What is Reddit's opinion of
DaisyDisk?
From 3.5 billion Reddit comments
100 reviews of this app found across Reddit:
Daisy Disk is a perfect app for nailing down exactly what’s eating up space. It also shows the data in a really nice pie chart so it’s easy to understand and visualize. Pretty sure there’s a fully functioning free trial available on their website but at $10 it’s worth it to keep around and use anytime you’re low on space.
I use it all the time since my editing programs can scatter large cache files around or a folder has much larger files stored in it than I realized.
Download the app DaisyDisk. The free demo is all you need, full featured, and will let you scan and visualize all the data on the hard drive. You can then easily hunt down the files eating up the space and delete them!
If it works for you, pick up a license to support the dev, it's on sale for $5 for Black Friday :)
Try a utility like DaisyDisk or if you're handy in Terminal you can probably figure out what's using all of your disk space with the 'du' command
Deleting the old library won't free up much space because it isn't taking up much space due to the "hard link"
This article explains hard links pretty well: https://sixcolors.com/post/2015/02/the-hard-link-between-photos-and-iphoto/
If you're on Sierra use this support guide to free up storage: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT206996
If you're on any other OS, or just prefer more control, use DaisyDisk to get a better understanding of what takes up space, the trial is all you need: https://daisydiskapp.com/
I would recommend Daisy Disk.
For me, it help find a bunch items that were just hidden/buried on my Macbook.
Back a few years ago I had to install Skype for a meeting. Deleted it afterwards but then found a 5gb folder hidden somewhere in my computer with Skype emojis. The app has been fantastic for file management and find caches that build up too high.
It is $10 though. I thought I purchased it at $5 years ago but I personally think it's worth it and could help.
Use Disk Inventory X (free) if you want to see where your storage has gone to.
Or if you want a more up to date UI, use DaisyDisk ($9.99) but Disk Inventory X still does the job.
Interesting, because I absolutely love the app DaisyDisk and think it's far and away the best disk space visualiser I've used. The radial pie chart makes clearing space much more effortless than square ones like DiskInventoryX. Is this instance somewhere that pie charts ARE valuable?
There are a few tools on Mac OS to help you with this...
My favourite is WhatSize - https://www.whatsizemac.com/
There was another one I tested, but ultimately bought WhatSize instead, DaisyDisk - https://daisydiskapp.com/
Good luck!
You tried DaisyDisk? How about GrandPerspective or OmniDiskSweeper? I also don’t see any mention of what size drive you have to begin with. This is relevant because you typically want to keep about 10% free, which, unless you have a 128 GB drive, you are well below.
That is rather larger than it should be. You will have to use one of the following utilities to find out what it consists of: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
>fluctuating storage space free (starts at about 50gb free then drops up and down)
This could be because it's creating backups (Time Machine) and then removing old ones as you run out of space
>when i check my storage stats it says my dad is mainly in my system storage and not my documents. E.g. i have a 160gb project in my documents but it only states i have 20gb worth of documents.
The built-in stats are garbage. Get Disk Inventory X (ugly but free) or Daisy Disk (pretty, but paid) and it will give you a much better idea of where your space is actually being used.
>having to constantly retset my mac for any performance
Do you mean reboot? The remaining symptoms sound like you have something running in the background that is using up your CPU.
You should scan your system for malware. https://www.malwarebytes.com/mac/
I would download DaisyDisk to see a better representation of how that space is being used. Once you know how and where the space is being used you can determine if it’s needed or not.
If you use iCloud then it might be data stored in iCloud that is downloading to your devices and/or temporary iCloud files - it should clean up after itself but can store a lot of cached data.
I suggest downloading DaisyDisk (https://daisydiskapp.com) - free trial available - and running it to see which folders are taking up the most space and then you can go from there.
DaisyDisk is my favorite program for this purpose. They have a paid version, but the free trial does what you need it to do. When you go to scan the drive, click the dropdown arrow to the right of "Scan" and choose "Scan as Administrator" This will give you a very detailed breakdown of what is on your computer and how much space it is taking up.
They are disk usage analyzers. Disk Utility X is a open-source shareware, but has been pretty slow to get support for new OS versions lately.
Daisy Disk is a newer version app that does the same thing, but instead of a square “Tetris” type view like DU X has, it uses a round pie like view. It’s a reallt nifty way to quickly see what’s using the bulk of your disk storage, and you can delete or move stuff right from the app, or open it in the required app.
People will often think “oh it’s full because of all my emails” (silly I know) and I’ll run one of those tools and emails are a bunch of tiny blocks, and the huge blocks are stuff like “iPhone backup” from 3 years ago, GarageBand instruments, etc; which can be analyzed and deleted there.
I wouldn't run any tools on the library folder if you're not confident you know exactly what you're doing (or without backups). Logs? Cool to nuke. Data? Sure, but if you break something, you're nuking the whole account and redownloading it... which leads me to my guess.
Most free email providers don't offer that much storage without paying - does she/work pay for google workspace or something similar with 150GB+ of storage? If not, then there's no way it's the actual attachments. Check the disk usage in the email web interface for the email account. In gmail, it's at the bottom of the page.
I'm guessing the library folder could be full of runaway logs or tons of saved drafts that got stuck in a loop or something like that.
Most email providers limit attachment size to 25mb per message, if she really has 150gb of attachments that's like 6,000 emails in her inbox at the max size (which is nuts and not the intended purpose of email lol - for reference my gmail account is 16 years old, 21k emails, and using 4.6GB).
If there truly are thousands of emails with image attachments, please tell her family about shared icloud albums, or dropbox.
Idk what disk usage scan you used but disk inventory x or daisy disk both do a decent job showing what and how big the files are that you're looking for.
You can't delete all your system, you Mac needs an operative system to run.
Also, that is taking up half your storage doesn't really help diagnose the problem. It could be you portioned your disk to install Windows for example and the system is taking 15Gb out of 30Gb which is normal.
Post more info about your system as indicated by the forum rules and we can go from there.
If you want a more direct answer, get this app https://daisydiskapp.com/ and find out what is taking up the space, delete it if it is something you don't need.
An application like DaisyDisk should help. You can also consider GrandPerspective or OmniDiskSweeper.
When you are that low on disk space, emptying your browser cache and turning off Time Machine (to get rid of local snapshots) would be steps to start with. After that, one of the following utilities may help you identify problem areas: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper. Storing files in iCloud Drive does not necessarily free up disk space, it will still occupy some local storage, there is no way to fully remove it from the internal hard drive and only have it in the cloud.
This is just a start —
- Restart your Mac while holding down the shift key. Rebooting should clear any swap (disk space used as RAM overflow). Holding down shift during boot puts you in safe mode which, amongst other things, clears some system caches. This is to just get you a bit of breathing room, it won't necessarily fix the problem.
- Boot back into normal mode and download either DaisyDisk https://daisydiskapp.com (free demo, $10 license) or https://www.omnigroup.com/more (free but not as pretty). Run it to see what's eating up your disk.
I had the same issue and a developer from DaisyDisk got back saying that this was a temporary issue and macOS Big Sur related issues are fixed in the beta release.
You can download the beta-version from here: DaisyDisk Beta
After some period of testing, this new version will be officially released under number 4.11. You will be able to update from the beta to the non-beta version by simply using the "Check for Updates" menu command (the app will also notify you about the availability of the new update).
Pick any one of the following: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper. Another commonly overlooked thing is improper removal of Steam games. If you just drag them to the Trash but don’t remove them through Steam, they still have space allocated to them.
Are you using the App Store version of DaisyDisk? If so, then you'll need to migrate to the stand-alone version if you want to use that feature.
As powerful as Terminal is, there is no substitute for manually freeing up space. To help identify what is occupying the bulk of your storage, I would suggest using one of the following: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper. It is possible that, even after freeing up the additional space, you could still get an insufficient storage warning. While you may have enough space, there isn’t enough contiguous storage, meaning adjoining on the SSD. The standard approach would be to backup, do a clean install, then recover your data.
I think a visualization like DaisyDisk (where you can drill down into each segment) would be really useful.
edit: Found a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aksFpEjE3pQ
Beep. Boop. I'm a bot.
It seems the URL that you shared contains trackers.
Try this cleaned URL instead: https://daisydiskapp.com/privacy.html?osVersion=10.15.4&lang=en&appVersion=4.10
If you'd like me to clean URLs before you post them, you can send me a private message with the URL and I'll reply with a cleaned URL.
It seems like people are once again not using search within the subreddit effectively. This is asked several times a week with regards to macOS and iOS. Nobody can tell you for sure without examining your computer, but you do have some tools you can bring to bear to try to get to the bottom yourself: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, and OmniDiskSweeper. Don’t use all 3, just pick one, and then if you are unsure whether something is safe to delete permanently, ask.
DaisyDisk; $10 and well worth it.
There’s a free trial that just shows many of the files taking up space, but not all. Also, you can’t directly delete found files from the trial version of the app, but you could use it to locate things and then go delete them manually. The full version allows scanning hidden/purgeable space and deleting those files directly from the app.
I recommend purchasing directly from the web site vs. going through the App Store; the App Store version has some additional restrictions in order to be store compliant. Although if you purchase from the App Store, you can get the standalone version for free later on.
Android Studio does leave cruft behind. Xcode builds up tons of cruft as you install updates and simulators that can be a pain to clean up from within Xcode. Same with Microsoft’s various dev tools for the Mac.
I had the same issue. This app helped me fix it - it helps visualize the entire disk and see what is taking up the space. There's a free trial but the full version is only $10, but totally worth it.
According to the authors of DaisyDisk, whom I trust, and support with my purchases ...
​
​
..; so I leave everything alone.
Yes, many apps release through both the App Store and directly to users. For example, DaisyDisk can be bought either through the App Store or through their website. Both versions are nearly identical, but the non-App Store version has slightly more features, because it's not limited by the App Store rules.
Well what I was trying to say is, on an average computer you have billions of lines of code worth of applications running. It's impossible to, not knowing the machine, tell what is taking up more space.
If you really want to know, look into it. Buy (or install the trial version of) DaisyDisk and look where your disk space is actually going.
I use CleanMyMac for last 3 years. Working great. No special knowledge reauaried.
Also, DaisyDisk is great, but you should know what are you doing with this app. If you choose DD, go with site-version, because it has more futures then version from Mac App Store. It can clean some oversized mail databases, internal time machine backups etc.
So, CC+DD is my choice.
Download the free trial of daisy disk:
Run it and see what’s taking up space. If it’s something you don’t recognise, google it first before deleting to make sure it’s not a system file. And make a backup first just in case!
Have you tried rebooting? This clears a lot of temp files
Could be a lot of things. One way you could go about it is download this: https://daisydiskapp.com
Get the trial and it will at least show you what is taking up that space. You can then decipher what to do with that info. A lot of time it could be iOS backups/software, iMessages, etc..
It may be some left over files, like workshop files. Check /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Steam/common/ and /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Steam/workshop/ to see if you can delete any unused game files. Also, you can use an app like DaisyDisk to scan for large unused steam files.
First of all, accept the fact that your Mac won't get ANY faster after you bought it. It will only become slower and slower. Then, be careful of your own "feelings" of the speed. In most cases, speed is an issue of perception. Finally, you should be aware that Mac is not so unique and powerful machine that you can just use it and do nothing to optimize it. EVERYTHING needs care. Since the Sierra OS X has given users the access to optimize his own hard disks and explore the system files deeper and further, APPLE also concede that Macs also need to be purged and optimized. Here comes the conclusion: be reasonable about the "speed" of your Mac. Then, install some system maintenance softwares just in case you are not tech-savvy enough to handle the problem using command lines. These softwares can serve you well, I guess. Some of them are free of charge: Dr. Cleaner CleanMyMac and DaisyDisk which requires a basic knowledge of the OS X system. I only tried these softwares. Dr. Cleaner among them is free of charge. Wish your mac and you well.
Use the "Scan as Administrator" command in DaisyDisk. You may not see the entire picture of your disk, there are some hidden folders. See https://daisydiskapp.com/manual/4/en/Topics/AdminScan.html.
Note that this command is available only in the stand-alone version of DaisyDisk. If you got the app from the App Store, just download the stand-alone version, it's a free switch: http://daisydiskapp.com/downloads/DaisyDisk.zip
Install Disk Inventory X or DaisyDisk. Either of these two apps will give you a more accurate and more detailed assessment of your storage (DaisyDisk will do it more beautifully than DiX but at a price).
There's also OmniDiskSweeper (also free), WhatSize (not free, has a free trial), and DaisyDisk (not free, has a free trial and a pretty interface).
Download a program called Daisy Disk, or something similar. Once you scan your HD, you should be able to see what is taking up space and where it's located.
DISCLAIMER Be very careful deleting stuff in Libraries or system folders!
I HIGHLY recommend DaisyDisk for freeing up space and finding files that you can remove. I have only used the free trial, but it was perfect for what I needed when partitioning my drive to run Bootcamp.
Library folder is where unaccounted for data usually lives. I’ve seen it be caused by games, mail (gmail) log files, video editing software, etc.
Did you go into the Library folder and select to calculate all sizes? View —> Show view options Make sure you give enough time for everything to calculate as it can take 30mins+.
If that’s not working, DaisyDisk works well from my experience. Free trial should be fine.
I'm not entirely sure about Google Drive, I think there's ways to use it as both a proper backup as well as a sync service but it depends on what method is used to upload the files.
As for finding out where you can free up some space, there's a couple ways. If you're running a mostly-recent version of OSX you can click the Apple logo in the task bar, then About This Mac. Click the Storage tab, then click Manage... and it'll open a window that both gives you some quick things you can enable that help with saving space as well as a sidebar that shows the largest apps, media and other files on the system. If you want a deeper and more complete view of every file on the system, there's programs like DaisyDisk that can be helpful.
You will probably want to use one of the following: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper. It might ultimately end up being forgotten installer or media downloads.
Ignore the other answers. Try using a tool such as Daisy Disk to see what is taking up your storage. It’s a paid app, but it has a free trial that will help you gain insight into what is taking up your storage.
They will be simplified, I imagine at some point they will look like this program Daisydisk. An app that lets you see your own balance in real time breakdown + public organizations will have open ledgers with the same sort of interface. https://openorgs.info/ is a start, but we will go so much further than these sites in the next 5-10 years, you'll wonder why you ever trusted a company that wasn't transparent with their finances.
How much is '[not] much room'?
Generally-speaking, it's mot considered good practice to get close to the limit - if for no other reason than that a major OS install needs lots of 'spare' room for scratch and temporary files as it shifts things around, makes copies and puts files it 'thinks' it might need later into temporary locations etc.
That is to say that a straight comparison between the two (Big Sur and Monterey) installer downloads isn't really the most reliable metric.
There were a few threads here about folks trying to upgrade to Monterey where the install process failed or hung due to insufficient disk space - which the installer detected - even when the user could see what appeared to be enough available space.
I'd suggest you'd be pushing it with anything less than 50 GB free, even though the actual installer files are around a quarter of that.
Would it be possible for you to push some of the files off onto a temporary external volume - during the installation; then bring them back after the install routine has completed using all the space it actually needs?
Even then, running close to full with a HD is not usually advisable. Have you considered attaching, say, a small portable HD for images, audio or other large files? If you're interested and not sure how or why, you'll get a lot of help here :-)
<em>Daisy Disk</em> is a good utility that might help. OWC sells reliable external volumes.
Good luck!
Ah, that’s helpful. Sometimes, when there’s missing storage, it’s caused by users reinstalling macOS incorrectly. That isn’t what’s going on here.
If you want to avoid using Terminal, check out DaisyDisk. The direct version (not from the App Store) appears to have a “scan as administrator” option which supposedly handles multiple user accounts:
https://daisydiskapp.com/manual/2/en/Topics/AdminScan.html
“It’s not necessary to scan disks as administrator every time unless you have multiple user accounts or large folders that require administrator access permissions. It’s generally a good idea to scan disks as normal user unless scan results reveal significant amounts of hidden disk space.”
That sounds like exactly what you need?
For several years, I've used the Daisydisk app (https://daisydiskapp.com) with great success to figure out what what's filling up the hard drive. I originally bought it through Apple's Mac Appstore. But I discovered that version can't look at certain system folders. If you get it from their website, it can see most of those. I don't know if that restriction still exists.
Use DaisyDisk to get more info about it.
Do you use Time Machine by any chance? If the backup disk is not connected, TM may make temporary local backup copies, which may account for the increase of the used disk space.
Most likely, the hidden space is caused by macOS temporary local snapshots, see https://daisydiskapp.com/manual/4/en/Topics/HiddenSpace.html
There are a few possible solutions to this problem described in the article. I'd start with scanning your disk with Disk Utility's First Aid and checking if there are any snapshot-related warnings or errors (aka "lost" snapshots) in the log. If so, there is no other solution but reformat the disk and reinstall macOS, because Apple doesn't currently provide tools for fixing APFS errors.
Hopefully your particular case is not that bad and the other solutions may work. If the problem persists, reach out to
You will need to use something like DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper to identify the folder containing the relevant files.
You can use DaisyDisk to visualise the space that is occupied by volumes. It's not free, but it's reasonably-priced and definitely worth the money.
If you don't want to pay for DaisyDisk, then you can instead can enter the following command in Terminal to display the sizes of the folders /Library and ~/Library, where the majority of unreconciled used space is often concealed:
zsh -sf <<'END'
function _filter
{
sed -E '/^ *[[:digit:]]+(\.[[:digit:]]+)?[BK] */d' | sort -hr -k 1
}
for directory in /Library "${HOME}/Library"; do
print -P "%K{21}%F{231}${directory}%E%k%f"
du -d 3 -h "${directory}" 2>/dev/null | _filter
done
END
(Select and copy the whole block of text.)
Try using this app called daisy disk, you can find out what's using your storage (trial version will do the job). And just a reminder, don't remove system files when you don't know what it is !
Yes, they get uninstalled for all users.
You can also get some space by uninstalling unnecessary language files from your system.
Also, sometimes the culprit is time machine, which creates snapshots of your backups in your local disk, when your backup destination disk is not connected.
A good utility to see what’s taking up the free space is: https://daisydiskapp.com
What's inside the hidden space, which components it consists of? (E.g. purgeable space, snapshots, other volumes etc.). Also if you are using the Mac App Store version of DaisyDisk, try to use the stand-alone version, it's not sandboxed and is more powerful in revealing the hidden space. Use https://daisydiskapp.com/migration/
Just copying and pasting my reply from yet another thread about storage management and Other:
If you aren’t a user of Steam for games/software, are remembering to connect your Time Machine backup drive regularly, have already tried using DaisyDisk or a similar piece of software to scan your drive for large files, your remaining option would be to perform an erase then install from macOS Recovery, and then migrate from your backup.
If you aren’t a user of Steam for games/software, are remembering to connect your Time Machine backup drive regularly, have already tried using DaisyDisk or a similar piece of software to scan your drive for large files, your remaining option would be to perform an erase then install from macOS Recovery, and then migrate from your backup.
Do you have iCloud enabled? If none of the other avenues people mentioned are working, it could be files that are trying to be downloaded from your iCloud also. You'd have to use a program called DaisyDisk and see if it's a folder called CloudKit taking up all that space. It would stay in the other storage until it completes it's download. But if you interrupted the download, then it stays in the Other Storage until it decides to start downloading again. It's part of the so called Optimized Storage, which is not really so Optimized...
The log doesn't contain any errors; therefore, you should use one of the following methods to locate the files that are occupying the unreconciled space:
- The file browser in System Information.
- The command in my previous comment.
- The third-party application DaisyDisk.
Be aware that the first method only shows the space occupied by the contents of your home folder.
> I'm looking to do both -- my hard drive is full already with just applications and a few documents, and that is with all my photos stored external.
If all you have is "a few documents" with all of your photos stored externally, then you're doing something wrong or you have a metric TON of applications. The OS itself should be no more than 20GB, so everything else is going to be applications and documents.
I would recommend pruning what you don't need, because 100GB of applications is unheard of for most users. (It may help to invest in software like DaisyDisk which is a great tool for visualizing disk usage, allowing you to see what specifically is taking up the room on your drives.)
I would suggest downloading and installing one of the following to help identify what is consuming the storage: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
Purgeable Space is a feature introduced in macOS Sierra that is linked to iCloud and the Optimize Storage feature. The files that occupy this space are files that have been copied to iCloud. macOS manages it automatically, so it is made available to use for other files magically. You can use tools to forcibly clear it if you want, though.
This article explains it all, and recommends Disk Drill. I highly recommend using DaisyDisk for this and as an awesome tool for managing Mac disk space in general:
Use Daisy Disk. I had the exact same issue and found loads of huge files in application support for Apps I no longer use. It's worth every penny. You can get a free trial here https://daisydiskapp.com
If the Manage button doesn’t give you the information you are seeking, you’ll have to resort to something like DaisyDisk. If you want to consider alternatives, there is also GrandPerspective and OmniDiskSweeper.
Mac disk purgeable space is the storage that your system keeps in case you want to re-download the files you removed for making some free space. Let us explain how it works.
There are some apps, that provide an option to clear purgeable space on Mac, for example, Disk Space Analyzeror Daisy Disk
Is your iMovie library actually empty though? Have you check its size in your Movies folder?
You can also download DaisyDisk or some other alternative and scan your disk, it'll give you an overview of what's hogging the storage.
I found links in your comment that were not hyperlinked:
I did the honors for you.
^delete ^| ^information ^| ^<3
To get the top-down overview you need, an application like DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper will be needed.
It’s not the 6 cores. I can run Photoshop with multiple files running and being rendered and exported and at the same time have Illustrator running. And I’m copying and pasting files between the two. On top of those two apps, I have Apple Mail, iCloud Photos, Notes plus 11 different apps running including a program called Daisy Disk that’s scanning my 1TB spinning External HDD.
The UI and animation still moves smoothly. All this on a 6 core i7-8750H with 16GB RAM.
(I’m also transferring files from an old External HDD to an External SSD)
I recommend using DaisyDisk instead because it can account for intangible used space. You should scan the system volume with administrative privileges.
this seems quite time consuming and risky
freeing up space
I would recommend using DaisyDisk (just the free trial version) to figure out which large folders you can get rid off
- If you’re already willing to wipe your hard drive this seems like a much easier method to free up space
- even if you have 128 GB of storage (the lowest on any mac), once you clear out things you will have enough to install the beta without wiping your hard drive
backing up files
It’s not recommended to run beta software without first backing up important files
- if you don’t have a hard drive on hand, I recommend using Google Drive / iCloud Drive / Dropbox / etc to keep a copy of any files you don’t want to lose
- this could also be a way to free up space (upload and then delete your local copy [you can’t do this with iCloud easily])
better approach to clean install
- if you really want to wipe all your files, you can simply create a new user and then delete the old one (this should delete all your personal files)
- again my recommended approach is still DaisyDisk
Firstly, on macOS, used space isn't necessarily unusable space because macOS automatically removes certain types of data, such as local copies of images stored in iCloud, local Time Machine backups, and caches when more space is required. macOS refers to this type of data as "purgeable space".
To view the amount of purgeable space on the system volume:
- In Finder, press shift-command-C.
- Select the volume
Macintosh HD. - Press command-I.
- Read the value of the Available field in the General section.
Secondly, I recommend that you use DaisyDisk to locate the unreconciled used space. You should scan the system volume with administrative privileges.
Do not modify any of the following folders, otherwise your iCloud content may be permanently corrupted:
~/Library/Application Support/CloudDocs~/Library/Application Support/SyncServices~/Library/Mobile Documents
(The tilde represents the path of your home folder.)
Are you on macOS Big Sur? It's still an early beta and not fully supported. This is a known issue, an update is coming soon to fix it, stay tuned :) Or, if you are on macOS Catalina, make sure you're using the newest version of DaisyDisk (4.10, can be found here: https://daisydiskapp.com/downloads/DaisyDisk.zip)
Thanks.
The container and its volumes don't appear to be corrupted.
What happens if you click on "Hidden space" in DaisyDisk? Does DaisyDisk show more information or prompt you to buy a license? By the way, I recommend that you scan the system volume with administrative privileges.
I had a bunch of cached iCloud files no disk sweep software could find, until I got DaisyDisk.
It wasn't showing up like that (greyed with diagonal lines), but maybe you could give that app a try?
Firstly, on macOS, used space isn't necessarily unusable space because macOS automatically removes certain types of data, such as cache and local Time Machine backups, when more space is required. macOS refers to this type of data as "purgeable space".
To view the amount of purgeable space on the system volume:
- In Finder, press shift-command-C.
- Select the volume
Macintosh HD. - Press command-I.
- Read the value of the Available field in the General section.
Secondly, the About this Mac storage chart is unreliable because it frequently miscategorises used space. I recommend that you use DaisyDisk instead. Alternatively, enter the following command in Terminal to display the sizes of the folders /Library and ~/Library, where the majority of unaccounted used space is often concealed:
function _filter { sed -E '/^ *[[:digit:]]+(\.[[:digit:]]+)?[BK] */d' | sort -hr -k 1 }; for directory in /Library "${HOME}/Library"; do du -d 3 -h "${directory}" 2>/dev/null | _filter; done
The About this Mac storage chart is unreliable because it frequently mis-categorises used space. I recommend using DaisyDisk instead.
If you tell us the paths of the folders or files occupying the majority of the used space, then we can tell you what they are, and whether it's safe to remove them.
Use any one of the following to identify the folders that are taking up the most space: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
Maybe use CleanMyMacX and daisydisk.
Firstly, on macOS, used space isn't necessarily unusable space because macOS automatically removes certain types of data, such as cache and local Time Machine backups, when more space is required. macOS refers to this type of data as "purgeable space".
To view the amount of purgeable space on the system volume:
- In Finder, press shift-command-C.
- Select the volume
Macintosh HD. - Press command-I.
- Read the value of the Available field in the General section.
Secondly, the About this Mac storage chart frequently mis-categorises used space. I recommend that you use DaisyDisk instead.
The makers of the DiskDaisy have an informative page about purgeable space. You won’t lose anything important, unless you need some of the things they list that are considered purgeable. (I had to do this last weekend, quickly and easy.)
Do you have iCloud Drive/Documents & Desktop in iCloud or iCloud Photos turned on? Or do you have Time Machine setup but rarely connect your backup drive, and your Time Machine local snapshots are amassing? To really drill down into what is filling your disk, you should use one of the following utilities: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
DaisyDisk should be able to reveal what is occupying this space. I recommend that you scan the volume Macintosh HD with administrative privileges.
What size is the internal drive? Isn’t there anything in ~/Downloads you can live without, maybe the Storage Management window you can access through the Storage tab in About This Mac?
If need be, you can use DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
I haven’t used CCleaner or OnyX for years, but if you want to track down the disk usage, consider DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper.
You can use DaisyDisk https://daisydiskapp.com/
To find out what is taking too much disk space. Then if you can ... delete what is not useful or ...
Backup your data , wipe your disk and reinstall a fresh macOS ...
You have a few utilities to pick from to help you with this: DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or OmniDiskSweeper. This is by no means a comprehensive list, so if you find another that works for you, go for it.
Daisy Disk can help with that. It will break down the storage like you see in System Information except rather than grouping files together in general categories, it will show you which files specifically are taking up space. That should tell you what all that “System” space is. (Plus it’s free)
Hope this helps!
This is quite a common issue. I always tell people with this to use DaisyDisk to manually see what is is and remove it. It’s never failed as far as I know.
DaisyDisk free trial: https://daisydiskapp.com/index.html
You should download and install DaisyDisk. It’s a utility to give you a more detailed view of what is using that space. Then you should be able to tell if some of it can be removed or not.
The best way to determine what “Other” is on a Mac is to resort to applications like OmniDiskSweeper, GrandPerspective, or DaisyDisk.
Download daisy disk and see where your space is taken up. It gives you a granular view into your storage usage.
If you have cloud storage like Dropbox, OneDrive, Box they may be catching data on your drive locally.
Other is just uncategorized data. Sometimes rebuilding the Spotlight index may help with recalculating. If it doesn’t you’ll need to use DaisyDisk, GrandPerspective, or another similar utility of your choosing.
This is a really good app for finding big files.
This app can clear the cache and show how your Mac is running.
Both of these are paid, but have free full trials for like 15 days.
Use DaisyDisk or GrandPerspective to discern what’s eating up your space as quickly as you free it up. It’s possibly some runaway logfile or error reports.
Daisy Disk will help you visualize the contents of your drive in a much more detailed and useful fashion. You can quickly delete stuff from it too.
IIRC the “Documents” bar is not at all related to the size of ~/Documents, it’s a narrow subset of file types. Here’s an old article on the subject that was the first thing that came up on a quick internet search, I doubt there’s been any significant change.
DaisyDisk — gives a detailed breakdown of your computer’s storage, including the ability to mass-delete unneeded files (in the paid version — $9.99 for a lifetime license)
Carbon Copy a loner — allows direct 1:1 cloning of drives. Useful when making redundant external backups. $39.99 for a lifetime license.
Also, I use macOS’ stock Mail app for a few reasons, but mainly MailDrop. You can send attachments up to 5GB just by dropping them into the email body, and the recipient will get an iCloud link to download the file. The file download remains active for a month, and does not count toward your iCloud account storage limit; instead, you have an unlisted 1TB MailDrop Limit, for free, forever. Apple’s official page on MailDrop here.