Chat History Not Being Saved (10 Days Missing)

Support Bug Reports
1

Describe the Bug

Chat history for the past 10 days is not being saved or stored in the expected location. The most recent chat history files are dated December 26, 2025, despite having active conversations through January 5, 2026.

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Open a project workspace in Cursor
  2. Have multiple chat conversations over several days
  3. Check the chat history storage location: ~/.cursor/projects/<workspace-id>/
  4. Observe that recent conversations (past 10 days) are not being saved

Expected Behavior

Expected Behavior

  • Chat history should be continuously saved for all conversations
  • New .json and .txt files should be created with current timestamps
  • Files should appear in the workspace storage directory after each chat session

Actual Behavior

  • Last saved chat history files: December 26, 2025 at 22:48
  • Current date: January 5, 2026
  • No chat history files created for ~10 days of active usage
  • All recent conversations appear to be lost or saved in an unknown location

Additional Information

  • I have had multiple chat sessions during this period

  • The UI shows chat history within the app, but files are not being persisted

  • No Cursor updates were intentionally performed during this period (that I’m aware of)

  • Disk space is available (~sufficient free space)

Questions

  1. Has the chat history storage location changed in recent versions?

  2. Is there a new storage format that might explain this?

  3. Could this be related to a sync issue if using Cursor’s cloud features?

  4. Are there any logs I can check to debug this further?

Operating System

MacOS

Current Cursor Version (Menu → About Cursor → Copy)

Version: 2.2.44
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 20adc1003928b0f1b99305dbaf845656ff81f5d0
Date: 2025-12-24T21:41:47.598Z
Electron: 37.7.0
Chromium: 138.0.7204.251
Node.js: 22.20.0
V8: 13.8.258.32-electron.0
OS: Darwin arm64 24.6.0

Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

2
3

I’m not entirely sure what you mean, but this working directory has never been altered. Besides Cursor, only the VS Code extensions “codex” and “claude code” running on Cursor can access it. Their chat histories are perfectly intact; only Cursor’s is missing. If there might be something like a file lock, please tell me what to clear or delete. I’m on macOS 15.7.2.

4

Hey, thanks for the report.

Just to clarify, when you say the UI shows chat history, do you mean the “Previous Chats” panel still lists your conversations, or only that you can see them during the active session?

A few things to check:

  1. Console errors: open Help > Toggle Developer Tools > Console and see if there are any errors related to storage or write operations.

  2. Storage path check: in recent versions, the chat history location may have changed. Try looking in:

    • ~/Library/Application Support/Cursor/User/workspaceStorage/
    • Check files modified after December 26

  3. Permissions: make sure Cursor has Full Disk Access in System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Full Disk Access

Can you also confirm whether Cursor auto-updated around December 26? That matches the build date of your version.

5

  1. I found a solution to the problem: delete everything in ~/.cursor/extensions/ except for claude-code and codex.

  2. Rename ~/Library/Application Support/Cursor to Cursor.bak, then start Cursor and log in again.

  3. Copy the Preferences file from Cursor.bak and the Settings.json and Keybindings.json files from the User folder back to their original locations.

  4. Regarding the permission issue: “Please ensure that Cursor has been granted Full Disk Access in System Settings > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Full Disk Access.” This permission—no app should request it unless it needs to access /System or /Library. Since your data is written to ~/.cursor and ~/Library/Application Support/, what is the purpose of requiring full disk access?

  5. When I reported the issue, I might have overlooked a problem: my Cursor exits extremely slowly, often getting stuck. The entire process tree shows 0% CPU usage, but it just won’t close. I suspect it might be trying to write something like chat history, but for some reason, it’s frozen. I tried waiting for it to finish and even went to sleep, but five hours later, it still hadn’t closed on its own. So, I believe there’s a 95% chance this is due to a bug in your database, and at least a 5% chance that something like a file lock you’re using hasn’t been released by my system.

  6. I have a suggestion: the official team could provide a set of tools to export various configurations and chat history. If you don’t want exported content to be seen by others, you can encrypt it—that’s fine. It’s simple. We just need to regularly back up our own configurations and chat history before issues like Cursor database problems, system errors, or hard drive failures occur. Right now, I’ve lost my settings and my bash command whitelist. Fortunately, I know what Cursor/User/Settings.json and Keybindings.json are for—otherwise, reconfiguring these would be a nightmare.

1 Like
6

Thanks for the detailed report and for sharing the solution.

I’m glad you were able to get things working again. The slow shutdown in Cursor and the missing history sound like a corrupted state in workspaceStorage. Deleting the Application Support folder really is a working workaround.

About Full Disk Access, it’s optional and shouldn’t be required for basic use. Thanks for confirming that.

If the issue happens again, it’d be helpful to know:

  • What extensions were installed besides claude-code and codex?
  • Did you see any errors in the Developer Console (Help > Toggle Developer Tools) before you applied the fix?