How to uninstall Scrivener on Mac

Your Scrivener projects are ordinary .scriv files saved wherever you chose, by default in your Documents folder, so removing the app does not delete them. What removal can reach is the automatic backups Scrivener keeps in its own Application Support folder. Confirm where your projects live and copy out any backup you might still need before you remove anything. This covers the official Mac package from Literature & Latte, plus a Homebrew section for the scrivener cask.

Quit Scrivener and save your backups

  1. Before quitting, open Scrivener › Preferences › Backup and use Open backup folder to locate the actual backup directory; it may have been changed from the default. Save and close your projects so any configured close-time backup finishes, then quit Scrivener.
  2. Check where your .scriv projects are saved. They are separate files and stay on disk after you remove Scrivener.
  3. In Finder, copy wanted automatic backups from the actual directory to an independent location outside every folder you will remove; ~/Library/Application Support/Scrivener/Backups is the default. Verify the copies before deleting originals. Also preserve custom settings or templates from the support folder if wanted.
  4. In Finder's Applications folder, move Scrivener to the Trash.
  5. Open System Settings, then General, then Login Items & Extensions. In this test Scrivener had an entry there; turn off any Scrivener entry that is still listed after the app is gone.

Where Scrivener keeps its data

Location What it holds What to do
Your Documents folder, or wherever you saved them Your .scriv project files Not app data; they stay on your Mac
~/Library/Application Support/Scrivener Scrivener's own folder, including its automatic backups in Backups Copy out the backups you need, then remove
~/Library/Caches/com.literatureandlatte.scrivener* App cache Safe to remove
~/Library/Preferences/com.literatureandlatte.scrivener*.plist App preferences Remove for a clean start

After verifying the backups, press Shift + Command + G in Finder to open each location or its parent and move only unwanted Scrivener items to the Trash. For the * cache and preference patterns, inspect actual names in the parent folder and remove only those owned by the version you are removing, preserving retained versions.

Check the result

pgrep -il scrivener
mdfind "kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier == 'com.literatureandlatte.scrivener3'"
ls -d ~/Library/Application\ Support/Scrivener

No output from pgrep means Scrivener is not running. No output from mdfind means only that Spotlight’s current index has no matching copy; excluded or unindexed locations may still contain one. Also inspect Applications and any other location where you kept Scrivener copies in Finder. For ls, "No such file or directory" means the folder, and the backups inside it, are gone; the path printed back means it is still there, which is expected if you left that row unticked.

If you installed it with Homebrew

The scrivener cask's zap list is ~/Library/Application Support/Scrivener, ~/Library/Caches/com.literatureandlatte.scrivener* and ~/Library/Preferences/com.literatureandlatte.scrivener*.plist. Running brew uninstall --cask --zap scrivener yourself moves all of them to the Trash, backups included, whatever you selected in Mole. To keep the backups, remove only the app:

brew uninstall --cask scrivener

Mole skips --zap if its list reaches unchecked or shared data, leaves its supported removal area, or cannot be fully verified. Leave the Application Support folder unticked and Mole drops --zap, while still removing the rows you ticked.

What Mole lists

Mole selects the cache and preferences named after Scrivener's bundle ID by default. With Remove data and settings with apps off, the listed ~/Library/Application Support/Scrivener review row starts unchecked. With it on, an eligible existing own unshared row may start checked; this folder can hold automatic backups, so verify independent copies and uncheck it if you want to retain it.

What this test covered

On September 20, 2026, Scrivener 3.5.2 from the official Literature & Latte package was copied into Applications and uninstalled live with Mole 1.15.0 build 280, with every review row selected. The app and the 13.8 MB Application Support/Scrivener folder went to the Trash. Mole's startup list showed a Scrivener entry that could only be changed in System Settings before the uninstall, and no longer showed it afterwards. Project files, sync and licensing were not tested.

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