How to identify the Other items in Mac storage

Hi,

I'm on an old iMac using Catalina 10.15.7

I'm needing to free up some space in order to do my next backup and noticed there was 260+GB in the Other folder (see pic below)

I've googled this and gotten an idea of what sort of file types these are so that's a start... but have encountered quite a bit of misinformation...or maybe it just doesn't apply to how a Mac with 10.15.7 stores data? One website (macpaw dot com) said to:

" 1. Open Finder > Go > Go to Folder in the top menu.

2.Now paste this path: ~/Library/Caches

See those small folders? This is where your Other storage is."

Well, I did that, but using Get Info on that Caches folder it contains only 2.71GB of data, so it can't all be in Caches. It must be elsewhere.

But where?

Thanks

Gordon

iMac 27″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Sep 7, 2024 6:57 AM

Top-ranking reply

D.I. Johnson

Level 8

35,489 points

Posted on Sep 7, 2024 8:07 AM

You can’t directly manage the contents of this category. That is done by macOS. The category varies in size depending on the current state of your Mac.

What you can do...

• Empty the Trash in the Dock.

• Empty the trash in the Photos app.

• Delete unused and unneeded installers from your downloads folder and desktop.

Reboot your Mac at least weekly.
Transfer files that you don’t use daily to an external drive and then delete them from the startup drive and empty the trash. Files that take up the most room are movies, images and music.
Force Time Machine to delete local snapshots:
About Time Machine local snapshots - Apple Support
Use Disk Utility to delete APFS snapshots:View APFS snapshots in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support

This from Apple on the subject of storage management:

Free up storage space on your Mac - Apple Support

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How to identify the Other items in Mac storage

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