ios 13.5.1 storage issues

A large “Other” can be an indication of storage corruption. The way to fix it is to back up your phone—>How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support

Then restore that backup—>Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

Apple can’t fix a problem with your phone without actually troubleshooting your phone. Go to Settings/General/iPhone storage and see what is using the most storage. For example, if Other is very large (>10 GB) that can indicate storage corruption. Other is all data on the phone that is not shown in the colored graph categories when you go to Settings/General/iPhone Storage. Other is typically 1-2 GB. If it is larger, to fix this follow these steps:

• Back up your phone to your computer, iCloud or both (for belt-and-suspenders added security)—>How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support
• Restore the backup you have just made—>Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

Here is additional information on Other—>What is "Other" and What Can I Do… - Apple Community

Which is why I posted how to fix it. Which I will repeat here:

Other is typically 1-2 GB. If it is larger, to fix this follow these steps:

• Back up your phone to your computer, iCloud or both (for belt-and-suspenders added security)—>How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support
• Restore the backup you have just made—>Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

Here is additional information on Other—>What is "Other" and What Can I Do… - Apple Community

I had the same issue, until my phone (iPhone 7 32GB Model A1778) suddenly turned off and then got into a loop starting up over and over again.

All of this after updating to ios 13.5.1, "other" went from 2~3GB to 13GB, then last time I was able to check it was 17GB, now I can't turn on my phone as it gets stuck in the loop.

Since I take a lot of care of my phone it is the only thing that comes to my mind.

The last comment of an url is helpless since it's a problem with the update which was made to prevent this problems "Description: A memory consumption issue was addressed with improved memory handling."

Guess is time to get a new phone.

I have a 64GB iphone 8plus and had 10GB of storage free before the 13.5 update. Now I've gotten a warning that I've run out of storage even though my photos/apps/music are the same. I suspect my other size took the space. I wonder if it has to do with the contact tracing. Or they are trying to force people to upgrade.

Post 13.5 Update my iphone 7 32 GB started giving Storage full issues , i have 50 GB icloud space yet i get the same error , "Other" is used upto 23 GB and is increasing ,due to this couldnt use Apps... Is someone from Apple team looking at it this is going to be a serious issues with iphone users.

Hi, I can't comment on the 'Other' storage issue as I have no idea what the fix would be or if Apple is looking into it. However, I wanted to clarify with you the purpose of iCloud. iCloud is not an extension of storage for your phone; iCloud is meant to serve as more of a backup. You can use iCloud to help free up space on your device by choosing to optimize your photo library (https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204264). However, purchasing additional iCloud storage doesn't mean that your phone storage goes from 32GB to 82GB. I hope that makes sense. It's entirely possible to have 50GB of iCloud space, but still be receiving 'low storage' notifications on your device.

Scardino wrote:

Question is, What is “Other” that all the sudden eats lots of space?

That has been answered several times in this thread. But here is a more detailed answer—>What is "Other" and What Can I Do… - Apple Community

Very glad that you were able to free up your device's storage.

In case you feel inclined, never hurts to send feedback directly to Apple to make sure this issue is on their radar

https://www.apple.com/feedback/

There isn’t really a way to pick and choose what’s included in a backup. If you backup using iCloud or iTunes, text messages are included in the backup (iMessage, SMS, MMS). You can read more about what is included in an iCloud backup here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207428, and more about each type of backup here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204136

If you want to be extra sure, you can always take screenshots of the texts and either email them to yourself or transfer the screenshots to your computer.

I’m sorry to hear about your mom!

13.6.1 is to specifically address abnormally large Other (and an unrelated green tinge problem on the screen of some phones). But Other is real data—>What is "Other" and What Can I Do About It? | Apple Support Communities. It’s only when there is storage corruption that Other becomes a problem. The current problem has nothing to do with 2 years ago. And reddit is not the final word on anything, and not a reliable source. For much longer than 2 years occasionally an iPhone would suddenly show a very large Other. In the past this was caused by an interrupted sync. During a sync content to be moved between iOS and iTunes was “staged” in storage (in Other), then in the final step of sync it was moved to the “sandbox” of the applications that owned the data. If the sync was interrupted before that final step the staged data would remain in Other.

The current problem has similar symptoms, but a totally different cause. It appears that it arose in 13.5.1 (or maybe 13.6), based on the fact that there was an order of magnitude increase in the reports of the problem in this forum and other sites. And it only happened to users who were already running out of available storage. A user would delete content, but not recover any storage. And Other would increase by the size of the content deleted. The reasonable assumption is that the space occupied by the deleted content was not being freed. This is the specific problem that 13.6.1 addresses.

If someone has a phone with plenty of storage they probably won’t even notice the size of Other, and they are also unlikely to delete large amounts of content, so even if Other grows larger as stuff is deleted they probably won’t notice unless they are actively looking for it. So that’s why the help article specifically refers to “when available storage is low”. I updated a family member’s iPhone 8 to 13.6.1 The phone was not short of storage, and did not have an especially large Other category, but Other went from 7.2 GB to 5.2 GB after the update. (My phone is not on a version affected by this problem).

The previous way of fixing it also works: Back up the phone, then restore the backup. But that doesn’t prevent it from recurring. I’m hoping that 13.6.1 fixes that also. Early reports are that it fixes the current problem by cleaning up Other. And several users who have access to the level 6 and above forum noted that it reduced their Other storage, but didn’t do it all at once. They could watch it go down over a period of several hours.

I just updated to ios13.6.1 - I was having the exact same issue. In order to update (couldn't even do it on my computer and it's a work phone so to do a reset and restart is a HUGE pain) I had to delete apps and every single picture I had on the phone.

When I looked at the purpose of the update it mentioned this problem. And I found this.... https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211686

My "other" immediately dropped by 10GB while I was watching the screen after I turned it back on. So....if you can manage to get enough stuff off, immediately try the update!!!

Larry is this the bug fix you’re referring to?

iOS 13.6.1 includes bug fixes for your iPhone.

• Addresses an issue where unneeded system data files might not be automatically deleted when available storage is low

Because this appears to only address when storage is low. That is clearly not the crux of the problem. If you’re referring to something else please share.

This problem has existed for at least two years.

https://www.reddit.com/r/iOSBeta/comments/8piu8l/bug_other_storage_has_progressively_gotten_out_of/

Hi , Thanks for your comments , not sure what was the problem other was using 23 GB of phone storage and systems and data was using around 5 GB , I managed to fix this issue by doing a factory reset good that I had a backup on iCloud so now I am good with the phone storage. But all this happened only after 13.5.1 update.

Same issue. I tried to discuss this with Apple's message support, the person didn't introduce themselves, and suggested things I had already tried such as restoring from a backup or offloading apps (which is not the problem, my "other" storage is gobbling up 7GB out of 16 GB, ridiculous). Then they went on suggesting that engineers are working on this diligently, when I asked about whether there is an update coming like 13.5.2, they suggested iOS 14, for my iPhone 6S. I recommend staying away from message support of Apple, it's a total waste of time, they don't even introduce themselves.

And this issue is real, the other storage has always been high and I have always needed to be conscientious about my storage usage, but after 13.5.1 it is abysmal.