Ios 7

The deleted mail is still there on the phone. If you do a "spotlight" search, I can pull up old deleted mail messages.

Not good. That confirms that this keeps building up and up and taking up space. I cannot find a way to permanently delete mail and imessages off the phone. They stay on the phone even if deleted--meaning they are only deleted from view but still searchable in "spotlight." ***

The only way to delete the hidden (saved) texts is to download a program like ibackupbot and delete the texts from there. The free trial worked for me and it was really easy. Read my earlier post.

I have gone online and read mixed reviews on the ibackupbot. I'm open to additional solutions.

I'm having the same issue. I was promted (forced) to updated to ios7 and have had alot of trouble with it. According to the usage report in my settings, my Messages take up 4.4GB. After deleting all my messages over a month old, my phone has now dropped to 4.3 GB. I called Applecare and didn't get much help there. They refered me here. I think it's a bug yet to be worked out...

Besides ibackupbot, are there any other ways to permanately delete messages form the phone?

It's not just messages. It's mail too if you use that. Deleted mail only removes it from view. mail is still there saved taking up storage space. Evidence of this is that you can "spotlight" old deleted messages. Not cool. It appears ibot can delete messages but can it also delete mail?

I have this issue, 3.2GB shows under usage->messages.

I have ticket with Apple since its 5s and under warranty.

Getting a call back this Friday I was told. Hopefully will release something to fix this and get back

my free space!

Usage ->Messages stuck in my new iphone 5s. n

Yes there is. Restore the phone and set up as new, not from a backup. Of course that deletes all of your data, and you have to sync content back. You cannot restore from a backup as the backup contains the cache data.

That's a "workaround" though...-What's the point of backup/restore if it does not work?

Thanks, but Il wait for a "solution" (or until I run out of space) .

K

You can call it a workaround, however I thought there was supposed to be a way to clear the hidden cache in iOS7. Restoring as new was the old solution, since the cache existed in the backup.

delete

I just used iBackupBot to clear out 1.8G out of my wife's SMS file (aka saved messages). Not so sure why everyone is hesitant to use it. I did a lot of research and this seems to be the only fix.

Just create a new backup, edit the backup using ibackupbot (delete the SMS attachements as in the picture), restore from that backup.... and you have your space back! Be sure to use the trial version for free.

Wow, That worked! Thanks Dromero101.!

Before 3.2 GB

After 1.9MB

Thanks Dromero101! That worked for me as well. I had 4.5 GB stuck in those saved messages, and now none!

I used iBackupBot as well! I was up at 1.4 GB of "Saved" Message data, and this got me down to 6 MB!!!!

Just to clarify:

-I edited the latest iPhone backup to my computer

-Navigate to "System Files > MediaDomain > Library > SMS" and delete all the files in those folders

-Restore the *edited* backup to your phone

-WOOHOO!

Thanks guys, I feel like I have a new phone. 🙂

I tried these steps but got stuck on the restoration. I got an error 36. Apparently you need free space on the phone greater than the size of the restore. Did you guys have enough space for the restore?