System Data taking up 1 TB on my iPhone and not freeing up space

Question

System Data taking up 1 TB on my iPhone and not freeing up space

What explains system data taking up so much space?

Currently my System Data is 1.02 TB (and increasing by the day). I definitely used about 1 TB before I noticed this problem. But no more.

Currently by Available space is 30.82 GB (and shrinking by the day). There must be a better solution than restoring the device. Especially a large device (my primary phone) that takes significant time to restore fully.

I’ve read that the system will remove it when I need it, but that is not happening for me. For example, I have a 2TB iPhone, and when trying to use Final Cut Camera, it says my device is full. Meaning the system is not freeing up the space for me. Screenshots included.

Thanks

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: iPhone System Data

iPhone 17 Pro Max

Posted on Dec 7, 2025 7:26 PM

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Answer 1

LD150

Level 10

100,503 points

Dec 29, 2025 4:18 AM in response to AmplifiedLife

First you need to clear that down and there is only one way...

The process of backing up, erasing and setting up again will reduce it to nearer 10GB

Resources…

Back Up: How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support

Erase & Restore: Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

Then you need to find out what app is causing this, games, free utilities, and socials are favourite suspects. Uninstall everything you don't use every day.

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Answer 2

LD150

Level 10

100,503 points

Dec 31, 2025 5:02 PM in response to internet626

internet626 wrote:

I am having the exact same issue. For me it started when I updated to iOS 26.1.

I wish there were a way to escalate this to Apple engineering somehow because it makes my phone nearly unusable, and I have to restore every few weeks to be able to use my phone again.

Then you need to find out what app is causing this, games, free utilities, and socials are favourite suspects. Uninstall everything you don't use every day. Apple vet apps for illegal functionality but not stupidity or inefficiency with storage

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Answer 3

Dec 7, 2025 8:54 PM in response to AmplifiedLife

I would ignore that because this system data will make room when you need more space on your iPhone. These are some cache and temporary files that will be erased by the system whenever you try to save more files.

System data on your iPhone has grown to nearly 1TB out of the 2TB total storage. A simple restart usually clears out temporary system files and brings that number back down.

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Answer 4

Dec 8, 2025 10:39 PM in response to SravanKrA

Thank you sir. But I have restarted and rebooted many times. I cleared safari cache, deleted apps, and removed video files. System Data is now 1.1 TB.

I make space and the iPhone uses more system data. I dont make space and the iPhone warns me it’s full.

Thank you

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Answer 5

Dec 31, 2025 3:09 PM in response to AmplifiedLife

I am having the exact same issue. For me it started when I updated to iOS 26.1.

I wish there were a way to escalate this to Apple engineering somehow because it makes my phone nearly unusable, and I have to restore every few weeks to be able to use my phone again.

Reply

Answer 6

Dec 29, 2025 3:43 AM in response to AmplifiedLife

Happening again...

I restored from backup, via my Mac, which brought the System Data down to 40GB. Unfortunately it started increasing by ~10GB per day immediately after.

System Data is currently up to 700 GB and climbing. My 2TB is now 1.6 TB full and 700 GB of it is System Data.

Any chance it’s hardware related? Is it worth a trip to Apple Store? Support?

Anybody able to point me to an explanation for this? I’ll even take a hypothesis.

On my device, it does not automatically make room, and restarts don’t help. So I have to deal with it or find a solution.

Thanks

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