How to free up space on your Mac, safely

See what's using your storage

On macOS 13 Ventura and later, including macOS 15, 26 and 27, the place to start is System Settings › General › Storage (Apple, Free up storage space on Mac). The bar at the top splits your disk into categories such as Applications, Documents, Photos, iOS files and System Data. Hover over a color to see its size; the light gray part is free space. Give it a minute after opening: macOS measures in the background and the numbers settle.

Under the bar, each category has an ⓘ button. Click it to open that category's files and remove what you don't need (Apple, Change Storage settings). Documents is the most useful: it has views for large files and downloads, and a file browser you can sort by size or by when you last opened something. Three categories, Other Users & Shared, macOS and System Data, only show their size; you can't remove files from them here.

Two other views help. All Volumes, at the top of the same page, shows used and available space for each volume on your internal disk. And System Settings › General › About has a Storage Settings button that opens the same page.

Let macOS do the easy part first

The Storage page lists three recommendations. Each is a switch you can turn off later (Apple, Optimize storage space):

macOS also clears some things on its own when space runs low: caches and logs that are safe to delete, temporary database files, interrupted downloads, staged updates and Safari website data, among others. That's part of why the right amount of manual cleaning is usually less than you'd think.

The big wins, in order

These steps are ordered by how much they usually free and how little can go wrong. Each one says whether you can undo it.

1. Large and old files

Big videos, disk images, virtual machines and project archives are the quickest wins. Three ways to find them:

• Storage settings: Documents › ⓘ, then the large files view. Sort by size or last opened.
• Finder: choose File › Find, set the search to This Mac, click the Add button below the search field, open the far-left pop-up menu, choose Other, and add File Size. Then set it to "is greater than" 1 GB (Apple, Narrow your search results in Finder).
• Terminal: these two commands only read. The first shows which folders in your home folder are biggest; the second lists single files over 1 GB.

du -hd 1 ~ 2>/dev/null | sort -h | tail -15
find ~ -type f -size +1G -exec du -h {} + 2>/dev/null | sort -h

On one of our Macs, the first command showed the usual suspects near the bottom of its list: ~/Library at 61G, ~/Downloads at 26G and a developer cache folder, ~/.npm, at 23G. The sizes are in gigabytes (G) and megabytes (M). macOS may ask whether Terminal can access folders such as Desktop or Documents; that's expected, and you can say no.

Undo: anything you move to the Trash can be put back until you empty it.

2. Old installers and disk images in Downloads

Once an app is installed, the .dmg or .pkg you installed it from isn't needed. Sort Downloads by size or by Date Added and look for installers, disk images and old archives. Open a .zip before deleting it, since it can hold documents rather than an app. Undo: the Trash, and the developer's site if you need the installer again.

3. Apps you don't use

In Storage settings, Applications › ⓘ lists your apps by size, without macOS's own apps. Removing the app is easy; removing the support files it leaves in your Library takes a little care. How to uninstall apps on a Mac completely covers both. Undo: the Trash, or download the app again.

4. iPhone and iPad backups

Old device backups can each take many gigabytes. Open Storage › iOS files › ⓘ, or connect the device, select it in Finder's sidebar, and on the General tab click Manage Backups, where you can delete or archive each backup (Apple, Locate and manage backups). Delete backups only for devices you no longer have, or after making sure a newer backup exists. Undo: none; a deleted backup is gone.

5. Duplicate photos and files

Copies pile up in Downloads, Desktop and old export folders. Photos has its own tool for duplicates inside the library, and files outside it need a different approach. Here's how to find and delete duplicate photos without deleting the wrong copy.

6. Developer files

If you use Xcode or other development tools, this can be one of the biggest categories, and none of it is your work:

• Simulator runtimes and platforms: in Xcode, choose Xcode › Settings › Components. It shows what's installed and how much space each one would free (Apple Developer, Downloading and installing additional Xcode components).
• Simulators for old Xcode versions: xcrun simctl delete unavailable removes simulator devices the installed Xcode no longer supports. It deletes their data, so only run it if you don't need anything stored in those simulators.
• Build products: Xcode's DerivedData folder (~/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData) holds build output and indexes. Apple doesn't document it as safe to delete, but Xcode rebuilds what it needs, at the cost of a slower next build. Quit Xcode first.
• Package caches from tools such as Homebrew and npm. The cache guide has the commands for each.

7. Mail and Messages

In Mail, Mailbox › Erase Junk Mail and Mailbox › Erase Deleted Items clear mail you've already thrown away (Apple). Storage settings also has a Messages category, so you can see how much space conversations and their attachments take.

System Data, snapshots and purgeable space

System Data is macOS's catch-all for files that don't fit another category: logs, caches, virtual memory and more. You can't manage it directly in Storage settings; here's what's in it and what you can safely shrink.

Time Machine local snapshots are hourly copies kept on your Mac's own disk. Apple counts their space as available and removes them when space is needed, so you rarely need to touch them; here's how when you do.

Purgeable space is space macOS can free on its own when it needs to, which is why different apps report different free space. What purgeable space is, and why it doesn't always free up.

Caches: last, and why

Caches are copies apps keep so they can work faster. Clearing them frees space for a while, but apps rebuild them as you use them, often within days, and macOS already clears safe ones when space runs low. So they're the last thing to reach for, not the first.

There's one useful exception. If you need room urgently, for example to install a macOS update, Apple notes that starting your Mac in safe mode clears certain system caches, which can free enough space temporarily; restart normally afterwards (Apple). For which app and browser caches are safe to clear, and how, see how to clear cache on a Mac.

Empty the Trash

Moving files to the Trash doesn't free space. Apple says the space isn't available until you empty the Trash. It's worth waiting a day before you do, in case something you moved turns out to matter. Then Control-click the Trash in the Dock and choose Empty Trash. This step is permanent.

What not to delete

• Your Library folder as a whole (~/Library), or whole folders inside it such as Application Support, Containers or Keychains. They hold your settings, app data, saved passwords and sometimes documents. Remove an individual app's folder only when you've uninstalled that app.
• Anything in /System, /Library or /private. macOS manages these. System Integrity Protection blocks changes to the most critical parts, but not to everything, and removing the wrong file can stop apps or your Mac from starting.
• The inside of your Photos library. Manage photos in the Photos app, never by opening the library package in Finder.
• iCloud Drive folders you think are "just on this Mac". Deleting a file from iCloud Drive deletes it from your other devices too (Apple). To free space on your Mac but keep the file in iCloud, Control-click it and choose Remove Download (Apple, Work with folders and files in iCloud Drive).
• Terminal commands from forums that use sudo rm -rf with wildcards, or promise to "clear System Data". They're the quickest way to lose something you can't get back.

And before any big clean-up, back up. If you use Time Machine, let a backup finish first.

How Tend helps

Tend's storage view and Space Map show what's big in your home folder, including app caches, logs, developer files and old installers in Downloads, and its Files tab finds large and old files, duplicates, similar photos and what cloud apps keep downloaded. All of that is free to look at. With Tend Pro, what you select moves to the macOS Trash rather than being deleted, caches of apps that are open aren't pre-selected, and your standard folders are protected. Tend can't shrink System Data or anything outside your home folder; that part is up to macOS. How the storage view works.

Questions

Related guides

Sources

• Apple, Free up storage space on Mac
• Apple, Optimize storage space on your Mac
• Apple, Change Storage settings on Mac
• Apple, See used and available storage space on your Mac
• Apple, View About settings on Mac
• Apple, Narrow your search results in Finder on Mac
• Apple, Locate and manage backups of your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch
• Apple, About Time Machine local snapshots
• Apple, Work with folders and files in iCloud Drive on Mac
• Apple, Delete files or recover deleted files in the Files app on your iPhone or iPad
• Apple Developer, Downloading and installing additional Xcode components

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