“iPhone storage almost full” bug

Yes for me that is the same now too after the first reset which solved it. That turned out to be temporary.. Just reset my XR again and updated to 15.2.1 hoping that this is solved in this release 🤞 We’ll see in a week or two.

Judging by the comments it seems to be an problem mostly happening on the XR 🙁

Same problem with the XR. Latest IOS update.

But the problem seems to occur when I plug in the phone to charge. When looking at the Storage, the "System Data" fills up the storage. When so, I cannot open any apps (as there is no storage left free). Rebooting the phone sometimes helps.

For example, I had to re-plug the phone several times before I do a backup.

Can anyone else verify if the issue occurs when plugging in the phone?

My XR experience is gradual increase in memory usage. Starts with 24 GB when I do a factory reset and then steadily increases to 32 GB over a 4 week period. And then more, the rate increases further.

Sometimes the camera application malfunctions suddenly and the usage increases to 50 GB. I had to switch off and on... The usage comes down to the steady state level.

Having the same issues. Have a iPhone 11 and I deleted all my app. Basically making the phone completely useless. Or I guess now it’s just a phone. Only call people or text but otherwise, there are zero apps other than factory. And it still says 63.5GB full with 85% being filled by apps. Going to do a factory reset now and see what happens.

Maybe it really is full - it should have been finally fixed for all models in iOS15.4

Settings, General, iPhone storage - Do some adding up of the numbers of GBs.

Make sure you empty the recently Deleted all in one go from those settings.

It is not fixed. I am on 15.4 and both problems (memory leak and sporadic misreported storage use) are still occurring.

Given that this has been going on since I upgraded to iOS 15 in September, I finally was forced to fix the problem myself, the only way Apple allows me—buying another phone.

Needless to say given this experience, not one made by Apple.

Guys it’s comical to watch folks do complete phone resets and restores only to find the bug comes back. It is obvious by now this bug is made by Apple and is a ploy to get you to buy more storage than you actually need hence increasing their profit.

Hi all, for me it now seems solved.

I don't think anything in particular was changed in 15.4 that fixed it. I read somewhere that sometimes when iPhone has low storage, and you update from the iPhone itself, it can leave files (stored/corrupt) which iOS doesn't pick up on. A suggestion was to update the iPhone from a MacBook, which I tried.

It's been more than a week now and so far I haven't seen any apps being uninstalled (which was always the first sign of the issue for me) or any messages that my storage is full.

For the ones having this issue reappearing after several factory resets and reinstalls etc., maybe this works too? So when the next update is out, do not install from your iPhone but from your MacBook through cable.

(And let's hope the issue doesn't reappear again in a few days time...)

Some of us don’t have MacBooks. I have over 30gbs of unused storage and still the notification remains. Apple techs can’t do anything about it and this is a brand new pro plus phone 🤷🏼‍♀️. I’ve done everything listed in the comments and from support itself

After many months of having this frustrating bug, I tried your method - except on a Windows 10 PC, i.e., restoring my fully updated (v14.4.1) iPad from a backup on iTunes.

The bug showed up for a little while after the restore, but half a day after the restore, the bug has disappeared (I guess the restore does some indexing and clean-up on the device in the hours after the restore). All has been fine for a week now.

I thought I had resolved this but after three months it has returned. Initially iOS updates seemed to temporarily fix the problem and I have been running 15.4.1 on iPhone XR without issue...then this morning the 'iPhone storage almost full' appeared again.

I postulated a few months ago that this could be linked to WhatsApp, and when I checked there was a WhatsApp update yesterday.

Is there anyone who has this bug and does NOT use WhatsApp?

I have now tried to sync my iPhone XR. It has locked on the Apple logo and none of the usual Volume Up / Down reset tricks seem to work. I am now locked out of my car. Does anyone from Apple ever read this?

Thank you for the WhatsApp feedback.

In the end my iPhone XR required Recovery mode to get it back. This results in considerable work rebuilding all the Apps, passwords, settings, music etc despite having a backup.

The bug has yet to return…

Apple Team are not here. just volunteers, users like you.

If you think its a bug then report it here

https://apple.com/feedback

I own an Iphone XR, the problem started when i updated to IOS 15.3.1.

i have actual used 39GB out of 64GB but still the notification prevents me from using the space i have!