You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

What is the best Mac cleaner software?

The question was asked Apr 16, 2016 2:25 PM at URL What is the best Mac cleaner software?


and got a lot of great answers and I intuitively agree that we don't really need them and they _can do damage.


dominic23

Please let Mac take care of it without the help of any additional application.

These Cleaner applications may clean too much and create problems.


But, my experience tells me that:

1. Apple Safari hold on to cookies and they magically reappear when you delete them and keeps local HTML5 storage for websites.

2. Apps that get uninstalled by being dragged to the trash will still have traces of it in several system folders.

3. Duplicate files can be nice to get rid of.


Thats why iit would be nice to know who you can trust.

What about?

MacCleanse 6, CleanMyMac, Movavi Mac Cleaner, ZipZapMac's Memory Cleaner App, Privatus Automated Privacy Protection, OnYX, CCleaner..

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9.4), Safari 7.05

Posted on Aug 29, 2018 7:36 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Aug 30, 2018 10:00 AM

+3 for no cleaning software.


As the 2nd article points out, they are capable of regenerating after deletion with files that go to many parts of the system.



Safari/Browsers – can’t delete cookies



Evercookie



The myth of the dangerous cookie



Quit Safari.


In Finder go to Go menu and then Go to Folder.


Copy and paste this ~/Library/Safari/Databases.


Delete the contents of the folder.


Launch Safari again and check if all is ok.


If that doesn’t work, copy and paste this ~/Library/Safari/LocalStorage.


Delete the contents of the folder.


Then go to Safari/History and delete any entries for the related websites.


Test.

Similar questions

5 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 30, 2018 10:00 AM in response to CPSky

+3 for no cleaning software.


As the 2nd article points out, they are capable of regenerating after deletion with files that go to many parts of the system.



Safari/Browsers – can’t delete cookies



Evercookie



The myth of the dangerous cookie



Quit Safari.


In Finder go to Go menu and then Go to Folder.


Copy and paste this ~/Library/Safari/Databases.


Delete the contents of the folder.


Launch Safari again and check if all is ok.


If that doesn’t work, copy and paste this ~/Library/Safari/LocalStorage.


Delete the contents of the folder.


Then go to Safari/History and delete any entries for the related websites.


Test.

Aug 29, 2018 8:12 AM in response to CPSky

Hello,

1. Cookies are created by web sites. There is no way to control or prevent that. You can try something like Cookie (https://cookie5app.com/) that will automatically remove non-favourite cookies on a regular basis.

2. Not all apps can be uninstalled by being dragged to the trash. Some of those "traces" are actually system files that were not created by the software in question and should not be deleted.

3. Recent versions of macOS already have features to manage your storage. Go to About this Mac > Storage > Manage.


Unfortunately, many popular "clean up" apps will damage your system.

Aug 31, 2018 12:33 PM in response to Eric Root

yes, this gets rid of what I wanted. The only thing left was website cache which I can delete in the developer edition, "empty caches". Now the only annoying problem left is that in Safari connects to a bunch of websites without me doing anything and this is exactly what I don't want. Why does it?


I thought it was due to items in the reading list, cookies , HTML5 Local Storage, notifications, but having erased everything Safari keeps connecting to various websites on its own and I don't like it. Should I just accept it (and/or deny it) or is there a workaround to make safari only do what I want it to?


Best regards,


Carl

What is the best Mac cleaner software?

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.