you to agree to Adobe’s terms, which basically state that Adobe is not responsible for any damage the software might cause:

Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner 2

You will need to type “y” and press Enter to proceed. From there, the next screen will show you all the bloatware Adobe left on your computer:

Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Installed on Machine

Wow, that’s a lot of stuff that’s left over I had no idea about. Note that none of this stuff is found in the App section of Control Panel in the computer. I went ahead and typed “6” to “Clean All”, only to be presented with an error:

Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner 3

I had to run the tool twice to clean up the list.

Now that the cleaner removed all Adobe software, my next step was to remove all the relevant folders that are left over in Program Files folder in my computer. Except…I could not remove them due to other Adobe software that was running on the computer:

Windows Cannot Remove Adobe Folder

The Adobe folder was in use. The two folders that failed to remove were these:

After Cleaner Two Adobe Folders

That’s right, Adobe has even more bloatware that runs without your permission. One such piece of software is called “Adobe GC Invoker Utility”, which automatically runs on start up every time you reboot. I looked it up, and it is supposedly software that makes sure that you don’t pirate the software. It always runs in the background and it does not get removed when you use the uninstaller, or Adobe’s cleaner tool.

Here it is, sitting along all other apps that run when the computer restarts:

Adobe Creative Cloud After Cleaner

Although you can just disable it from running on start-up, I would recommend to remove it completely.

Remove Adobe GC Invoker

NOTE: The next step involves running Windows Registry Editor, so you have to be very careful – only delete exactly what I show you below or you could corrupt your Windows installation!

Run “regedit” (Windows Registry Editor) as Administrator and navigate to: Computer -> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -> SOFTWARE -> Microsoft -> Windows -> CurrentVersion -> Run

If you don’t want to go through all the trees within the registry editor, simply search for “AdobeGCInvoker-1.0”. Manually delete this key from the registry by selecting it, and pressing the Delete button. Close out of the registry editor.

Reboot Computer and Manually Remove Remaining Adobe Folders

The last step is to reboot your computer and manually remove the remaining Adobe folders. Here is a list of folders that you need to delete:

  • C:\Program Files\Adobe
  • C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe
  • C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe
  • C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Adobe

If you are really anal about getting every Adobe-related folder deleted from your computer, search for “Adobe” folders on your computer and delete them. However, I would only recommend this step if you really know what you are doing. My suggestion is to only remove specific folders that might be sitting in Users -> Your Username folder, as well as any Temp folders.

How to Remove Adobe Creative Cloud from Your Mac

After I wrote the section on removing Adobe Creative Cloud from PCs, I decided to go through the process of removing Adobe Creative Cloud from Macs as well, since many of our readers run Creative Cloud from their Mac desktops and laptops. Here is what you will need to do:

  1. Sign in to Adobe CC desktop app.
  2. Remove all Adobe apps such as Photoshop and Lightroom using the Creative Cloud desktop app.
  3. Download and run Adobe CC uninstaller software.
  4. Remove all Adobe folders in local storage.

Sign In and Remove Adobe CC Apps

Similar to the PC instructions, the first step is to sign in to the Adobe Creative Cloud desktop app, if you have not already done so. After that, make sure to go through all existing apps and remove them one by one until there is nothing left.

Remove Adobe CC Desktop App

After you go through the first two steps (which are identical to the PC steps), download the Mac version of the Adobe CC uninstaller software from here.

When you run the tool, you will be asked to type your system login/password:

Creative Cloud Uninstall Permissions

On the next screen, you will be warned that the app was downloaded from the Internet. Click “Open”:

Creative Cloud Uninstaller Security Warning

A new screen will come up, asking if you want to remove the Adobe Creative Cloud desktop app:

Creative-Cloud-Removal-Warning

Go ahead and click “Uninstall” to start the removal process. It will take a little bit of time to remove the desktop app. At the end of the process, you will be shown the following screen:

Creative-Cloud-Mac-Removal-Success

Remove all Adobe Folders

Once the desktop app is removed, navigate to your “Application” folder and move all Adobe folders to Trash. You should see a list of folders similar to below:

Mac-Applications-Folder-Adobe

The next step is to remove Adobe applications from the “Utilities” folder (found under Applications -> Utilities). Navigate there, then select all Adobe folders such as “Adobe Application Manager” and “Adobe Installers” and move them to Trash.

There are more Adobe folders under Library -> Application Support, and possibly in other locations. Before you decide to remove any of those folders, make sure that you have no other Adobe software left on your computer.

The last step is to empty the Trash bin, which should uninstall and remove any other remaining Adobe apps.

Congratulations, you should now be completely Adobe-free on your PC or Mac if you followed this guide.

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Disclosures, Terms and Conditions and Support Options
Filed Under: Post Processing Tagged With: Adobe, Software, Creative Cloud

About Nasim Mansurov

Nasim Mansurov is the author and founder of Photography Life, based out of Denver, Colorado. He is recognized as one of the leading educators in the photography industry, conducting workshops, producing educational videos and frequently writing content for Photography Life. You can follow him on Instagram and Facebook. Read more about Nasim here.

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Sean murphy
Sean murphy
August 25, 2019 11:54 am

Just pirate Photoshop. Really. Just do it. Reddit is your friend.

3
Reply
Riley
Riley
September 14, 2020 7:32 pm

I can’t say it enough, THANKYOU NASIM!!! I was having a small breakdown as adobe bloatware was slowing my computer down to the point i could barely run 4 tabs on google and I was considering just buying a new laptop. oh my lord,,, thankyou, this article saved me so much stress.

2
Reply
Mike
Mike
January 20, 2020 7:10 am

Hi Nasim,
It’s even worse than you describe. I let my Creative Cloud subscription expire before attempting to uninstall it, and it won’t let me uninstall the apps on my computer – it doesn’t give me the uninstall option in Creative Cloud Desktop – unless they’re up to date. This means I have to go through the entire process of updating all the installed apps (which appears to include multiple versions of some of them – I’m sure I didn’t ask for those) BEFORE I can uninstall them.

What a waste of time and bandwidth.

I should say I’ve been very happy with my Adobe apps, but I can no longer justify the expense, so I’ve let my subscription expire and am now removing the apps and all the associated software. Your article is very helpful in this process. My advice to others doing this is to remove them before your subscription expires.

2
Reply
Dave Jackson
Dave Jackson
August 7, 2020 1:57 pm

After spending a good eight hours of using the methods mentioned as well as digging through the registry, I still get CC Cleaner and other adobe products trying to call home. I use Glasswire and am blocking any thing Adobe on my Windows 7 PC, but I wont be handing that old computer off to anybody now.
Adobe makes a great product but they DO NOT have the right to bomb my equipment with hidden files and malware.

1
Reply
Bryan
Bryan
July 30, 2020 3:32 pm

Get rid of Creative Cloud, Adobe Muse CC 2018… on Windows 10
If you have ever tried to get rid of this or any other Adobe program, you have seen that the criminals at Adobe have made it just about impossible. Go ahead and try in control panel or with your fancy dancy uninstaller software…it won’t work!!
Being that I wanted to throw my computer threw the window; I sat down and forced myself to find a solution. Here it is:
Open up Task Manager
Scroll down until you see anything adobe related that you don’t want on your computer. These files are hidden and hard to find. But if you right click on the file, it will open a menu, choose go to file location. Go to that location and delete the file. But…
You will need to end the task to delete the file, shit wait…another clever and sinister Adobe tactic…it restarts so fast you cannot delete it. F*****S! No worries simply right click on the file and open properties and find the tab with all of the permissions set, security was mine. Now change all of the permissions to Deny and save. Boom, you can kill all of the freaking files you want. I was able to Remove the HEX file and even that $#@!@#@! Adobe Muse CC 2018 right from the control panel!
You are most welcome! Go forth and DELETE the hell out of Adobe :)

1
Reply
Ruben
Ruben
May 20, 2020 6:17 am

Thanks to people like you is why the imperialism of enterprises like Adobe will never dominate our computers. I used to like these apps but I just hate the way they abuse their power. The minute I realized I couldn’t remove my suscriptions cause I needed to pay a fee and then you cannot remove your credit card information from the system then I knew I had to get away from this vicious corporate snake.
Thanks again for your great help. You saved me from having to reset the whole O.S.

1
Reply
Keri Eppperson
Keri Eppperson
November 28, 2020 3:25 pm

Even worse is I have tried repeatedly to download the uninstaller and cleaner tools and nothing happens. There is a blue flash across the tab as if it were doing something but I’ve got a window open on the downloads file and there’s nothing there. In short, nothing is downloading!

0
Reply
Ann
Ann
August 24, 2020 5:39 am

thank you so much, Nasim, for this detailed advice. I followed it all and it all worked for me until the cleanup of bloatware. I ran the tool as administrator, but it kept saying that it had cleaned the files, but each time I ran the tool the same files were still there. Would you have any tips for getting round this please? Ann

0
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J R
J R
May 15, 2020 12:21 pm

I have NEVER (to my knowledge) downloaded and installed any CC software to my computer so I cannot get past step one!
Adobe used to be something good, it isn’t any more.
How do I get around to just the Adobe Reader on my machine?

0
Reply
Mar The
Mar The
April 18, 2020 4:15 pm

Useful article is useful. Tried doing a clean install of updated CC the other day and ran into the infinite loading circle on the CC desktop app. Adobe’s suggestion of simply removing the contents of the OOBE folder did not help one bit. Found your article, went through the various procedures you mentioned (that Adobe *doesn’t* address in their own support article), and lo and behold the CC desktop app runs without issue

0
Reply

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