iPad Mini - storage amount completely wrong?? 10GB missing??? HELP!!!

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Level 1

3 points

iPad Mini - storage amount completely wrong?? 10GB missing??? HELP!!!

My 16GB wi-fi iPad Mini (Jan 2014) running iOS 7.0.4 is currently saying that I've "used" 12.4GB of my available storage & only have 496MB left available, which doesn't make sense because I have nowhere near 12.4GB's worth of data & apps installed on the iPad........ Ok now, I'm not completely clueless! I am fully aware that the total available storage on an iPad Mini is in reality a good 3-4GB less than the device's actual overall stated capacity (16GB in this case)due to the size of the OS itself & any pre installed software, so I'm not naively expecting to be able to install a full 16GBs worth of apps & data. I do, however, expect to be able to download & install more than 3GB worth before the "your device is almost full" pop-up appears, which brings me to the heart of the problem here......

When I manually add up the size of each of my installed apps (including the size of any stored 'documents & data') as per the size listed next to each app in the "Usage" section of "Settings", I get a total of just 2.55GB; a big difference compared to the 12.4GB that the device is saying I've used..... WHY???

OTHER RELEVANT INFORMATION

* Included in my calculation of the 2.55GB of storage that I've actually used is:

- all installed music

- all installed/shared photos & movies from the Photos app

- all installed iBook media

- apps that report having "no data"

- the listed data as used in each of the Messages, Calendars, Mail, Sounds, Safari & Contacts apps

- the specified total data usage for each app - including both it's size & 'documents & data' value

* the "Other" category that is usually listed in the 'Usage' section is not currently showing up on my iPad Mini. "Other" is not there.

* I have 34 apps listed in the "Usage" section of my device - including all pre installed apps & those which report having 'no data'.

* the following is a breakdown of the 34 apps on my device & their size (including both the app's size & that of any "documents & data") as listed under "Usage":

- Music 1024MB (1GB)

- Kindle 227MB

- Photos & Camera 151MB

- Facebook 128MB

- Evernote 94.1MB

- Notability 97.1MB

- Grafio 88.9MB

- iBooks 77.9MB

- Procreate 72.6MB

- Goodreader 71.4MB

- EBay 67.4MB

- Chrome 53.0MB

- Udemy 44.2MB

- Dropbox 38.0MB

- Sketch Book 37.7MB

- IM+ Pro 7 33.4MB

- Pocket 33.0MB

- Instapaper 31.7MB

- iDraw 26.3MB

- Weather Au 25.1MB

- Zite 22.5MB

- Flipboard 21.5MB

- Lynda.com 20.0MB

- Mail 17.0MB

- Prismatic 16.0MB

- Calculator 13.9MB

- Readability 12.4MB

- Messages 10.4MB

- MxTube 9.6MB

- Contacts 3.5MB

- Safari 3.4MB

- Calendars 1.5MB

- Sounds No Data

- Videos No Data

TOTAL = 2549.5MB or 2.49GB

**** Why does the manually added size of all my installed apps & data equal just 2549.5MB when the device itself states that 12.4GB of storage is already in use???......

**** Of the approximate 12GB of storage that should realistically be available for me to use, why is it that 9.5GB of it appears to be missing / unavailable to me???? That is 75% of my storage space that's seemingly vanished from my iPad Mini.

**** Why, when I download say a 10MB app, does 200-300MB vanish from my 'available' storage amount instead of just the 10MB of app??? Why when I delete an app over 200MB in size does only 5-10MB of space free up & not the full 200MB from the app????

WHAT'S GOING ON???......... HELP!!!!!!

iPad, iOS 7.0.4, iPad Mini 16GB Wifi

Posted on Apr 2, 2014 5:30 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 10, 2017 1:23 AM in response to Arazzon

The movies App seems to handle its cache very badly. In my case, storage was showing Media occupying 50% of my storage although I didn’t have any movie nor photos nor anything. I deleted the movies app and all went to normal.

I am am using iOS 11 so this bug is still there and affecting very badly a lot of users. Apple should take care of it ASAP.

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Answer 2

Apr 2, 2014 5:48 AM in response to Arazzon

How much space is used by your Other? You may be able to reduce.

How Do I Get Rid Of The “Other” Data Stored On My iPad Or iPhone?

http://tinyurl.com/85w6xwn

How to Remove “Other” Data from iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch

http://www.igeeksblog.com/how-to-remove-other-data-from-iphone/

With an iOS device, the “Other” space in iTunes is used to store things like documents, settings, caches, and a few other important items. If you sync lots of documents to apps like GoodReader, DropCopy, or anything else that reads external files, your storage use can skyrocket. With iOS 5/6/7, you can see exactly which applications are taking up the most space. Just head to Settings > General > Usage, and tap the button labeled Show All Apps. The storage section will show you the app and how much storage space it is taking up. Tap on the app name to get a description of the additional storage space being used by the app’s documents and data. You can remove the storage-hogging application and all of its data directly from this screen, or manually remove the data by opening the app. Some applications, especially those designed by Apple, will allow you to remove stored data by swiping from left to right on the item to reveal a Delete button.

What is “Other” and What Can I Do About It?

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-5142

iPhone or iPad Ran Out of Storage Space? Here’s How to Make Space Available Quickly

http://osxdaily.com/2012/06/02/iphone-ipad-ran-out-of-available-storage-space-ho w-to-fix-quick/

6 Tips to Free Up Tons of Storage Space on iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch

http://osxdaily.com/2012/04/24/6-tips-free-up-storage-space-ipad-iphone-ipod-tou ch/

Also,

How to Clear Message/iMessage Cache on iPhone & iPad And Reclaim Lots of Free Space

http://www.igeeksblog.com/how-to-clear-message-imessage-cache-on-iphone-ipad/

 Cheers, Tom 😉

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Answer 3

Arazzon Author

Level 1

3 points

Apr 3, 2014 8:11 PM in response to Texas Mac Man

Hi

Thanks for you're reply.

The strange thing is, there 'was' no "other" anywhere listed under "General" --> "Usage" -->'All other apps'.... There is no amount of 'other', which must must also be wrong.

After I downloaded a 13.5MB Calculater app, which then immediately reduced my 'available' space from 496MB to just over 200MB (before I even opened it off the first time), I restored my iPad to factory settings & set it up again as a 'new ipad' & redownloaded everything. I'd ended up deleting so many apps to try & free up space & all it ever seemed to do was increase the amount of space I'd used up, instead of decreasing it.

Not sure what the deal was with it, seeing I wasn't using iCloud or syncing any on it, so that kinda thing wasn't responsible for the problem.

At least for now, the restore has fixed the problem & the combined storage of my apps is approximately equal to the 'used space' as listed under "Usage".

I suggest anyone else with this problem restore their iPad/iPhone. Although you can do a back up first & restore from that if you like, you don't have to completely restore it to factory setting & lose everything like I chose to do.

Cheers!

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Answer 4

Jul 10, 2014 1:41 AM in response to Arazzon

This is EXACTLY the problem I have and I am completely befuddled no one has a simple solution for this. Anyone out there?

i Will reset but hoping for some clarification on this issue.

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Answer 5

Diavonex

Level 9

67,217 points

Jul 10, 2014 1:59 AM in response to Arazzon

What is "Other"

1. Cache for apps, browser, mail, Messages, Reading List

2. Saved games

3. Documents and data

4. Notes

5. Voice Memos

You can backup and restore to reduce "other" but they will start building up over time.

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Answer 6

Jul 10, 2014 10:52 AM in response to Diavonex

Thanks Diavonex! Unfortunately, like the OP there is no "Other" available. Perhaps I'm not seeing it, but I added up all my apps and it amounts to about 2 gb and it is saying I'm using up about 12 gb.

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Answer 7

Jul 10, 2014 11:51 AM in response to Damon Collazo

Damon Collazo wrote:

Thanks Diavonex! Unfortunately, like the OP there is no "Other" available. Perhaps I'm not seeing it, but I added up all my apps and it amounts to about 2 gb and it is saying I'm using up about 12 gb.

You have to connect the iPad to your computer to view the Other.

iPhone, iPad, and iPod: Understanding capacity

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1867

 Cheers, Tom 😉

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Answer 8

SergZak

Level 6

10,326 points

Jul 10, 2014 12:18 PM in response to Texas Mac Man

@ Arazzon (not Texas Mac Man...sorry)

You're already on iOS 7 but I know that the full iOS 7 update was auto-pushed to a few of my iOS 6 devices by Apple without my knowledge nor consent...

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57604701-37/ios-6-holdouts-complain-about-larg e-unwanted-ios-7-download/

This was a big problem with iOS 6 as it robbed users of ~3.2 GB of their storage. I really don't think this has happened AFTER you've already installed iOS 7 but just do a quick check of your device to make sure that you don't have a very large update sitting on your device and taking up space.

Settings/General/Software Update and make sure that there is no "Install" button sitting there. If there is, report back as you have an update already downloaded to your device waiting to be installed. I doubt you'd have this issue but I thought I'd bring it up anyways just to cover all bases.

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Answer 9

Maxi_D

Level 1

0 points

Oct 3, 2014 5:18 AM in response to Arazzon

For anyone with this issue, restoring factory settings should fix it. Had the exact same issue and worked for me.

Settings>General>Reset>Erase all content and settings.

Remeber to back up to iCloud or iTunes first.

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Answer 10

May 1, 2015 9:16 AM in response to Arazzon

exact same problem. restored from scratch, still the same issue. my "other" storage matches exactly what the "photos" storage should be.

it feels like the problem started when we got switched from iPhoto to Photos app. i'm rolling with it, since life's too short. a fix would still be neat.

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Answer 11

Jun 1, 2015 5:19 PM in response to Arazzon

I'm having a similar problem. I tried resetting content from the iPad and also did a restore from backup. After restore, before syncing from backup, capacity was ~14.3 GB. Once restored from backup, capacity drops to 12.75 GB. So somewhere between, I lost about 1.5 GB.

Anyone have any other thoughts on this?

TIA,

Brad

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Answer 12

Jun 9, 2015 8:21 AM in response to Arazzon

I had the same issue. I have a 16 GB iPad mini 2 and it was showing me that I only had 200 MB free, but iTunes was telling me that I had 7 GB free. I added up the storage like you and found that it was no where near what the device was reporting. So, I restored my iPad from the most recent iCloud back up (this morning) and now my iPad is telling me that I have 6.9 GB free. That's a lot of space in my opinion to just "disappear" like that.

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Answer 13

Shourin

Level 1

0 points

Sep 21, 2015 10:39 PM in response to Maxi_D

I play an online game called clash of clans. Will all my progress go. And resetting takes over a day ??!!

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Answer 14

Shourin

Level 1

0 points

Sep 21, 2015 10:42 PM in response to Jason Hansen

By the way how to restore using iCloud?

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Answer 15

Oct 30, 2015 1:23 PM in response to Arazzon

Finally someone with the same problem! Funny thing is, this is happening on my brand new Mid-2015 Retina 15 inch Macbook Pro. I've gone through and meticulously added up the values/usage of everything on my hard drive, as well as double checked using OmniDisk Sweeper. Both of these indicated that I'm only using 104.0 GB out of 500 GB Flash Storage, yet under "About this Mac," I'm using 499.06 GB with only 1.58 GB free space. This is clearly wrong, yet I'm unable to back up my iPhone or download anything about that size.

Please, if anyone has found a way to resolve this, I could use the help!

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