To function properly, your computer’s hard drive needs enough space. If you create space on your hard drive, you clean up unused files and fragments of data. Your hard drive might even need to be replaced if it is not large enough to meet your needs. If you use a computer daily, you may notice that your hard drive space has disappeared and wonder, “what is using the space on our hard drive?” The installed programs or saved files in Windows Explorer may not always provide a clear indication of its use.

Emptying trash on Mac will completely remove them and free up the disk space. However, Mac OS has multiple trash cans, so you may need to empty more than one. To empty main trash of your user account: Step 1: CTRL-Click or right click on the trash icon at the bottom right corner. Step 2: Now, choose empty trash. It will delete all the files. Free up hard drive space on your Mac. This image was lost some time after publication, but you can still view it here. The Metrobilly blog has a short tutorial for freeing up a few GBs of precious. Here's mine, M1 MBA. So I guess the answer is 251 or 245, depending on how you read it. Last edited: Dec 5, 2020.

You can make it out with Windows’ help. You can make sure you have plenty of free disk space on your PC by using the dedicated settings menu in Windows 10. The space utilized on your device and the type of content downloaded will be shown. You can use Storage Sense to automatically delete temporary files, Recycle Bin items, and other items you might not need. Follow these steps to view your internal storage and free up space.

Contents

• 3 What is disk space, exactly?

How to Free Up Disk Space

The lack of sufficient disk space can lead to problems when saving files and slowing down your device. The author will show you how to find out what’s taking up hard drive space, how to free up disk space, and how to make cleanup safer and more efficient by using a reputable cleanup program.

How to clear disk space in Windows and Mac

The simplest way to free up disk space on PCs and Macs is to empty the recycle bin, clean the disk, delete temporary files, uninstall applications, and use a hardware junkware removal cleanup tool.

The garbage generated by many programs can be overwhelming. This makes you forget what it felt like when you bought your computer. What happened to all the free space? The next section tells you how much disk space you have available at present.

You can clear space on your Mac by using the Storage Management feature. You can delete important data or files when you clean out your trash on your own. Is there a similar feature in Windows? The only way to optimize your computer’s performance is to know what files it needs and which are not necessary.

The Avast Cleanup tool removes bloatware, obsolete programs, and old registry entries for outdated programs, but it keeps what you need. Try Avast Cleanup to reduce the time it takes to boot and improve your computer’s performance.

How about manually deleting files on your PC? This guide will guide you through the process. The steps are as follows:

Empty the trash process of cleaning a hard drive typically begins and ends with emptying the trash.

You don’t delete a file when you right-click and choose Delete or when you drag it to the Trash on a Mac. The file can still be restored.

You can let your Recycle Bin or Trash pile up over time if you don’t have a routine that cleans it out regularly. The solution to how to increase disk space is as simple as deleting all the data.

1. The Trash on Mac or Recycle Bin on Windows is accessible by right-clicking.
2. To empty the recycling bin or trash, click Empty Trash.

There! we are done! Please check the Recycle Bin first before deleting it. You can return to the file’s original location by right-clicking it.

There may be a notice that you may be about to delete a file permanently if the file is a bigger one than your available space on your main hard drive. It will help if you read everything before you make a decision.

Searching for something and not finding it? As a starting point, we should consider the stuff your computer doesn’t need, so let’s tackle the stuff you’re not using at all.

1. Use Disk Cleanup

There are many automated ways of deleting things from Windows, including obsolete Windows files and items in the Recycle Bin. The steps are as follows:

1. This is the first step. Click Disk Cleanup on your taskbar.
2. This is the second step. Then choose a drive to be cleaned.
3. Three. You will be able to see how much space you will clear when you use Disk Cleanup. Aside from the Windows ESD Installation Files, none of them are at risk if deleted. This can be left unchecked.
4. The fourth step is here. Additionally, you can delete additional files if you select Clean up system files to delete (see step 2), which offers more deletion options.

You can speed up your computer with Disk Cleanup, one of the best ways to clean Windows. Does Mac OS have a similar feature?

You can free up storage space on your Mac by using Mac’s built-in cleanup app, Optimize:

1. The first step is taking action. Then click the About This Mac icon in the upper-left corner.
2. This is the second step. Click Manage and then Storage.
3. This is the third step. The Optimize Storage link can be used to get rid of large files, such as movies and TV shows.

This page allows you to empty the Trash automatically and move files to the Cloud. You can utilize Optimize to free up disk space and make space for new files on your Mac.

1. Delete temporary files

If you want to remove temporary files created by Chrome or another browser, you need to do so from the programs themselves. You clear the cache on Mac and PC through the browser’s settings – get to the advanced section of the browser and look for the Clear Cache button. This button is usually adjacent to the button for deleting cookies.

There are numerous ways to increase the size of a cache. To gain more disk space, you can flush out all the data your browser stores automatically on your computer.

1. Delete duplicate files

It is possible to handle the copying process manually or use a program that identifies duplicates for you. The use of an app ensures that you do not delete folders with similar names but different contents. The purpose of this article is not to delete precious memories but to free up disk space.

Can you remember all of this? A program that does everything for you would save you time and make things simpler. Avast Cleanup can help you. The Avast Cleanup tool lets you remove temporary files from the web browser and duplicate folders on Mac or Windows computers.

1. Uninstall applications

The removal of unneeded or useless programs on your computer can increase hard disk space. The money they receive from those software companies can help PC manufacturers lower their prices by installing bloatware on their machines. This results in a bit of saving but lots of irritations—time to eliminate the headache.

To make your PC have more disk space, you may want to delete unnecessary applications:

1. This is the first step. Choose Add or remove programs from the taskbar.
2. Next, step 2. Remove programs from the list on your computer. You might need to search for unfamiliar programs to delete them. Something with Microsoft or Windows in it probably means that it is important and should not be altered. You can remove it from Disk Cleanup if it’s not important.
3. Three. Please select the program you want to uninstall by clicking it.

This guide shows you how to uninstall Mac apps that eat up space and free up storage disk space without using a third-party uninstaller.

You can also uninstall apps using bloatware removal software for PCs and Macs.

1. Configure System Restore

You can restore critical files lost by recent updates with System Restore. As long as you don’t need it, you can usually leave it as is.

Your hard drive reserves space for System Restore so it can function. The following steps describe how you can set aside space on your hard drive by using System Restore:

1. This is the first step. You can choose System protection or Create a restore point from the Taskbar. Select Create a restore point.
2. Using the highlighted window, click Configure.
3. The slider controls the Max Usage amount. It is generally best to leave the default settings untouched unless all other options have failed to work.

The decision is up to you: is a failsafe mechanism more important than increased disk space? Exercise caution before making a decision.

What is disk space, exactly?

The total amount of hard drive storage space is called disk space. There is no unit for describing the volume of space on a computer. As a result, your operating system uses a lot of memory, called disk space, for apps like Google Chrome.

Why should I free up disk space?

It would help if you regularly cleaned up your PC to reclaim some space on a drive that is 90% full, as this will not perform as well as one that is 85% full. The most popular programs generate a surprising amount of garbage. This could explain why your hard drive is 90% full. It’s a good idea to become familiar with how to free up disk space.

You should keep at least 15% of your disk space free to store temporary files. The browser stores the information from commonly visited websites, so over time, you can accumulate data from sites you haven’t visited for months. Your browser’s temporary files can be deleted so that the sites you visit can take up less space.

Windows updates also consume space. Removing old updates and one-time installation files will make way for new updates to be installed, further securing your computer.

The hard drive will automatically split files into small segments, and it will store them wherever it can if you don’t have enough storage space. The segments will be read once the file is opened. The PC may have difficulties opening large files otherwise. This can be solved by defragmenting your hard drive, but you’ll need extra space.

Additionally, if your RAM must offload some work to your hard drive, you will need some free space. It will speed up considerably when this occurs, although it won’t freeze since the hard drive is too full to help.

How to check disk space on Windows 10

Windows 10 offers an easily accessible disk space. The link below is to show you the amount of disk space your Mac has.

The following steps will guide you through determining what is taking up space on your Windows 10 computer.

1. The taskbar will display a folder icon.
2. The PC can be selected by clicking here.
3. You can determine the size of your C: drive by clicking on Devices and drives.

If your hard drive is full, you must clear it. It is also possible to do this via Windows task manager.

How to check disk space on Mac

To clean up your Mac hard drive, you must know how much space you’re using. This is easy to find out. Follow these steps to determine how much space your Mac has:

1. The Apple icon is located on your desktop in the upper-left corner. The About This Mac option appears.
2. The Storage tab will appear at the top.

You can also see here what storage type you are using. The categories should be obvious, although you should investigate what Other means on a Mac. It should be easy to speed up your Mac if you learn more about it.

Free up extra space with Avast Cleanup

What are the best ways to remove all the useless files and data without compromising important files or data? There is software available that can be used to accomplish this. It is hard to find anyone who isn’t using one of these apps due to how useful they have become to so many people over the years.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is my local disk C full?

There is an error message stating that when your C: drive is full, Windows will prompt you with this message: “Low Disk Space. There is no more space available on the Local Disk (C:). Click here to see whether you can free up some space.”.

How do I delete unnecessary files from the C drive?

You can access the main drive (usually C: drive) by right-clicking it. It includes options to delete temporary files when you click on Disk Cleanup. There is also an option to clean up system files. You can then remove the categories by clicking OK > Delete Files.

Does compressing C drive slow it down?

To decompress a compressed file, the CPU must work more. The reading of compressed files might be faster if the hard drive is slow on a computer with a fast CPU. These compromises write performance, however.

What happens when you run out of disk space?

The answer to that question is simple: Your computer will work less efficiently. The reason for that is because when the memory on your computer runs out, it will turn to the hard drive space for “virtual memory.”

Freeing space on your Mac OS X startup disk

This extract from a chapter of our book Troubleshooting Mac® OS X describes several ways to free-up space on your Mac OS X startup disk, also known as your Mac OS X boot volume.

While you could replace your current hard drive with a larger model, or install a second internal hard drive if your Mac will support such, the following tips will help you to free some space without changing your hardware. Additional tips are provided for saving more space if you have a second internal hard drive or an available partition.

Determining available space on your startup disk

To check how much free space is available on your startup disk:

1. In Finder®, select your startup disk's icon. For most users, this is Macintosh HD.
2. Press the Command-I keyboard combination.
3. The Get Info window for your startup disk will open. In the General pane, the Capacity, Available (free space), and space Used on your startup disk will be displayed, as seen in the following screen shot:

Simple ways to free space

You can employ any of the following tips to increase the free space available on your Mac OS X startup disk without altering your hardware.

Empty the Trash

As obvious as it may sound, some folks regularly Trash files but neglect to periodically empty the Trash. In Finder, select Finder > Empty Trash or, under Mac OS X 10.3 or later, you can also select Finder > Secure Empty Trash.

Do not use the Trash as a temporary storage area: only put an object in the Trash if you are sure it is no longer needed.

Some applications, such as iPhoto® and Mail, have their own Trash, spearate from the Trash seen in the Dock. Emptying the application’s Trash may delete its contents immediately or move its contents to your personal Trash, which you can then empty as noted above.

Archive old files

Archive — move, copy and delete, or backup and remove — files you do not use regularly to CD or another backup medium.

If you have not done so already, this is an excellent time to consider implementing a comprehensive backup and recovery solution.

Mac OS X 10.3 Panther® and later include a built-in function for creating compressed archives of files or folders. These archives are generally far smaller than the original files they contain, provided the original is not already in a compressed format. To use this function, see the following AppleCare® Knowledge Base document corresponding to the version of Mac OS X you are using:

Clean up system logs and temporary files

Follow the advice in our 'Running Mac OS X Maintenance Scripts' FAQ to regularly execute the Mac OS X maintenance routines that clean up System logs and temporary files created as part of the UNIX® underpinnings of Mac OS X.

Remove unused localization files

If you selected the Easy Install option when installing Mac OS X, localization files for over a dozen languages are installed. These files enable the Mac OS X interface to appear in a variety of languages. You can save roughly 200MB of disk space by removing unneeded localization files using the freeware utility Monolingual.

Warning:

Be sure to thoroughly read the instructions before using Monolingual. Only use a version that is compatible with the version of Mac OS X you have installed. Never remove English localization files. Many applications require English and will not open if English is removed.

Delete the Previous Systems folder from a prior Archive and Install

If you have performed an Archive and Install of Mac OS X, a Previous Systems folder was created containing your prior Mac OS X System folder. Once you are satisfied that your Mac is functioning properly after an Archive and Install, you can delete the Previous Systems folder as follows:

• Mac OS X 10.3 Panther® or later:

1. Using your Admin account, drag the Previous Systems folder to the Trash.
2. Type your Admin password when requested to authenticate this operation.
3. Empty the Trash.

• Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar: See the AppleCare Knowledge Base document 'Mac OS X 10.2: How to Delete a Previous Systems Folder.'

Uninstall unused applications

If your Macintosh HD > Applications folder is cluttered with applications you are no longer using or trial software that shipped with your Mac that you do not intend to use, then uninstall them.

Delete old iTunes Library file backups

Recent versions of iTunes® create a backup of your current iTunes Library file whenever the iTunes application is updated. After you are satisfied that an iTunes update is performing nominally, trash old iTunes Library files with your Home > Music > Previous iTunes Library folder, then empty the Trash.

Freeing Space On Mac Startup Disk

Remove old iOS device backups

How To Clear Space On Your Mac

Apple iOS® devices (iPad®, iPhone®, iPod touch®) automatically back up specific files and settings to your Mac whenever they are connected to your computer. The backups are saved in your Home > Library > Application Support > MobileSync > Backup folder. While you should retain your most recent backups from these devices, older backups can be deleted in the Devices pane of iTunes preferences. For details, see the following AppleCare Knowledge Base documents:

Trashed iDVD or GarageBand? Don't forget the loops and themes…

If you plan to uninstall iDVD® or GarageBand® by moving these applications' icons from the Macintosh HD > Applications folder to the Trash, be sure to also trash the corresponding iDVD or GarageBand folders within the Macintosh HD > Library > Application Support folder. These folders contain iDVD themes and GarageBand loops and instruments, respectively, that consume several gigabytes of disk space.

Uninstall Mac OS 9

If your PowerPC™-based Mac can only start up into Mac OS X and you have no need for Classic mode, you can uninstall Mac OS 9 to save additional space.

More ways to save space if you have a spare partition or second hard drive

If you have an available partition or a second hard drive, you can also save space on your Mac OS X startup disk with the following additional tips.

Move your iTunes Music folder to another disk or partition

To change the location of your iTunes Music folder, carefully follow the instructions in the AppleCare® Knowledge Base document 'iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Music folder.' Additional information can be found in iTunes Help.

Laptop users may want to consider having two iTunes libraries: a small library of current favorites on their computer, while their complete library resides on an external hard drive. Utilities like iTunes Library Manager enable you to easily have multiple iTunes libraries you can use with your account.

You can investigate other solutions for managing multiple iTunes libraries by searching MacUpdate and VersionTracker.

Move your iPhoto Library folder to another disk or partition

To move the iPhoto Library folder to a new location, employ the instructions in the AppleCare Knowledge Base document from this list corresponding to the version of iPhoto you are using. Additional information can be found in iPhoto Help.

Laptop users may want to consider having two iPhoto libraries: a small library of current, favorite photographs on their computer, while their complete library, or archives of older photos are saved on an external hard drive. Utilities such as iPhoto Buddy and iPhoto Library Manager enable you to have multiple iPhoto libraries that you can use with your account.

You can investigate other solutions for managing multiple iPhoto libraries by searching MacUpdate and VersionTracker.

What about moving my Home or Users folder?

The UNIX underpinnings of Mac OS X make it possible to move either your Home folder or the entire Users folder to a different disk or partition. While this seemed to work well for some users in the early days of Mac OS X, it has become problematic with respect to Mac OS X Updates.

For example, we know of at least one Mac OS X Security Update that expected the Users folder on the Mac OS X startup disk. Those who had relocated Users to another partition had problems installing this update. Consequently, we do not recommend moving either your Home or Users folders to a different disk or partition.

How To Save Space On My Mac

Finding lost disk space

If you find your Mac OS X startup disk has become full unexpectedly:

Mac Free Up Disk Space

1. Check Console for clues. In particular, examine the various Console logs for large blocks of identical, repeating messages. Such blocks of repeating messages often indicate a runway process is logging excessively due to either a flaw in the process itself, its logging parameters, or a problem with your Mac. Excessive logging can result in log files growing without bounds.
2. The utilities OmniDiskSweeper and WhatSize are great for finding large, invisible files. Be sure you understand the purpose of a large file before deleting it. In particular, Virtual Memory (VM) Swap files, located in the /private/var/vm directory, should not be deleted while your Mac is running. VM Swap files are created and released dynamically by Mac OS X.