AIO: External storage (Local) on SMB bind mount – user data still written to Docker volume

Hi,

I’m running Nextcloud All-In-One (AIO) behind NGINX Proxy Manager in Docker and I’m trying to use an SMB share as primary user storage to avoid filling up the Docker host disk.

I have mounted the SMB share on the host and bind-mounted it into the AIO mastercontainer. I also enabled the External Storage app and configured a Local external storage backend.

However, user data is still written to the Docker volume instead of the SMB share.

I want to confirm whether my approach is supported in AIO and what the correct procedure is.

What I’ve done

Mounted SMB on the host, for example:

```

/mnt/next-cloud

```

Bind-mounted it into the AIO mastercontainer:

```

volumes:

  • /mnt/next-cloud:/mnt/next-cloud

``

Enabled External Storage:

```

occ app:enable files_external

occ config:system:set files_external_allow_create_new_local --value=true --type=boolean

```

Added External storage → Local with path:

```

/mnt/next-cloud/users

```

Set it as default backend:

```

occ config:system:set files_external_default --value=“users”

```

Verified the mount is visible inside the container:

```

ls -la /mnt/next-cloud

```

Logged out and back in.

Expected behavior

User home directories should be created under:

```

/mnt/next-cloud/users/

```

Disk usage should grow on the SMB share, not in /var/lib/docker.

Actual behavior

/mnt/next-cloud/users remains empty

User uploads still increase Docker disk usage

occ files:scan either does nothing or fails with Redis disconnects during scans

Hi, see GitHub - nextcloud/all-in-one: 📦 The official Nextcloud installation method. Provides easy deployment and maintenance with most features included in this one Nextcloud instance.

External Storage !== Primary Storage

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I’d like to thank you for replying to my post it helped me find the exact option I need for my setup

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