Mac storage full? 7 fixes, from free to one click

Why your Mac says storage is full#

A Mac fills up in three places. The first is files you downloaded once and forgot: installers, PDFs downloaded three times, screen recordings. The second is space macOS files under System Data, which Apple describes as files that "don't belong to any more specific category": caches, logs, developer tools, iPhone backups and Time Machine snapshots. The third is photos and videos.

On the MacBook Pro we test on, the disk was 99% full with only 10 GB left. The Downloads folder held 3.9 GB, but ~/Library/Caches held 25 GB and ~/Library/Developer held 296 GB, almost all of it old iPhone debugging files from Xcode. None of that shows up when you look through your own folders, which is why a full Mac so often feels like it is full "for no reason".

1. Check what is actually using space#

Open System Settings › General › Storage (on macOS 12 Monterey and older: Apple menu › About This Mac › Storage). Wait for the colored bar to finish loading; it can take a minute on a full disk. Each category with an ⓘ button opens a list you can sort and delete from.

If you want a folder-by-folder view, Terminal gives one in a few seconds:

du -sh ~/* ~/Library/* 2>/dev/null | sort -rh | head -15

This lists the 15 biggest folders in your home folder and its Library, largest first. It only reads; it changes nothing.

2. Empty the Trash#

Files in the Trash still take up space. Right-click the Trash in the Dock and choose Empty Trash. If macOS says an item is in use, see what to do when the Trash will not empty.

3. Clear Downloads and old installers#

Open Downloads in Finder, switch to list view (⌘ 2) and click the Size column. Installer files ending in .dmg and .pkg are safe to delete once the app is installed. Look for copies such as report (1).pdf and report (2).pdf too.

This is the step our own app, Sweepy, does in one click: it sorts Downloads and Desktop into duplicates, old installers, old files and large files, moves what you pick to the Trash and can undo the whole cleanup. You do not need it; sorting by size in Finder works, it just takes longer.

4. Find large files anywhere#

In Finder press ⌘ F, click Kind, choose Other…, tick File Size, then set "is greater than 500 MB". Old screen recordings, exported videos and virtual machine disks show up here.

5. Shrink System Data#

System Data is the category people ask about most. The safe wins, in order:

• Caches you own. ~/Library/Caches is often 5 to 30 GB. See whether it is safe to delete Library caches.
• Xcode and developer files. If you have ever plugged an iPhone into Xcode, check why Xcode takes so much space. This was 242 GB on our test Mac.
• Time Machine local snapshots. See how to delete local snapshots.

The full walkthrough is in Mac System Data too large.

6. Remove old iPhone and iPad backups#

If you back up an iPhone to the Mac, each backup can be tens of gigabytes. Go to System Settings › General › Storage, click ⓘ next to iOS Files, and delete backups of devices you no longer own. With the iPhone connected, you can also select it in the Finder sidebar and click Manage Backups.

7. Let macOS offload to iCloud#

In System Settings › General › Storage, the Recommendations list offers Store in iCloud, which keeps recent files on the Mac and older ones in iCloud Drive. This needs enough iCloud storage, and files download again when you open them, so it suits fast internet and documents more than big media libraries.

Before you delete: never remove anything inside /System, /Library/Apple or /private/var/db. Stick to files inside your home folder, and empty the Trash only when you are sure.

How much space each step got back on our Mac#

Your numbers will differ. The point is to measure first; the biggest folder is rarely the one you expect.