Deleting old time machine backups

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Level 1

4 points

Deleting old time machine backups

I can only see about 2 weeks of backups in time machine, but I can look at backups back to 2017 in finder. I'd like to delete older backups for space. 1) is there a way to just tell time machine to delete older backups as needed to make more space? 2) I can't delete from finder because files are locked, and there are too many files in each backup to find them and unlock. "unlock all" seems to only work within a folder.

iMac 27″, macOS 10.13

Posted on Nov 28, 2023 5:46 AM

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Answer 1

Owl-53

Level 10

104,767 points

Nov 28, 2023 6:57 AM in response to MikeCable

Get a New External Drive with at Least 2 1/2 times greater Capacity than your Internal Drive.

Remove the Existing Drive from Time Machine >> Open TM preference pane then select disc then highlight the drive and then pick "remove disk" (lower right)

Put aside the existing drive for Safe Keeping or re-purposing, at a later time

Add the New Drive as the TM Backup drive hence forth

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Answer 2

dialabrain

Level 10

136,517 points

Nov 28, 2023 6:03 AM in response to MikeCable

You should never manually delete Time Machine backups.

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