Deleting file inflating system data on macOS Venture?

File system Snapshots. The snapshot shares the srorage of every file.

Deliting the file, just means the snapshot (or snapshots) inherit all the storage, until deleted file’s storage.

Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal

Time Machine snapshots

tmutil listlocalsnapshots /

Snapshots for volume group containing disk /:

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-142742.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-163342.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-174425.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-192243.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-203820.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-222814.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-01-232930.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-02-002823.local

com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-04-02-012748.local

tmutil deletelocalsnapshots 2021-04-01-142742 # deletes 1 snapshot

tmutil deletelocalsnapshots / # deletes all the snapshots

Also see:

diskutil apfs listSnapshots /

Did you remember to "empty the Trash" after deleting these files?

"System" data is controlled by macOS. The largest contributor to its size are Time Machine local snapshots, which in theory, trim themselves over time.

Ref:

• Free up storage space on your Mac - Apple Support
• View APFS snapshots in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support
• What is "Other" storage on a Mac, and how can I clean it out? - ASC
• Still struggling with snapshots - The Eclectic Light Company

Just to add to what has already been rightly suggested

If is are additional user accounts on the computer ?

Those accounts would contribute to this issue

If there were another user account and it was Deleted but the Home Folder was left behind

That too could be contributing factor to this issue

Delete a user or group on Mac

OH3rd wrote:

I have been trying to clear up drive space and it seems the more I delete the LESS available space I have

Yes. That's normal.

In modern versions of macOS, you can't actually delete any files. All you can do is flag them for deletion. The operating system will save them in a local snapshot. Then, the "deleted" system daemon runs within a day or so and deletes any expired local snapshots. Any delete files that were held by that snapshot are then deleted.

the system data is an ABSURD 590+GB!!

That is a different, but related problem. Usually people only notice either problem when they have already run critically low on free storage. Note that I said "free" storage. In most cases, the operating system will only tell you about "available" storage. If you want to learn about "available" storage, I recommend the "fiction" section of your local bookstore or library.

What you'll have to do is figure out why you have so much data usage. If you haven't detected a trend yet, I'll give you another hint. This is most definitely not related to "system data" in any way. That's just Apple's word for "other data" that it can't categorize as images, document, videos, etc.

Some of this "system data" may be local snapshots. But it could also be created from many different 3rd party apps and system modifications. Sometimes Apple background tasks create it too. If you had been wondering, "what does AI mean to me", know you know. It means you're out of disk space. 😄

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