Deletion/erasure of mail messages doesn't fee up storage space

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Level 1

4 points

Deletion/erasure of mail messages doesn't fee up storage space

Despite deleting thousands of emails and attachments, I can't reduce the amount of storage that Mail takes up on my hard drive. After deleting messages, I make sure to "erase deleted messages in all accounts." The number displayed in the Storage window of "About this Mac" never alters, no matter how many messages and mailboxes I delete. I have tried rebooting in safe mode but the problem persists.

I am using a MacBook Pro 13-inch, 2017, Mail version 14.0

I was hoping that installing Monterrey might resolve the issue but I don't have enough free disk space to do that.

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 11.6

Posted on Nov 2, 2021 6:43 AM

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Answer 1

Lori_G7

Community Specialist

Nov 3, 2021 7:42 AM in response to LizzieHexxam

Hi LizzieHexxam,

Thank you for reaching out to Apple Support Communities.

From your post, we see that you’re having an issue with completely deleting emails to free up storage space on your Mac. We want to help. To make sure that we are covering everything, here's how to Delete emails in Mail on Mac - Apple Support. You can pay particular attention to the "Permanently delete emails" section.

Also, here's how to Free up storage space on your Mac - Apple Support

Best Regards!

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Answer 2

LizzieHexxam Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 3, 2021 7:36 PM in response to Lori_G7

Thanks for the response but I had already tried the measures you recommend.

I eventually had an extended chat session with a support team member who was unable to come up with a solution, but an extended phone call with a second support person helped export mailboxes, and delete messages. It only slightly reduced the number of gigabytes the Mail program was occupying but at least was a sign of progress.

Unfortunately, after deleting most of the emails and mailboxes and removing attachments from the remaining messages, the application is still hogging 174 gigabytes of space on my system. I'm unable to upgrade to Monterrey. So I did not achieve the result I was seeking.

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Deletion/erasure of mail messages doesn't fee up storage space

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