Disk Utility Has No Space but Storage does?

Files in iCloud may also take up space. You can review your iCloud settings in System Settings. If you turn on the "Optimize" flag, then it will be more aggressive about deleting local copies. If necessary, you can right click or control click on an iCloud-managed file in the Finder and choose "Remove download" to delete the local copy, keeping the iCloud stub.

Otherwise, you really aren't in control of file deletion. The best you can do is request a file to be deleted. After a day or so, the local snapshots that hold a backup of the file will eventually be deleted and the storage for that file will be made truly "free".

However, once you truly hit rock bottom and run out of storage, which it appears you have done, it is extremely difficult to recover. The system will continually block operations due to lack of free storage, all the while telling you that you have plenty available. Eventually, some will return and you'll forget about it until next time. But every time, it gets worse and worse. Most people never notice it until a system update fails.

I'm really not kidding about making 300 GB available. It's your choice if you want to make this a weekly frustration or a yearly one. Just be careful about downloading any "clean up" or "app zapper" tools from the internet. Those can have truly catastrophic results. Never delete a file that you didn't create - on purpose. If you find some massive file inside a "Library" folder, stop right there. Come back here and ask about it.

Choncey wrote:

Thanks for not answering my question at all. I asked how to get the utility disk space down.

@etresoft did answer......."Wait a day or so. The system deletion commands will eventually run and free up that 60 GB, at least briefly."

Keep in mind the value of Free space as listed in Disk Utility is the only value you should be concerned with regarding storage space. The Available value is very misleading and I wish Apple would do away with it since most users don't understand what Apple means by Available. Available consists of Purgeable items and Free space (the latter is already available for immediate use). You can see this in Disk Utility where it mentions Available with Purgeable in parentheses. The Purgeable value is what will actually be released at some unknown time in the future and will become Free space. The difference between Purgeable and Available is the current Free space of which you currently only have 18.6GB.

Deleting files from an APFS volume is complicated. Even though you may delete a lot of data, that data is most likely still being retained in hidden APFS snapshots usually related to Time Machine or a third party backup app. Until those APFS snapshots have been transferred to external media, that "deleted" data will remain hidden on your drive. Even after the snapshot has been transferred, the snapshot still remain for a while longer depending on the app which created the snapshot. There are other things with an APFS volume which can also leave behind large amounts of data, but since you have 434GB Available (415GB Purgeable), they are unlikely to be involved here.

FYI, running with only 20GB of Free space is the absolute bare minimum for light workloads and you have just 18.61 GB Free. For larger workloads like videos, you should have a lot more Free space available.....obviously at least another 40GB+ at the bare minimum.

You definitely don't seem to have a large enough internal drive for the type of work you are doing on this Mac. In that case you should change how you store your large files. After finishing up work on a large video project, then you should move that project to external media....just make sure that you are also backing up that external media so you don't lose any data. Depending on how many concurrent video projects you work on at one time, you definitely need to keep at least 100GB of Free space available at all times (perhaps even more).

FYI, if you completely run out of Free storage space on an APFS volume, then it can cause major problems for the user especially if that APFS volume is the macOS boot drive. When an APFS volume runs out of Free space, it may be impossible to delete any files to free up space due to how the APFS file system works...the APFS file system needs to be able to write & store updated information about the pending file deletion before the data is deleted (or marked for deletion since it may still be retained in an APFS snapshot). If it cannot do so, then it will be impossible to fix the problem without completely erasing the drive and starting over by performing a clean install of macOS & restoring from a backup. There is a slim chance of possibly deleting a hidden APFS snapshot to free up space, but that may affect your backups especially if they are still pending.

Choncey wrote:

No problem, I thought, I'll delete things to make space.

Ha!

I still apparently lack the 31 GB space on my computer to save the video file.

apparently

I've deleted everything possible from my computer, we're talking well-over 60GB now over a six-hour period.

Before going any further, I should point out that 60 GB is a drop in the bucket. That is the absolute bare minimum here. You aren't making space available (even if you were). You're just moving the needle a little above "critical".

I can't do anything on this computer. It won't let me save the video file.

That's because your hard drive is full.

What am I supposed to do to get that down?

Wait a day or so. The system deletion commands will eventually run and free up that 60 GB, at least briefly. It sounds like you've been running on fumes for some time. The operating system itself might soak up most of that 60 GB before you get a chance to use it. That's a 1 TB hard drive. Make at least 300 GB free and then we'll talk.

Choncey wrote:

Thanks for not answering my question at all. I asked how to get the utility disk space down.

I specifically answered your question. I said "Wait a day or so".

You should carefully review what I said afterwards too. Once the system "deleted" task runs, the disk utility space will go down, maybe, in a Schrödinger's cat kind of way. By that I mean that you won't know until you look at it. But the longer you wait, the less chance that you will be able to observe any change in disk utility space. The system will almost immediately being using that 30 GB that you've freed up. You've let it go too long. You have to get ahead of it. Fee up another 270 GB and you'll be good.