How to free up storage on a Mac (2026 guide)

If your Mac is reporting that the startup disk is almost full, the storage is almost never gone to user files. It is gone to caches, logs, and orphaned support data that macOS does not surface in the built-in storage UI.

This guide covers the four categories that account for the vast majority of reclaimable space on a typical Mac, in priority order.

1. Browser caches

The single biggest source of wasted space on most Macs is browser cache. Each browser keeps its own cache, and the more browsers you have installed, the more storage they collectively hold.

The browser cache directories on macOS are:

• Chrome: ~/Library/Caches/Google/Chrome
• Safari: ~/Library/Caches/com.apple.Safari
• Firefox: ~/Library/Caches/Firefox/Profiles
• Arc: ~/Library/Caches/Company.ThingBrowser
• Brave: ~/Library/Caches/BraveSoftware/Brave-Browser

On a Mac that has been in regular use for a year, these directories typically hold 20–50 GB combined.

What to do: In each browser, open settings and clear cached images and files. None of your bookmarks, passwords, or open tabs are affected — only the cache.

2. System and app caches

~/Library/Caches collects scratch data from every app you have ever launched. It rarely self-cleans. Apps like Slack, Spotify, Discord, Zoom, and Photoshop can each hold several gigabytes here.

What to do: It is safe to delete the contents of ~/Library/Caches while apps are closed. macOS and each app will recreate the caches they actually need on next launch.

3. Old logs

macOS and apps write diagnostic logs to:

• /private/var/log (system logs)
• ~/Library/Logs (user logs)

These accumulate indefinitely. Crash reports from apps you uninstalled years ago can still be sitting here.

What to do: Files in these directories are safe to remove. macOS recreates the log files it needs.

4. App leftovers

When you drag an app from Applications to Trash, macOS does not remove its support files. These survive uninstalls and pile up over years.

The directories where leftover files hide:

• ~/Library/Application Support/<app name>
• ~/Library/Preferences/<app bundle id>.plist
• ~/Library/Saved Application State/<app bundle id>
• ~/Library/Containers/<app bundle id>
• ~/Library/Group Containers/<team id>.<app bundle id>
• ~/Library/LaunchAgents/<app bundle id>.plist

A single uninstalled creative tool can leave 5–10 GB of support data behind. Multiplied across years of installed-and-removed apps, this can easily reach 50 GB.

What to do: Search each directory for app names you no longer have installed. Remove the matching files. (This is the tedious one to do manually — it is the main thing Unclutter automates.)

What is *not* safe to delete

Avoid touching:

• Anything in ~/Documents, ~/Desktop, ~/Downloads
• Photos and Music libraries
• /System (System Integrity Protection prevents this anyway)
• /Library/Extensions unless you know exactly what a kext is for
• iCloud Drive contents — deleting locally deletes from iCloud

The shortcut

If you would rather not walk through six ~/Library subdirectories by hand, Unclutter does all of this in one scan and shows you exactly what it found before anything is deleted. Get Unclutter for $25 →