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AweCleaner for Mac is very to use, so you can use it to free up disk space on MacBook with only 1 click. It can remove all junk files, find/remove duplicates, useless large files; it also can clean up all internet junk and help you uninstall useless programs on the MacBook. Getting disk space usage from the command line is simple. The df command shows disk usage per filesystem. The du command shows disk usage for files, directories and subdirectories. This is great for simple things, however, doing an in-depth analysis is easier using some graphical tools. Then click Target Disk Mode button, when the computer has started up, a disk icon appears on the desktop of the other Mac. Access the disk and got to /Users/username location, to delete some files. Then select the disk and get info to check the available storage, make sure the available storage is more than 30 GB.

  1. How To Clear Disk Space Mac
  2. Mac Check Disk Space
  3. How To Check Disk Space Mac

Most of us are keen to update to a new version of macOS as soon as it is available. macOS Big Sur has been out since November 12, still, many users couldn't update their Macs straight away. It’s very frustrating if you see a message telling you that you don’t have enough space to install the new macOS. Don’t worry, though. There are lots of things you can do to fix it. We’ll show you what they are in this article.

How much space do you need for Big Sur?

While the installer for Big Sur takes up less than 16GB of space, you should make sure that you have at least 20GB of free space on your startup disk before you try to download and install it. The more free space, the better. Your Mac uses disk space to store temporary files and provide storage for active apps and tasks (which is what RAM does), so you should never be running with almost no disk space left.

CleanMyMac X makes it very easy to free up disk space on your Mac by identifying junk files and allowing you to get rid of them with a click. It can also detect large and old files and show you the files taking up most space and uninstall applications.

How to free up space for macOS Big Sur?

Complete the following steps to ensure your Mac is ready to update to Big Sur.

1. Backup your Mac

Back up all files and data that are stored on your Mac. Preferably twice to different locations. While upgrading to Big Sur is safe, you never know when something might go wrong. If you use Time Machine or another backup tool, run a manual backup just before you upgrade. And, if you can, clone your startup disk to an external drive, too.

2. Free up disk space using CleanMyMac X

If you don’t already have CleanMyMac X installed, download it for free here. This tool will help you clear some space and delete large and old files quickly.

  1. Launch CleanMyMac X.
  2. Choose System Junk in the sidebar and press Scan.
  3. When it’s finished, press Clean to free up space, or Review Details to find out more.

3. Get rid of large and old files

Media files usually gobble up a large amount of disk space. And the worst thing is they are scattered around Mac’s folders, making it difficult to find and remove them. CleanMyMac X proves to be useful here:

  • Choose Large & Old files in CleanMyMac X’s sidebar.
  • Press Scan.
  • When it’s finished, use the middle column to filter files by type.
  • Check files that you want to delete.
  • Press Remove.

4. Use Apple’s built-in storage management tool

Apple has provided a method for you to manage storage by showing you what is taking up disk space and making recommendations for deleting. It’s not as quick and easy as CleanMyMac X, but it can help you save disk space. Here’s how to use it.

Other
  1. Click on the Apple menu and choose About this Mac.
  2. Select Storage and press Manage.
  3. In the Recommendations section, review each section in turn.
  4. Now go through each of the sections in the sidebar.
  5. Delete files or take further action, depending on what you choose.

5. Delete local Time Machine snapshots

There is one other thing you can try if you keep getting a message telling you that you do not have enough space to install Big Sur. You should only try it if you are sure there is enough space on your startup disk and that the message is wrong. And it will only work if you use Time Machine to back up your Mac.

Time Machine stores local snapshots on your Mac. Your Mac is supposed to count the space used by snapshots as free space, which is why it looks like you have enough space for the installation. Old time vegas slots.

Pine game. However, it seems that the installer may not realize the space is free. The solution is to delete the snapshots. This won’t remove backups on your backup disk, just snapshots on your Mac.


Open Time Machine from System Preferences. Uncheck Back Up Automatically and wait some time till Time Machine deletes snapshots. Then you can turn Time Machine back on.

If you’re familiar with Terminal, you can try deleting local snapshots manually.

  1. Go to Applications > Utilities and launch Terminal.
  2. Type: tmutil listlocalsnapshots /
  3. You will see a list of snapshots that look like this: com.apple.TimeMachine.2020-10–09-002010.local
  4. To delete a snapshot, type: sudo tmutil deletelocalsnapshots
  5. Then type the date part of the snapshot name. For example: sudo tmutil deletelocalsnapshots 2020-10–09-002010
  6. Type Return and repeat for each snapshot you want to delete.

Hopefully, this helped you free up some space and update your Mac to the latest OS. If you're just preparing your Mac for the upgrade, don't forget to back up your data before you start clearing space. So you won't be afraid of losing anything important.

So, your Mac is running out of storage. You try to figure out what’s taking up your disk space by clicking the Apple logo on the top-left of the screen, selecting About This Mac, and hitting the Storage tab.

To your surprise, you see a yellow bar representing “System” that seems to occupy way more space than you think it should. In the example above, it only shows 207 GB, but take a look at this Apple discussion — some Mac users report that System Storage takes an astonishing 250 GB.

Worse yet, you have no idea what’s included in “System” storage, because clicking the “Manage” button brings you to this System Information window… and the “System” row is greyed out.

Why does my Mac system require so much space?

What does it contain?

Is it safe to remove some of those system files?

How do I regain more storage space?

Minecraft for macbook air free. Questions like these may easily get to your head. Although my Mac now has a good amount of disk space available, I’m always wary of files that are taking up more space than they should.

I have no idea why “System” is greyed out while “Documents,” “System Junk,” “Trash,” etc. allow you to review the files based on size and type. How to center text on a mac. My hunch is that Apple does this on purpose to prevent users from deleting system files that could lead to serious issues.

What Files Are Included in System Storage on Mac?

During my research, I found many people report that Apple counts iTunes backup files and app caches (e.g. Adobe video cache files) in the System category.

Since it’s greyed out and we are unable to click on that category for deeper analysis, we’ll have to use a third-party app to assist.

CleanMyMac X is perfect for this kind of analysis. Since I tested the app in our best Mac cleaner review, it immediately came to my head when I saw “System” was greyed out in Storage. Note that CleanMyMac isn’t freeware, but the new “Space Lens” feature is free to use and it allows you to scan your Macintosh HD, and then show you an in-depth overview of what’s taking up disk space on your Mac.

Step 1:Download CleanMyMac and install the app on your Mac. Open it, under “Space Lens” module, first click the yellow “Grant Access” button to allow the app to access your Mac files and then select “Scan” to get started.

Crossover windows emulator mac. Step 2: Soon it’ll show you a folder/file tree and you can hover your cursor over each block (i.e. a folder). There you can find more details. In this case, I clicked “System” folder to continue.

Step 3: The file breakdown below indicates that some Library and iOS Support files are the culprits.

How To Clear Disk Space Mac

The interesting part is that the System file size shown in CleanMyMac is much smaller than the size shown in System Information. This puzzles me and makes me believe that Apple definitely has counted some other files (not real system files) in the System category.

What are they? I have no clue, honestly. But as reported by other Mac users who experienced the same issue, they said Apple also considers app caches and iTunes backup files as System files.

Out of curiosity, I ran CleanMyMac again for a quick scan. That app found 13.92 GB in iTunes Junk. Further review revealed that the junk files are old iOS device backups, software updates, broken downloads, etc.

But even after adding this amount to the original system files returned by CleanMyMac X, the total size is still a bit less than what’s returned in System Information.

If cleaning the System Storage is still not enough to bring your Mac available disk space to a normal level (i.e. 20% or more), see below.

What Else Can I Do to Reclaim More Disk Space?

There are tons of ways out there. Here are a few of my favorites that should help you get back a decent amount of space quickly.

Mac Check Disk Space

1. Sort all files by size and delete old large files.

Open Finder, go to Recents and look at the Size column. Click on it to sort all recent files by file size (from large to small). You’ll have a clear overview of what items are eating up a large amount of space, e.g. From 1 GB to 10 GB, and from 100 MB to 1 GB.

On my MacBook Pro, I found a few large videos that could be transferred to an external drive.

Note: If the Size column doesn’t show up, click on the Settings icon and select Arrange By > Size.

How To Check Disk Space Mac

2. Remove duplicate files.

Don’t forget those duplicates and similar files! They can stack up without you being aware of it. Finding them is sometimes time-consuming. That’s what Gemini 2 is designed for. Simply select a few frequently used folders (e.g. Documents, Downloads, etc.) in the main zone of Gemini.

It then scans them and returns all the duplicate files that might be worth removing. Of course, it’s always a good practice to review them before doing so. You can also read more from our detailed Gemini review here.

Wrapping It Up

Ever since Apple introduced the Optimized Storage feature, Mac users got the option of saving space by storing content in the cloud. Apple also has several new tools that make it easy to find and remove unneeded files.

That bar under the Storage tab is beautiful. It does allow you to get a quick overview of what’s taking up the most space on our hard drive. However, it still lacks insights into the “System” category as it’s greyed out.

Hopefully, the guides above have helped you figure out the reasons you’ve got so much “System” data, and most importantly you’ve reclaimed some disk space — especially for new MacBooks pre-installed with flash storage — every gigabyte is precious!





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