Stop receiving "Your disk is almost full" notification

Here it is! Finally someone saved us from apple… Lol…

Disabling the most annoying message ever created by Apple:

https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/282813

But before you do that, you have to do this:

https://www.howtogeek.com/230424/how-to-disable-system-integrity-protection-on-a -mac-and-why-you-shouldnt/

Regards…

Yes, I know and have seen that thread in Stakexchange. When it is an obvious bug, you can mess with it, but when it is a real message because you are under 10gb for example, make some space free. Keep my remark about SSDs in mind (more free space needed for longevity).

The reminders app is for users - it does not control Mac OS behavior. Therefore, it will not control system based messages. I have all Notifications turned off permanently; but I still received the "not enough space on this disk" pop-up several times yesterday while intentionally trying to fill up an SSD hard drive as much as I could before erasing it.

Came in here to post a link to this and found that someone already did. This answer should be much higher up

Silencing "Your disk is almost full" notification - Ask Different

Here is the full copy from the thread:

The solution to disabling the "almost full" and "full" notification is to disable the daemon responsible for it:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

Alternatively, if you only want to prevent the "almost full" from appearing so often then you can lower the GB threshold via:

minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20

The default 20GB is too high for small SSDs and a possible bug causes the alert to be shown every day rather than just once, so as a workaround you can lower the free space before the alert appears, e.g. to 10GB:

defaults write com.apple.diskspaced minFreeSpace 10

The daemon only reads its prefs on startup so you need to restart it if you have system integrity turned off:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

Otherwise kill it:

killall diskspaced

In case you are interested in the other preferences for these disk alerts you can view some of them using the help param:

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/StorageManagement.framework/Versions/A/Resources/diskspaced help --- Domain: com.apple.diskspaced Supported keys: debugLog (BOOL) - log additional debug information. Default: NO checkAllVolumes (BOOL) - check all volumes. Default: NO minDiskSize (int) - minimal disk size in GB. Default: 128 minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20 minPurgeableSpace (int) - minimal purgeabe space size in GB. Default: 20 --- Commands: removeAllNotifications - Removes all scheduled and delivered user notificiations.

And here are a couple of hidden ones:

warningInterval (integer default 0) lastWarningDate (string e.g. 2017-05-05 16:48:29 +0000)

I didn't look too closely at but it is possible setting the last warning date to a date in the future would also prevent the alert displaying.

New answers are always displayed last.

I am assuming that you have actually tried this (which is what we are supposed to do according to the ToU)? Terminal commands aren't for everybody, especially when one typo can render your computer inoperable.

Yes, you assumed correctly. I have extended the interval used to show the popup by following the instructions given. I don't mind having the popup display; I just don't want to dismiss it every few seconds

The solution to disabling the "almost full" and "full" notification is to disable the daemon responsible for it:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

Alternatively, if you only want to prevent the "almost full" from appearing so often then you can lower the GB threshold via:

minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20

The default 20GB is too high for small SSDs and a possible bug causes the alert to be shown every day rather than just once, so as a workaround you can lower the free space before the alert appears, e.g. to 10GB:

defaults write com.apple.diskspaced minFreeSpace 10

The daemon only reads its prefs on startup so you need to restart it if you have system integrity turned off:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

Otherwise kill it:

killall diskspaced

In case you are interested in the other preferences for these disk alerts you can view some of them using the help param:

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/StorageManagement.framework/Versions/A/Resources/diskspaced help --- Domain: com.apple.diskspaced Supported keys: debugLog (BOOL) - log additional debug information. Default: NO checkAllVolumes (BOOL) - check all volumes. Default: NO minDiskSize (int) - minimal disk size in GB. Default: 128 minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20 minPurgeableSpace (int) - minimal purgeabe space size in GB. Default: 20 --- Commands: removeAllNotifications - Removes all scheduled and delivered user notificiations.

And here are a couple of hidden ones:

warningInterval (integer default 0) lastWarningDate (string e.g. 2017-05-05 16:48:29 +0000)

I didn't look too closely at but it is possible setting the last warning date to a date in the future would also prevent the alert displaying.

I stole this answer from 'malhal' here Silencing "Your disk is almost full" notification - Ask Different

It worked for me!

As a different approach, altering the system's settings, I found out this resource, which claims to either disable the feature completely (I would not suggest do that), either to set the size you think fits your system+HDD/SDD (as I recall was possible in older Mac OX versions):

Silencing "Your disk is almost full" notification - Ask Different

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/254485/silencing-your-disk-is-almost-f ull-notification

Yet, I would still try the OnyX way first, before altering system's settings!

Hope this helps!

Felix

I understand the argument that having low space is not a good practice.

I understand the need for a warning to inform the user that they should address this issue.

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY this warning needs to pop up 5 to 10 seconds after the user dismisses it, every time the user dismisses it.

Sometimes a user is in the middle of something, and 3 Gigs free is okay for the next half hour while they finish an e-mail or something.

THE SOLUTION HERE is simply put the **** thing on a timer, so that it resurfaces after 20 minutes or an hour, rather than after 10 seconds. Having something pop up and remind me every 10 seconds is one of the reasons I switched from Windows to Mac.

To do this, you run:

defaults write com.apple.diskspaced warningInterval 3600

On the command line.

After the fact, I see that the:

defaults write com.apple.diskspaced warningInterval 3600

Does not work, at least on Sierra. It did work for a couple hours for me, but then stopped working. So, I spoke too soon...

"I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY this warning needs to pop up 5 to 10 seconds after the user dismisses it, every time the user dismisses it."

but it is not just a warning, when you are very low on space; when the cpu has a lot to do for a moment, the mac can crash. So a timer is not a good idea.

For the LOVE OF GOD please share a way to turn this off. I just can't take this any longer. I have over 7 GB of free memory and I don't need a single extra MB to get on with my life. Just need to kill this notification!

7 GB on a hard drive is like driving your car with a cup of gasoline. Your OS needs space to operate. Every action you take (add, delete, type, activities online, etc, etc) requires the OS to read and/or write to disk. In order to write, it needs space (although sometimes temporary) continuously. So, your hard drive isn't just "storage", it is THE working component on your computer.

Therefore, if you maintain enough empty hard drive space, you will not get the message. It is that simple.

FWIW, iOS devices have a different OS management system, so it operates somewhat differently.

Hey guys and gals. I have this same notification problem. Just started happening with High Sierra 10.13 on my rig. I have 75gb. free. That's GIGABYTE not MEGABYTE. 😉

I'm guessing bug... that hopefully will get fixed with the next update pushed.

...or maybe its the Russians! Seriously! When this kind of nonsense happens, call me crazy but, admittedly;

I right away get suspicious of bad actors.

Ajaba wrote:

13. Done. Disk space warning has now been disabled and System Integrity Protection is still functional.

That is not accurate - you are disabling notification centre not just the disk space warning. Some people might actually want notifications from Mail, Messages or other apps.

Earlier in this thread there are other system modifying 'hacks' that allow notifications to work but seem to alter the notification from the disk space checking process, that could be a better option.