iCloud for Mac is stuck on "waiting to upload"

No upload since January this year.
When I take a picture on my mobile phone it gets synced to my macbook pro but since January no file was uploaded to iCloud from my macbook pro this year. According to System Preferences / Apple ID / iCloud Drive, there are still 66 GB storage available.
I am unsure if I should disable and enable iCloud Drive since the following warning is displayed. "If you turn off iCloud Drive, all documents stored in iCloud will be removed from this Mac."

For me signing-in and out of iCloud on my macbook pro did not help. The result was that the iCloud Drive folder is now empty and everything is saved to iCloud Drive (Archive). If I add a file to iCloud Drive it is not uploaded but stuck in "Waiting to Upload".
Maybe it is related to the macOS Big Sur update.
I would try if resetting / reinstalling helps but then I would loose all changes since January which are not yet uploaded.
I'm a bit surprised there was no warning that all my files were not synced for 3 months.

Maybe apple is working on it.

Update: One night after signing-in and out of my iCloud account, many files got synced to my computer from iCloud but nothing got uploaded.
I checked the logs of the cloudd process with "log stream --process <cloudd PID>" but found nothing helpful. There is one message "cloudd: (CloudKit) CloudKit SQLite Pool Drain" which appears often and which captured my interest but I found nothing on google about it.

There is a potential reason for iCloud being stuck in "waiting to upload". Some month ago, maybe around the time iCloud stopped uploading, I worked on a github repository which was included in a iCloud subfolder. My computer van was making lots of noise and then I realized iCloud was having problems syncing many changes, for example after every compilation. So I moved the repository out of the iCloud folder which makes sense since it is already backed up at github.
Maybe iCloud never recoverd from that.

Because of Bagelbite's comment I thought of the node_modules folder needed for Angular projects. There's a simple solution to stop trying to push those folders to iCloud Drive. Add .nosync to the folder name. I did this and added an alias folder that links to the nosync folder so the project will still build. This fixed my issues and my iCloud Drive is completely in sync with my other devices now.

I found a GitHub project that automatically adjusts your node_modules folders, bit more efficient.

https://github.com/HaoChuan9421/nosync-icloud/blob/master/docs/README_en.md

Hope this helps!

I was able to stop "waiting to upload" by dragging all the files out of the problem folder to the desktop. I deleted the problem folder. I added the folder back to the desktop. I drug each file and folders back into the folder one by one to find the problem folder. If I found another problem folder a drug all those files to the desktop one by one and then deleted the old folder and then created a new folder and drug the files and folders back into the new folder.

Not sure why it is working so far?

Maybe, the Desktop & Document Folder is the cause of the issue.
I tried not to include 'Desktop & Document Folder' on the iCloud, then upload and download works normally.

I just started seeing this problem on my MacBook Air M1 too. I am looking for advice as are many others (waiting to upload).

May 2021
still have this problem

I wish APPLE would answer this know issue - I'm experiencing the same thing too. There is a Folder on my Desktop too that says "waiting to upload" --according to what I have read here on this topic, it has been a known issue for months and Apple does not seem to be willing to address it. Seems also that it could be a Google Chrome/Drive compatibility conflict. Getting tired of all these different platforms not playing nice with each other -- is it not us, the CONSUMER, who have already paid in one way or another for these so-called services?
Very frustrating!

This is what worked for me (Big Sur, iCloud upload from 2013 MacBook Pro to 2013 iMac STUCK). I, first, did one last backup of my iMac data on Time Machine to an external hard drive. I signed out of iCloud from the iMac. That erased my desktop folders on the iMac but the documents were still present in the iMac's document's folder. Next I signed back into the iCloud on the iMac. The desktop folders reappeared and, in Finder, those folders showed the download icon next to each subfolder and file within the subfolders. I clicked on the icon of each desktop file (within the subfolders, about 500) which brings up a small window showing the progress downloading each file. I clicked only 1-2 files at a time (PDFs and audio files) to follow the download progress. This may sound tedious but the maneuver worked so far (performed 1 week ago) and, since, I have confirmed that newly-made files are uploading and downloading normally.

I recently noticed this problem a week ago on my 13" Macbook Pro 2020 (with M1 chip). I just force quit all apps, and restarted Finder. Then I restarted my computer. And now, everything is all uploaded to iCloud. Hope this helps!

Mismo problema, no sincroniza nunca o duplica todos los archivos

July 2021 .... the problem is still there... has someone actually found the root problem of this ? I tried everything:

• Reboot
• Rename
• Disable/Re-enable iCloud
• Compress
• ...

In my case I have folders marked as "Waiting to upload". When I rename them or add .nosync and then rename them back I can see a progress indicator uploading the changes... and then the state goes back to "Waiting to upload".

I have the impression that all the files are there (I only checked one folder with this error, but I have 300 GB of data in iCloud) but the status is always blocked.

I'm considering moving to a different backup/cloud solution since I can't afford losing those files since I need them for my accountancy.

I solved this annoying issue for the meantime by going to my Files app in my iPhone, long clicking on any folder containing the 'waiting' files and selecting 'compress'. This then immediately starts uploading to iCloud and is mirrored on my MacBook iCloud Finder as it should be. I then delete the uncompressed version in my iPhone (long click and selecting delete). Then going to my MacBook and unzipping the new compressed file. Not sure why it happens but it seems to fix by zipping so maybe hidden bad files somewhere – who knows – please fix Apple – surely this is a simple one! It erodes trust when this type of stuff happens. Hope this helps others.

I have had this issue multiple times. Each time it happens I move the files & folders in their current hierarchy into the Downloads folder (thus removing them from iCloud), wait for about 5 minutes and then move them back. This forces iCloud to reupload everything and usually resets the waiting issue.