Windows 10: How does One Drive work when there is no connecton to a network

I just finished setting up several Word 2016 custom templates on One Drive and the work fine. What surprised me was that if I am not connected to a network those templates still work. Also some files I put on One Drive are there also. How can that be? Perhaps One Drive is not purely a cloud storage thing.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. That pretty well explains what is happening here.

Yeah, that is how the cloud storage works by default.

You create a copy on your computer, and it syncs it to the cloud. Now, the file is technically in both places. So, if you update the file from the web interface, the next time your computer connects to oneDrive, it would update the local copy on your computer.

So, you have the benefit of having your files in 2 different places.

You can configure OneDrive to set which folders are synced with your PC. For example, I have a movies OneDrive folder which I choose not to sync with my laptop to save storage space on the laptop.

Thank you. That seems like a good idea!