Cryptomator file explorer not responding issue

I had a weird issue with cryptomator. After about 3 weeks of no issues at all. I can log in, unlock my cryptomator vault, move my files, add files, delete files ect, and not one issue until a few days ago. I wonder what caused this?

I am using my windows 11 laptop with cryptomator, & I place my cryptomator vault in my Pcloud and use it there.

My laptop is 1 year old & I have used less than 90 GB on my laptop of my available 500 GB of space. Well, last week, I unlocked my cryptomator vault, and decided to delete 3 folders, the first 2 deleted as usual, the 3rd one, when I clicked delete, my laptop froze & the dreaded message of file explorer has stopped, I forced stop cryptomator & still no luck, I had to reboot & tired again I did this reboot 5 times and each time, I had the same issue.
Ultimately, what I did was remove my cryptomator vault from cryptomator & then removed the folder in Pcloud. & started completely over. >> I have a copy of my files in an external hard drive as a backup, once I created a new vault inside of pcloud with cryptomator, everything now works & has worked for a few days flawlessly.

Once reinstalled I went back into my files in cryptomator and tried to remove the 3 folders I tried to remove that glitched on me before & no issue each one deleted with one click.

Any idea what could have caused this?? all the settings & port settings are the same as before. I do keep updated copies of my files in a external password protected hard drive BUT it is super convenient using cryptomator BUT if I cannot rely on it? I have no idea what caused this issue.
I also decided to try Koofr as a backup & keep a copy of my important files there with a super strong password. I am not a business, just a homeowner & so far, I am using about 20GB of storage with cryptomator for things I want to keep secure & cryptomator was great & still is BUT IF I get weird hiccups like this and can’t access my files (file explorer not responding) well, it will eventually be a problem,
This was the only issue that day while using my laptop for anything else that day and nothing else triggered the file explorer not responding & freezing of any other programs.
I could get into google dive, my file manager and add. remove, rearrange, copy & delete files or folders with no issues. I also deleted & reinstalled files in pcloud that are not in cryptomator & those files deleted & reinstalled with no issue at all with pcloud. I did this with over 15 files in pcloud and also in file manager on some files/folders I have in my laptop to see if the hiccup was with pcloud or my file manager & not one file caused any issue & I deleted and reinstalled a lot of files in pcloud and on my laptop with my file manager with no issues.so I am stumped as to what happened & is this a known bug ?

Well, since I received no responses to my post, I decided to contact cryptomator directly & decided to post their reply here so IF anyone else is having issues like I did and below is the answer I received. I am disappointed that many read my post & no one responded.

Hi there,

Thanks for the detailed write-up, that context is really helpful, and I’m glad you’re back up and running.

Based on what you describe, this most likely wasn’t a problem with your files or the encryption itself. The freeze you ran into looks like a known compatibility issue between Cryptomator and the pCloud Windows client, where Windows File Explorer can intermittently hang during file operations (creating, renaming, saving, or deleting) in a vault that lives on pCloud. Other users on Windows 10 and 11 have reported the same “Explorer stops responding” behavior specifically with pCloud, while local vaults and other providers work fine. It is being tracked here, in case you’d like to follow along:

https://github.com/cryptomator/cryptomator/issues/3473

Because the hang is intermittent rather than tied to those specific folders, that also explains why your fresh vault now deletes the exact same folders without any trouble. Your data was never in danger, this happens at the drive/mount level, not inside the encrypted files, and keeping that external backup is exactly the right habit.

A couple of things that may reduce the chance of it happening again:

  • Make sure you’re on the latest version of Cryptomator.
  • In Cryptomator’s settings under “Virtual Drive”, you can try a different volume type (for example WinFsp / FUSE) to see whether it behaves more stably on your system.

If it ever recurs, you can help us dig deeper: enable debug logging (Cryptomator preferences), reproduce the freeze, and send us the log file. Details on where to find it are here, and you’re welcome to review and redact anything sensitive before sending:

https://docs.cryptomator.org/desktop/troubleshooting/

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