How do I delete old backups from Time Machine on external drive.

Time Machine should delete old backups automatically when it gets too full. If you need to delete old backups manually only attempt this from within the TM interface and never via Finder, or backups will probably get stuck in your Trash.

In addition to the inputs from the others, and for future reference, you may find the following articles handy when you want to delete Time Machine (TM) backups:

• Remove a backed-up item from your backup disk - Apple Support
• How to Delete Old Backups from Time Machine on Mac - OSXDaily
• How to delete Time Machine backups on Mac - techradar.pro

Although you can drag and drop a back up into the Trash, it won't update the correct size and space available remaining on the drive ... sort of defeats the purpose for doing so.

A few other things:

1. Your backup drive's capacity should be, at lease, 2.5-3x the capacity of your Mac's system drive.
2. If you use VM hosting apps, like Parallels or VMware. Each time you use a VM, it changes the file size and TM will back it up. This can eat up the drive's capacity quickly as each of these can be multiple GBs in size. If you do use these types of apps, I suggest that you add the /Documents/Parallels folder to the TM exclusion list so they don't get backed up.

Dear Sheryl,

What Mac do you have? This forum covers Mac desktops, other than iMacs, made from 1998 to 2005 Only a few of those models can run the OS version (OS 10.5) that enables Time Machine. Is your that old??

If they deleted then you're probably OK.