Can Lightroom Presets Be Used In Photoshop?

Can Lightroom Presets Be Used In Photoshop?

A common topic of discussion in our community is, “How to Use Lightroom Presets in Photoshop.” Whether or not you can use Lightroom Presets in Photoshop depends on which version of Lightroom and Photoshop you are using, and what type of presets you have installed or created.

With the latest versions of Lightroom and Photoshop, Lightroom presets are now stored in the same location as Adobe Camera Raw, as .XMP files, so as long as you open a raw file in Photoshop as a Smart Object, you will be able to double-click that Smart Object layer, and open original raw file in Adobe Camera Raw through Photoshop, and re-edit the raw file, with access to presets.

Unfortunately, you will not be able to just apply raw presets directly within Photoshop, and once your layer stops being a Smart Object that contains an original raw file, your Lightroom presets will begin to behave differently, even if you do open that layer in Camera Raw, because you will essentially be editing a PSD/TIF type file, not raw data anymore.