If you’re a MacBook user, you may be familiar with the “other storage” that takes up a lot of space on your hard drive. Unfortunately, the Mac operating system doesn’t allow you to touch system files or other storage files, so it can be frustrating to try to figure out what’s taking up all that space. In this post, we’ll show you how to completely remove the other storage or the files that are taking up space, and we’ll do it completely for free.
To get started, click on the Apple icon on top of your screen and go to “About This Mac”, then click on “Storage”. This will show you in gray how much of your hard drive is taken up by the other storage files. Click on “Manage” to do a little bit of calculation, and it will show you how much space “other storage” is taking up.
Unfortunately, you can’t do much with the other storage files natively inside the Mac operating system. However, there is a third-party app called CleanMyMac X that can help you identify what’s inside the other storage and manually choose to delete those files. You can download the free version of the app and use its “Space Lens” function to scan your hard drive and put everything into folders.
Once you’ve identified the files that are taking up space, you can delete them manually or use the removal process in CleanMyMac X. If you use the free version, the removal process will only remove so much, so you’ll have to find the same exact path inside of your computer which you can with the finder window. However, the full version of the app offers the convenience of removing all the files for you.
It’s important to back up any of your Macs to an external hard drive using Time Machine before you delete any files. This way, you can get those files back if they’re not backed up somewhere else. If you’ve never used Time Machine before, there’s a video in the description that explains the simple process for backing up your Mac.
In summary, the steps to delete other storage are:
1. Click on the Apple icon on top of your screen and go to “About This Mac”, then click on “Storage”.
2. Click on “Manage” to calculate how much space “other storage” is taking up.
3. Download CleanMyMac X (free version) and use its “Space Lens” function to identify the files that are taking up space.
4. Manually delete the files or use the removal process in CleanMyMac X (full version) to remove all the files.
5. Back up your Mac using Time Machine before deleting any files.
By following these steps, you can free up space on your MacBook and get rid of the pesky “other storage” that’s been taking up so much room.