My Mac has recently alerted me to a lack of space for any sort of downloads. I have less than 1 GB of storage left. I checked the storage, and almost 200 GB is being used by “System Data”. I read on other articles that you can access this by going to Disk Utility and then deleting APFS snapshots. When I try to do that, the delete option is greyed out and I am unable to click on it… what on earth do I do???
The final word from Apple on Managing the " System Data “ Category
System Data: Contains files that don’t fall into the categories listed here. This category primarily includes files and data used by the system, such as log files, caches, VM files, and other runtime system resources. Also included are temporary files, fonts, app support files, and plug-ins.
You can't manage the contents of this category. The contents are managed by macOS, and the category varies in size depending on the current state of your Mac.
There are areas of the Operating System which we users have control over and >> User Account Folder ( Home Folder )
All other areas are not accessible
It is generally a good computer practice to alway keep at least 20% to 25% of the Total Drive Capacity’s as Empty Space. Allowing the computer to drop below these guidelines may eventually cause unintended consequences including the current issue.
Not to scare anyone but if this issue in not dealt with soon, it is possible the computer will cease to function or worst case, cease to even boot up at all.
There is Purgeable Space and there is Empty Space.
Purgeable Space which is Controlled by the Operating System. When the Operating Systems decides the computer needs additional Empty Space, it will move a portion of the Purgeable to Empty space
AFAIK - there is no User Actions to hasten this transition from Purgeable to Empty Space
It can day or longer before this will occur.
The links below will assist in identifying what is taking up space on the Internal Drive and provide possible ways to remove data that is under the direct control of the User ( Home Folder ) .
Rebuild the Spotlight index on your Mac
What is “Other” storage on a Mac, and how can I clean it out?
Free up storage space on your Mac
How to delete Time Machine snapshots on your Mac.
Often caused if the Time Machine Drive has not been attached to the computer and TM Backup is set to run on a Schedule.
TM Backup will make Snap Shot on the Internal Drive awaiting the TM Backup Drive to be attached.
Only then will the Snaps Shots be transferred to the External Drive and deleted the Snapshot from Internal Drive..
View APFS snapshots in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support (CA)
See used and available storage space on your Mac
Locate backups of your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch
If there a Suite of Adobe Applications used on this computer ?
They may create some very large cache files that can be removed. Though, the Adobe cache files will be recreated as the Applications needs them.
https://helpx.adobe.com/ca/premiere-pro/kb/clear-cache.html
The same clearing of System Cache files can be achieved by booting into Safe Mode
They will be recreated as the System Requires
The final word from Apple on Managing the " System Data “ Category
System Data: Contains files that don’t fall into the categories listed here. This category primarily includes files and data used by the system, such as log files, caches, VM files, and other runtime system resources. Also included are temporary files, fonts, app support files, and plug-ins.
You can't manage the contents of this category. The contents are managed by macOS, and the category varies in size depending on the current state of your Mac.
There are areas of the Operating System which we users have control over and >> User Account Folder ( Home Folder )
All other areas are not accessible
It is generally a good computer practice to alway keep at least 20% to 25% of the Total Drive Capacity’s as Empty Space. Allowing the computer to drop below these guidelines may eventually cause unintended consequences including the current issue.
Not to scare anyone but if this issue in not dealt with soon, it is possible the computer will cease to function or worst case, cease to even boot up at all.
There is Purgeable Space and there is Empty Space.
Purgeable Space which is Controlled by the Operating System. When the Operating Systems decides the computer needs additional Empty Space, it will move a portion of the Purgeable to Empty space
AFAIK - there is no User Actions to hasten this transition from Purgeable to Empty Space
It can day or longer before this will occur.
The links below will assist in identifying what is taking up space on the Internal Drive and provide possible ways to remove data that is under the direct control of the User ( Home Folder ) .
Rebuild the Spotlight index on your Mac
What is “Other” storage on a Mac, and how can I clean it out?
Free up storage space on your Mac
How to delete Time Machine snapshots on your Mac.
Often caused if the Time Machine Drive has not been attached to the computer and TM Backup is set to run on a Schedule.
TM Backup will make Snap Shot on the Internal Drive awaiting the TM Backup Drive to be attached.
Only then will the Snaps Shots be transferred to the External Drive and deleted the Snapshot from Internal Drive..
View APFS snapshots in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support (CA)
See used and available storage space on your Mac
Locate backups of your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch
If there a Suite of Adobe Applications used on this computer ?
They may create some very large cache files that can be removed. Though, the Adobe cache files will be recreated as the Applications needs them.
https://helpx.adobe.com/ca/premiere-pro/kb/clear-cache.html
The same clearing of System Cache files can be achieved by booting into Safe Mode
They will be recreated as the System Requires
Managing APFS snapshots might be easier through the terminal:
tmutil listlocalsnapshots /
If you find any snapshots, use the following command to delete them, replacing date-of-snapshot with the date of the snapshot you want to delete:
sudo tmutil deletelocalsnapshots date-of-snapshot
Try using OnyX and DaisyDisk as well for clearing out system clutter.
I recommend conducting a check and repair of the system disk and its containers in Disk Utility before deleting snapshots.
Is it a Time Machine backup snapshot or a snapshot from some other backup app? macOS will sometimes have a system snapshot as well....it may not be possible to delete a system snapshot.
If you have any web browsers open, then make sure to use the browsers' menus & settings to clear the browser cache & perhaps data to help free up some more space. Perhaps having only 1GB of Free space is preventing you from being able to delete a snapshot. When the system runs out of storage space, bad & weird things tend to occur.....sometimes it may not be possible to delete anything.
You may want to try booting into Recovery Mode to see if you can delete the APFS snapshot (assuming it is a backup snapshot....don't delete a system snapshot since they are only about 11GB anyway).
Before you do anything else, make sure to have a good backup of your data since you may end up with a frozen computer and being unable to boot the computer again due to running out of Free storage space.
How have you tired deleting the Time Machine local snapshots?
If you haven't use Disk Utility try using it like this:
Unable to delete APFS Screenshots
