To check Mac hard drive usage, click the Apple logo in the top left corner of the screen, and then select About this Mac. Choose the Storage tab. You will see a line with different colors indicating the. You can view how much space certain files are using on your hard drive by selecting About This Mac from the Apple menu. Where you can see different categories, such as Audios, Music, Movies, Apps, Backups and how much of your hard drive space is being consumed by these different file types. Simply, Other storage on Mac consists of files that do not easily fall into the clearer category labels like 'Audio.' The types of 'Other' files would include: Documents like PDF.psd.doc, etc. MacOS system and temporary files. The best external hard drives can add more storage to almost any Mac. Adding an external hard drive to your Mac is a cost-effective and easy way to expand your storage capacity. Backup the Mac computer with Time Machine. Check the available storage space on your Mac to ensure at least 30 GB available storage. Otherwise, you will need to remove some content from your Mac to clean up the storage space. If you don't have an idea how to clean up your Mac.
© Provided by TechRepublic Erik EckelMore about Apple
GrandPerspctive permits customizing a variety of scan parameters to better enable locating specific files that may no longer be needed on a Mac drive.
Contemporary Mac SSD drives often feature less storage than did their mechanical predecessors. Although cloud-computing and iCloud adoption rates have increased and shifted some of the burden for storing application data, documents, spreadsheets, presentations, photographs and videos to data centers, Mac users still commonly run short on disk space. With many Macs—including several popular models of iMacs, MacBook Airs, MacBook Pros and Mac minis—shipping with just 256GB SSDs, it's important to maintain tidy drives.
But just how should you free space when a Mac runs short on storage?
SEE: Apple iOS 14: A cheat sheet (TechRepublic)
Using a trusted application uninstaller—Pocket Bits' App Uninstaller and MacPaw's CleanMyMac X are two options—to remove no longer needed programs is a smart first step. If, after running the macOS storage management utility—accessed by clicking the Apple logo from a Mac's menu bar, selecting About This Mac, highlighting the Storage tab and clicking the Manage button—to remove unwanted photos, movies and other unwanted files and finding still more free space is required, check out Erwin Bonsma's GrandPerspective app available within Apple's App Store for just $2.99. The compact 3MB app punches above its weight class and simplifies the challenge of locating various files of your choosing. Featuring an interactive interface that permits color-coding scan results based on creation date, extension, file type, last access date and last change date, among other options specified within the program's Preferences (Figure A), the tool generates an interactive, graphical view of the files you scan.
Figure A
© Provided by TechRepublic GrandPerspctive permits customizing a variety of scan parameters to better enable locating specific files that may no longer be needed on a Mac drive. Erik EckelSEE: Want a new MacBook Pro? Answer these 6 questions before buying the Apple laptop (TechRepublic)
Further simplifying storage cleaning efforts, GrandPerspective lets you perform scans by disk or individual folders. You can also scan iCloud and other cloud directories that integrate within Finder. It's up to you. The program begins as shown in Figure B.
Figure B
© Provided by TechRepublic The GrandPerspective interface requires specifying the disk or directory to scan. Erik EckelThe GrandPerspective interface requires specifying the disk or directory to scan.
After specifying scan parameters, including the disk or directory, the app generates a graphical representation of the results (Figure C).
Figure C
© Provided by TechRepublic GrandPerspective includes multiple color schemes to assist in interpreting scan results. Erik EckelEach rectangle represents a file. Files stored within the same directory appear adjacent to one another within the GrandPerspective display and share the same color shade. The larger the rectangle, the larger the file's size. Thus, large files jump out and become easy to identify. When coloring by the Last Access parameter, the oldest files will be shaded the deepest color.
SEE: 5 Big Sur tips to enhance your Mac experience (TechRepublic)
When the cursor is placed on a rectangle, the corresponding file's filename, location and size are displayed at the window's bottom. Desktop camera mac. Clicking the double-arrow icon opens an inspector window, from which you can click the Info, Display or Focus tabs. Selecting Display and choosing Last Access from the Color By drop-down menu permits color-coding the scan results and quickly identifying the oldest files by color (Figure D).
Figure D
© Provided by TechRepublic A variety of customizable features enable macOS users to locate specific kinds of files. Erik EckelA variety of customizable features enable macOS users to locate specific kinds of files.
The app provides other convenient capabilities, too, directly within the scan results window. You can open files in Finder, perform Quick Looks, filter files and folders and even delete files directly from within GrandPerspective (Figure E).
Figure E
© Provided by TechRepublic GrandPerspective permits deleting files directly from within the app. Erik EckelGrandPerspective permits deleting files directly from within the app.
Freeing disk space on a Mac need not be a time-consuming chore. Project deepweb mac os. Locating old, large and other unnecessary files is just a few clicks away thanks to GrandPerspective.
Optimised Storage helps you save storage space by storing your content in iCloud and making it available on demand:
- When storage space is needed, files, photos, films, email attachments and other files that you rarely use are stored in iCloud automatically.
- Each file stays exactly where you last saved it, and will download when you open it.
- Files that you’ve used recently remain on your Mac, along with optimised versions of your photos.
If you haven't yet upgraded to macOS Sierra or later, find out about other ways to free up storage space.
Find out how much storage is available on your Mac
Choose Apple menu > About This Mac and then click Storage. Each segment of the bar is an estimate of the storage space used by a category of files. Move your pointer over each segment for more detail.
Click the Manage button to open the Storage Management window, pictured below.
Manage storage on your Mac
Mac Hard Drive Other Space Objects
The Storage Management window offers recommendations for optimising your storage. If some recommendations have already been turned on, you will see fewer recommendations.
Store in iCloud
Click the Store in iCloud button and then choose from these options:
- Desktop and Documents. Store all files from these two locations in iCloud Drive. When storage space is needed, only the files you recently opened are kept on your Mac, so that you can work offline easily. Files only stored in iCloud will display a download icon , which you can double-click to download the original file. Find out more about this feature.
- Photos. Store all original, full-resolution photos and videos in iCloud Photos. When storage space is needed, only space-saving (optimised) versions of photos are kept on your Mac. To download the original photo or video, just open it.
- Messages. Store all messages and attachments in iCloud. When storage space is needed, only the messages and attachments you recently opened are kept on your Mac. Find out more about Messages in iCloud.
Storing files in iCloud uses the storage space in your iCloud storage plan. If you reach or exceed your iCloud storage limit, you can either buy more iCloud storage or make more iCloud storage available. iCloud storage starts at 50 GB for $0.99 (USD) a month, and you can purchase additional storage directly from your Apple device. Find out more about the prices in your region.
Optimise Storage
Click the Optimise button to save space by automatically removing films and TV programmes you've watched. When storage space is needed, films or TV programmes that you've purchased from Apple and have already watched will be removed from your Mac. Click the download icon next to a film or TV programme to download it again.
Your Mac will also save space by only keeping recent email attachments on this Mac when storage space is needed. You can manually download any attachments at any time by opening the email or attachment, or saving the attachment to your Mac.
Optimising storage for films, TV programmes and email attachments doesn't require iCloud storage space.
Mac Hard Drive Other Space Mac
Empty Bin Automatically
Empty Bin Automatically permanently deletes files that have been in the Bin for more than 30 days.
Reduce Clutter
Reduce Clutter helps you identify large files and files you may no longer need. Click the Review Files button and then choose any of the file categories in the sidebar, such as Applications, Documents, Music Creation or Bin.
You can delete the files in some categories directly from this window. Get in, get out mac os. Other categories show the total storage space used by the files in each app. You can then open the app and decide whether to delete files from within it.
Find out how to re-download apps, music, films, TV programmes and books.
Where to find the settings for each feature
The button for each recommendation in the Storage Management window affects one or more settings in other apps. You can also control these settings directly within each app.
- If you're using macOS Catalina or later, choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Apple ID, and then select iCloud in the sidebar: Store in iCloud turns on the Optimise Mac Storage setting on the right. To turn off iCloud Drive entirely, deselect iCloud Drive.
- If you're using macOS Mojave or earlier, choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click iCloud, then click Options next to iCloud Drive. Store in iCloud turns on the Desktop & Documents Folders and Optimise Mac Storage settings.
- In Photos, choose Photos > Preferences and then click iCloud. Store in iCloud selects iCloud Photos and Optimise Mac Storage.
- In Messages, choose Messages > Preferences, then click iMessage. Store in iCloud selects Enable Messages in iCloud.
- If you're using macOS Catalina or later, open the Apple TV app, choose TV > Preferences from the menu bar, then click Files. Optimise Storage selects “Automatically delete watched films and TV programmes”.
- In you're using macOS Mojave or earlier, open iTunes, choose iTunes > Preferences from the menu bar, then click Advanced. Optimise Storage selects “Automatically delete watched films and TV programmes”.
- In Mail, choose Mail > Preferences from the menu bar and then click Accounts. In the Account Information section on the right, Optimise Storage sets the Download Attachments menu to either Recent or None.
Empty Bin Automatically: From the Finder, choose Finder > Preferences, then click Advanced. Empty Bin Automatically selects “Remove items from the Bin after 30 days”.
Other ways that macOS automatically helps to save space
With macOS Sierra or later, your Mac will take these additional steps automatically to save storage space:
- Detects duplicate downloads in Safari, keeping only the most recent version of the download
- Reminds you to delete used app installers
- Removes old fonts, languages and dictionaries that aren't being used
- Clears caches, logs and other unnecessary data when storage space is needed
How to free up storage space manually
Even without using the Optimised Storage features described in this article, you can take other steps to make more storage space available:
Clear Hard Drive Space Mac
![Mac Hard Drive Other Space Mac Hard Drive Other Space](https://www.mac-forums.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Storage.jpg)
- Music, films and other media can use a lot of storage space. Find out how to delete music, films and TV programmes from your device.
- Delete other files that you no longer need by moving them to the Bin, then emptying the Bin. The Downloads folder is good place to look for files that you may no longer need.
- Move files to an external storage device.
- Compress files.
- Delete unneeded email: In the Mail app, choose Mailbox > Erase Junk Mail. If you no longer need the email in your Deleted Items mailbox, choose Mailbox > Erase Deleted Items.
Learn more
- The Storage pane of About This Mac is the best way to determine the amount of storage space available on your Mac. Disk Utility and other apps may show storage categories, such as Not Mounted, VM, Recovery, Other Volumes, Free or Purgeable. Don't rely on these categories to understand how to free up storage space or how much storage space is available for your data.
- When you duplicate a file on an APFS-formatted volume, that file doesn't use additional storage space on the volume. Deleting a duplicate file only frees up the space required by any data that you might have added to the duplicate. If you no longer need any copies of the file, you can recover all of the storage space by deleting both the duplicate and the original file.
- If you're using a pro app and Optimise Mac Storage, find out how to make sure your projects are always on your Mac and able to access their files.