Purgeable Space on External HDD

On my External HDD it's showing 17.5 GB of Purgeable and I have searched the whole Internet but I only find it related to Internal Hard Drive.

I have even saw some Apps but everyone talks about Internal Hard Drive.

Can somebody help on how to clear away this Purgeable Space.

MacBook Pro (M1, 2020)

Posted on Oct 6, 2023 1:52 PM

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5 replies

Oct 6, 2023 2:15 PM in response to ParthPrintingMoney

ParthPrintingMoney wrote:

On my External HDD it's showing 17.5 GB of Purgeable and I have searched the whole Internet but I only find it related to Internal Hard Drive.
I have even saw some Apps but everyone talks about Internal Hard Drive.
https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/96ac15a8-eb3a-4e90-98d8-3f30b139d739
Can somebody help on how to clear away this Purgeable Space.


Typically purgeable space is remove in due time /or as needed for an operation...


17.58 GB out of your ~2000GB is next to nothing hardly....Garbage collection is typically handled by the drive/enclosure software.



SSD function most efficiently if you always leave 20% free storage.



Oct 6, 2023 6:17 PM in response to ParthPrintingMoney

Yeah I agree that it's not even 1% but I was wondering whether would it still show on Windows or not & if yes then can I delete it from there?

It isn't some set aside storage. It entirely could be your files which can be easily replaced from the cloud or application installers that can be re-downloaded. Purgeable doesn't mean unused and unnecessary. It means the data can be purged because it can be recreated if needed. Local Time Machine snapshots are a good example of purgeable space. They are useful, but not necessary.

Purgeable Space on External HDD

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