19

Someone referred me to the chaindata folder to troubleshoot a problem I am having with Ethereum-Wallet/Mist. How can I find it?

eth
  • 85,679
  • 53
  • 285
  • 406
Micah Zoltu
  • 945
  • 2
  • 8
  • 21

4 Answers4

27

geth (used in the Ethereum Wallet) saves its internal states for the main network in the chaindata directory. You can find it in the:

  • ~/.ethereum on Linux
  • ~/Library/Ethereum on OS X
  • ~/AppData/Roaming/Ethereum on Windows

In these directories, there are:

  • chaindata: production blockchain
  • testnet: test blockchain
  • keystore: your keys
techraf
  • 249
  • 3
  • 15
Ellis
  • 2,354
  • 14
  • 14
  • For OSX there are two library folders. You will need to enable hidden folders to fine the Library referenced above which is found in HD/Users/{your name}/Library and is a hidden folder – Albert Renshaw Dec 03 '17 at 04:42
  • To view hidden folders run this in terminal defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES then relaunch finder (option+control click finder icon and select relaunch) – Albert Renshaw Dec 03 '17 at 04:43
  • On mac open finder and press Cmd+Shift+G then you can directly navigate to the path ~/Library/Ethereum – Albert Renshaw Apr 08 '20 at 05:45
3

When you first launch Ethereum-Wallet it will show the splash screen. Shortly after the splash screen will show a LAUNCH APPLICTION button. Click this button to see the full UI. If you are fully synced already it may skip straight to the full UI

enter image description here

Once that is open go to the Accounts menu > Backup sub-menu > Accounts menu-item.

enter image description here

The UI for your file explorer will differ by OS, but you should see a folder that contains folders like this, in particular it should contain a chaindata folder:

enter image description here

Side-note: While you are here you should backup the keystore folder. Details about this can be found at How do I backup my ether accounts?. Be sure to save your passwords as well!

Community
  • 1
Micah Zoltu
  • 945
  • 2
  • 8
  • 21
  • We also emphasize that for each file in keystore, you also need to backup your passwords, http://ethereum.stackexchange.com/questions/108/how-do-i-backup-my-ether-accounts – eth Jun 26 '16 at 22:11
  • 1
    Edited to link to that question and mention saving password. – Micah Zoltu Jun 26 '16 at 22:14
  • How does this answer relates to the actual question? Surely one of those has been edited, I need to downvote in this case. #offtopic – Mars Robertson Nov 07 '17 at 06:12
  • The question was how do I find chaindata folder in must. This is a direct answer to that. I'm not sure why you believe it isn't? – Micah Zoltu Nov 07 '17 at 16:44
2

On Mac OSX or GNU Linux, simply open a terminal and search for your chaindata using the find commandline tool:

find ~ -type d -name 'chaindata'

Where the first parameter ~ tells to look into your $HOME directory and all subfolders. Type d is for directories only.

A possible result looks like that:

/home/user/.ethereum-dev-private-testnet/chaindata
/home/user/.ethereum-consensys-public-testnet/testnet/chaindata
/home/user/.ethereum-fast/chaindata
/home/user/.ethereum-ethdev-berlin-testnet/chaindata
/home/user/.ethereum/chaindata

As you can see, I have multiple blockchains on my computer.

q9f
  • 32,913
  • 47
  • 156
  • 395
0

On an Ubuntu system in a terminal/ CLI you can use:

locate chaindata
Cisko Rijken
  • 211
  • 2
  • 5