How To Free Up The Other Space On Mac

I basically bought my M1 just to be able to do this. Continue browsing in r/mac. A community for all things relating to Apple's Macintosh line of computers. Free up disk space on Mac 1. Find large files you don’t need. Potential space reclaimed: 2-5 GB. Go to your desktop and press Command + F; Choose “This Mac” Select Other in the dropdown menu; Under the Search Attributes menu, tick File Size and File Extension; Well done! Now you can type in different file extensions and sort the.

When Apple released macOS High Sierra, it introduced a new file system, APFS, and brought lots of under-the-hood changes to the way your Mac stores data, but, thankfully, we don’t need to get into those. One thing we should talk about, though, is 'other volumes' in a container because it might be mentioned on screen from time to time, especially if you use the Optimize Storage feature.

About this Mac includes a storage feature to see a snapshot of your storage usage, but it also offers up recommendations to free up space and more. Head to → About this Mac. I found 1 solution to figure out how to clean up a little Other space, opening iTunes up, going to Preferences, Device and cleaning all the devices backups except the last one. Sure, it cleaned up 1 GB for me and 46 for my cousin, but the Other storage still takes a half of our Mac storage. I'll be glad for your answers and helpful comments.

Other volumes: what does it mean?

In HFS+, the file system replaced by APFS could split a disk into different partitions. APFS gets rid of the concept of partitions and replaces them with containers. But containers differ from partitions. As well as having multiple containers on a physical disk, a container can have multiple volumes. For example, in macOS, your startup container has the main boot volume – usually called Macintosh HD – as well as the Recovery volume, Preboot volume, and volume for virtual memory like swap files.

Before we discuss what 'other volumes' in the container are, let’s look at where the message appears in the Storage tab of About this Mac.

Click the Apple menu.
Choose About this Mac.
Select the Storage tab.

After a short time, when macOS has calculated it, you’ll see a colored bar describing how your storage is allocated. Most of the time, the box looks like the image above. But sometimes, you’ll see part of the box colored gray and the description ‘other volumes in container.’

Those ‘other volumes’ are the recover, preboot and virtual volumes. If you see that message, the other volumes likely take up much more space than they should because something has gone wrong. Unfortunately, reclaiming the storage space isn’t as simple as just getting rid of the other volumes since they are crucial to the OS.

How to delete other volumes in a container?

However, there are other ways you can fix the problem to free up space on your Mac or get rid of the other volumes in a container message. Let’s look at the options.

1. Get rid of purgeable space with CleanMyMac X

CleanMyMac X is one of my favorite tools for freeing up space, as well as doing general maintenance on my Mac. Don’t take my word for it, though, well-known tech blog iMore.com called CleanMyMac X ‘the simplest way to keep your Mac clean.’

One of the new features in CleanMyMac X is the ‘Free up purgeable space’ tool in the Maintenance utility. This tool identifies space on your startup disk that contains files that macOS doesn’t need but which are only deleted when your Mac is running really low on storage. If you want to release that space before then, you can’t. Unless you use CleanMyMac X. Here’s how it works:

Download and install CleanMyMac X (there’s a free version available).
Launch CleanMyMac X.
Choose Maintenance from the sidebar on the left.
Check the box next to Free Up Purgeable Space and press Run.
Wait. Identifying space that can be safely purged takes a few minutes, but it won’t be too long.
When it’s finished, you’ll hear an alert and see a message telling you it’s done. If there was a problem with other volumes in a container taking up too much space, it should now be fixed.

2. Create a new user account

Some Mac users have reported that creating a new user account allowed them to reclaim storage from other volumes in a container successfully.

Click the Apple menu and choose System Preferences.
Select the Users & Groups pane.
Click on the padlock and type in your admin username and password.
Press the ‘+’ at the bottom left of the screen.
Select Administrator from the dropdown menu and enter details for the new account.
When you have created it, restart your Mac and log in with the new Administrator account.
Choose About this Mac from the Apple menu again and then click on the Storage tab.
See if the ‘other volumes in this container’ disappeared.

3. Delete the extra volume

Apple's Storage tab doesn't give many details on what's going on with your drive and those other volumes. To find out what volumes your drive consists of, let's run this Terminal command: diskutil list

Look at the breakdown and see if there are multiple Macintosh HD - Data volumes. If you've found the extra volume, probably that's the one that eats out your space.

To delete this volume, follow the instructions:

Deleting a volume erases all data it contains. Back up your data to avoid losing any important files.

Open Disk Utility on your Mac.
Select the APFS Volume you want to remove.
Click the Delete Volume button '—' in the toolbar. If the button is dimmed, the selected volume is in use, which means you can't delete it. To delete this volume, you need to enter Disk Utility in macOS Recovery.

To start up from macOS Recovery, press and hold Command-R when your Mac starts up. Release the keys when you see an Apple logo, spinning globe, or other startup screen. Go to Disk Utility from the Utilities window.

4. Erase your disk and reinstall macOS

If nothing else helps, erasing the disk and reinstalling macOS may be the only way to fix the 'other volumes in container' issue. Don't forget to back up your data first.

To erase your disk:

Start up your Mac in the Recovery mode (press and hold Command-R on Mac's startup).
From the Utilities window, select Disk Utility and click Continue.
Select Macintosh HD in the sidebar of Disk Utility and click the Erase button.
Use Macintosh HD as the name.
In the Formal field, choose APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
Click Erase.
After the erase is complete, delete all the volumes that may be left in the sidebar. (keep the Macintosh HD volume you just erased).
Quit Disk Utility.

You will see the Utilities window again. Click Reinstall macOS and wait till it's done. The other volumes should be gone.

macOS has made lots of improvements to the way it deals with storage space on your Mac, partly due to the lower capacity of the SSDs found in most Macs compared with physical hard disks. However, sometimes these features go wrong, and it’s then that you may see the ‘other volumes in a container message.’ Happily, fixing the problem is not usually difficult, and it’s even easier if you use the Free Up Purgeable Space tool in CleanMyMac X.

/PowerMyMac /How to Clear System Storage on Mac Effectively

By this time, you might have been experiencing that you are a sort of running out of system storage on your Mac and you may be looking for ways on how to clear system storage on Mac. And one of the first thing that you would do is to check out your disk space for you to see what are the things that are eating up your Mac's system storage.

And once that you view system storage on Mac, you will then be surprised to see a yellow bar that refers to your System which is like occupying more of your space on your Mac, including so many purgeable files to delete. And the worst case is that you actually have no idea what are the things that are included in your system storage.

TIPS:

That is why in this post, we are going to show you how to clear system storage on Mac and what are the things that contain your system storage on your Mac so that you will have better knowledge on what are the things that you should be removed from your Mac.

Article GuidePart 1. What Dose System Storage Mean on Mac?Part 2. How Do I Free up System Storage on My Mac Automatically?Part 3. How to Clear System Storage on Mac Manually?Part 4. In Conclusion

Part 1. What Dose System Storage Mean on Mac?

What Is System Storage on Mac?

The files that actually your system storage of your Mac contains are all of those junks that you actually do not need on your Mac. This can be your System Cache, Application Cache, System Logs, User Logs, and more.

Why Is My Mac System Storage So Big?

Why is there so much system storage on my Mac? These files are stored on your Mac every time that you are making a download, or saving new files on your Mac. This can be your email attachments, iTunes movie, and more. Some of these files are saving large files that is why it can take up your system storage quickly.

Furthermore, Your 'System' and 'Library' folders are the main storage locations. Therefore, if your 'system' takes up a lot of space, Time Machine snapshots are most likely stored on your Mac.

Now you know what is system storage, but how to clear system storage on Mac so that you can free up more space to save other files you desired? macOS comes with a feature to optimize your storage: turn to “About this Mac” > choose Storage > click Manage button, then you will see Store in iCloud, Optimize Storage, Empty Trash Automatically, and Reduce Clutter. You can make use of these options to reduce the system storage on your Mac first.

Part 2. How Do I Free up System Storage on My Mac Automatically?

There are methods to clean Mac system storage manually we will talk about in the next part, but they surely take more time and effort as you will be needing to go through your Mac one by one.

However, there is a better way for you to free up system storage Mac. You will be able to clear your Mac’s system storage in no time.

All the methods on how to clear system storage on Mac that we have included in the next part can all be done just by one program – the iMyMac PowerMyMac. This program is considered to be a Mac system storage cleanup tool that you can use to reduce system storage on Mac by removing all junk files.

Using the PowerMyMac will allow you to choose all the junks or files that you no longer need on your Mac and clean them. You can decide what to remove or not, so you will be assured that none of your important files will be deleted without you knowing it. Then how to get rid of system storage on Mac with PowerMyMac?

Here is how to clear system storage on Mac with PowerMyMac.

Download and install PowerMyMac on your Mac, then launch it.
Launch the iMyMac Program
Select the Master Scan module to clear your Mac’s system storage by deleting System Cache, Application Cache, System Logs, User Logs, etc.
After scanning, mark all the files that you would want to clean and click on the “Clean” button.

So there you have the easy way on how to clear system storage on Mac with just a few clicks using PowerMyMac. You can also try the other options that the program has to clean up other things like duplicate photos on your Mac. This will then boost the performance of your Mac and at the same time, you will be able to gain more of your system storage back.

Part 3. How to Clear System Storage on Mac Manually?

Method #1. Delete Time Machine Backups

Not only will Time Machine backups be stored on an external drive, but macOS will also keep a backup copy on your startup drive so that you can restore files when the external drive is unavailable. You may need to delete your Time Machine backups when your Mac is run out of system storage. Check the steps below:

Launch Terminal and type this command: tmutil listlocalsnapshotdates
Press the Return button then you will see a list of Time Machine backups listed by date.
Type the command: tmutil deletelocalsnapshots NAME (NAME is the name of one of the listed backups).
Press the Return button again.
You can repeat step 3 and step 4 to remove those backups you'd like to clear out.

Method #2. Clean Up Your Mac's Cache

Caches are one of the biggest culprits as to why your Mac’s system storage is getting full. So for you to know how to delete system storage on Mac, go ahead and clean up your Mac’s cache:

Launch Finder on your Mac.
Then go ahead and click on “Go to folder”.
From there, go ahead and type in ~/Library/Caches then remove all the files that are taking up most space.
After that, go ahead and click on “Go to folder”.
Then type in /Library/Cache and then once more, go ahead and remove all the files that are taking up most space.

Method #3. Remove Your Old iTunes Library Backups

Whenever you make a backup on your iTunes, the more backup file is stored on your Mac. And with that, these backups that you no longer use will be piled up on your Mac and this can cause your system storage to get full as well.

So, for you to remove system storage on Mac, go ahead and remove all those old iTunes Backup that you no longer need:

Go ahead and launch Finder on your Mac.
Then go ahead and click on the “Go” button located at the menu bar.
Then choose “Go to Folder”.
Then go ahead and enter the following: ~/Music/iTunes/Previous iTunes Libraries
Once done, you will be able to see all of your iTunes back-ups. The date they were made is also indicated so you can go ahead and choose your old backups and delete them.

Method #4. Take Out All Unused Applications

This method is one of the most common ways on how to clear system storage on Mac. All you have to do is to go through all of the applications that you have on your Mac and sort out which are the ones that you no longer use and uninstall them. You just have to make sure that you are removing them correctly and not just by merely dragging them over to your Trash bin.

You have to make sure that when you uninstall any application on your Mac that you no longer need, you should also find all the files or folders that are associated with that application. If not, then you are still leaving data behind and that will still eat up space on your Mac.

Method #5. Clean Up Your Photo Library

Photos are one of the most common data that we have on our Mac. And keeping them is keeping memories. However, these photos actually take up more space on your Mac’s system storage. So you have to make sure that you sort things out.

How To Clean My Macbook Hard Drive

So how to clear space on Mac system? You can delete all the photos that you think you no longer need and as well as those photos that have more than one copy. You also have the option to transfer them over to another hard drive or USB drive for you to free up space on your Mac.

Method #6. Delete Any Old iOS Backup

Just like your iTunes backup, the old iOS backup that you have on your Mac is also one of the reasons as to why your Mac’s system storage is getting full. That is why it is a good idea that you should also remove your old iOS backup from your Mac. Let's check the steps on how to clear system storage on Mac below:

Go ahead and launch Finder on your Mac.
After that, go ahead and click on the “Go” button located at the menu bar.
From there, go ahead and choose “Go to folder”.
Then once that you are in, go ahead and type the following: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup

Once that you have opened the window, go ahead and choose all the old iOS backup that you have on your Mac. Dates of the backup are already indicated so that you will be able to know which of them are the old ones.

Part 4. In Conclusion

As you can see, it is an easy thing to do on how to clear system storage on Mac. Though doing this manually will take more time and effort. But all thanks to the PowerMyMac, you will be saving more of your time and effort as it will only need a few clicks to do the cleaning process and optimize system storage.

Make it a habit of cleaning up your Mac every now and then so that you will not be able to experience having full storage and a slow Mac. Remember, cleaning up all the files and other things that you no longer need will sure be a great help for the performance of your Mac.

Last Tip: If you want to reduce the “system” storage size on your iPhone or iPad, just turn to the provided link to check how to free up system storage on iPhone.

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Free Up Other Space On Mac

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