I’m about to start using Scrivener on Windows. However, I am considering moving to Mac some months from now. Will I be able to read my Scrivener files on the Mac version? Are there precautions I should know about now?
Thanks
Easily answered:Yes. No. Happy Scrivening.
Not so fast… There is one caveat that you need to keep in mind.
The Windows license is NOT transferable to Mac.
Technically this is not a large, insurmountable problem, but you do have to purchase scrivener for Mac.
That said, you have to purchase MS Office, Photoshop, etc as well.
Yes so fast! 
There is a way to transfer the license if you’re abandoning the Windows version entirely at some point, and bought it at full price to begin with, and bought it directly from Lit & Lat. If you got it at a discount or with a promotional deal, then you’ll definitely have to buy a new license. Details here:
scrivener.tenderapp.com/help/kb/ … ac-version
The trick (assuming you qualify) is to use the trial version on the Mac while you wait/hope for the license to transfer.
Your sig should be applied to my posts
I had asked previously about transferring a scriv license from Win to Mac. That’s actually the least of my concerns.
The real concern is: Will I be able to open and convert Scriv files made in XP over to the Mac version of Scriv?
How to address this concern? Would I need to just keep using the Windows version or could I convert, after already having data in a Windows format?
Thanks!
There is no conversion. The project formats are compatible; many people exchange their projects via Dropbox between Scrivener for windows (version 1) and Scrivener for mac (version 2) constantly. If you were going from Mac to Windows, I’d caution that Custom MetaData was not readable in the Windows version (yet), but in the other direction, everything but your compile settings are 100% transferable with no conversion necessary.
Just make sure you copy over the entire .scriv folder & contents for each project on Windows ( each of which will magically appear as a single file on the Mac). Don’t make the mistake that some do and assume the project.scrivx file within the .scriv folder is the whole enchilada–it’s not.
I’d argue it’s like all your other files. Any jpegs you have will open fine in Mac orogrammes that read jpeg files. If you buy Office for Mac, your Word and Excel files created on your PC will open fine in Office for Mac.
The only thing to consider (in my opinion) is whether the slight difference in functionality between the Mac and PC version will cause you any problems - I don’t think it will, but I have no experience of this.
Good luck with your switch