Today’s Question: Can you just drag the photos into any folder you want in Lightroom Classic?
Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can drag-and-drop to move photos in your Lightroom Classic catalog from one folder to another, and those changes will be reflected on your hard drive. In fact, it is important that photos or folders only be moved or renamed within Lightroom Classic, as doing so directly through your operating system will cause Lightroom Classic to lose track of the photos updated outside the catalog.
More Detail: One of the most important “rules” to follow when it comes to managing your photos in Lightroom Classic is that updates to your images or folder structure should be made within Lightroom Classic, not directly through your operating system or other software. This is especially important when it comes to moving or renaming photos or folders.
Within Lightroom Classic you can drag-and-drop to move selected photos to a different folder. You can also drag-and-drop a folder to move it into a different folder. And if needed, you can create a new folder in order to re-organize your photos or folders.
If you click the plus (+) symbol to the right of the Folders heading on the left panel in the Library module, you can choose “Add Folder” from the popup. In the dialog that appears, navigate to the location where you want to create a new folder. Then click the “New Folder” button at the bottom of the dialog. Enter a name for the new folder and click the Create button. Then click the Choose button, and the new folder will appear on the Folders list.
You can then continue dragging and dropping photos as needed to improve your organizational structure. You can also right-click on a folder and choose the option to rename the folder or rename photos by selecting them and choosing Library > Rename Photos from the menu. And again, just be sure that all of this work is done within your Lightroom Classic catalog, so Lightroom won’t lose track of your photos and folders.