Application directory
Overview
Depending on your installation method and OS, you will have one or two directories that contain Factorio assets.
User Data directory
The user data directory is where personal files are stored, such as world saves. Search your computer for this directory, or type it into your file manager address bar.
Windows
%appdata%\Factorio
Mac OSX
~/Library/Application Support/factorio
Linux
~/.factorio
Zip File
The unzipped Factorio directory
A list of all things found here:
- Save games (as zip files)
- User-installed/created Mods.
- User-installed/created scenarios.
- User configuration and settings storage
- Log File (factorio-*.log)
- Player data (player-data.json)
Note: Deleting the configuration file will result in a default replacement being generated upon the next Factorio launch.
It is recommended to create backups from this directory (of saves, config, etc) before installing a new version, or installing mods.
Application directory
The application directory stores three things:
- Factorio executables (./bin)
- Data for vanilla Factorio (./data)
- API documentation
Windows
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Factorio C:\Program Files\Factorio
Mac OSX
~/Library/Application Support/Steam/steamapps/common/Factorio/factorio.app/Contents/ ~/Library/Application Support/factorio
Linux
~/.factorio
Zip File
The unzipped Factorio directory
Changing the user data directory
You can create a file config-path.config to configure Factorio to any directory.
Please see this discussion (for MacOS, but should work on any other OS).
In order to change the user data directory, user must edit the location of the "write-data" entry in the file __Game_Install_directory/config/config.ini. This affects the location of mods, scenario and temp.
If you want to move only the location of your save files you can change the the save directory using symlinks but this still means that all users of the computer will share the same data, including settings.
Linux
Update __Game_Install_directory/config-path.cfg
use-system-read-write-data-directories=true
Update __Game_Install_directory/config/config.ini
[path] read-data=__PATH__executable__/../../data write-data=.local/share/factorio
You could set the write-data value to .factorio if you prefer.
Once you have done this, you can remove write permissions to the entire game installation directory except for config/config.ini, which must be writable by all people who wish to play the game.
Note that if someone changes any options, in-game, those option changes will apply to everyone who plays on the same computer.