Manage your Mac’s storage

Craig Grannell shows how to use macOS and GrandPerspective to free up space on your Mac.

Modern Macs come with limited storage that typically cannot be upgraded. If you have a 128GB drive, you’re likely stuck with it for the life of the machine. Run low on space and you may be able to work with external drives or the cloud, but those rely on extra hardware or internet access.

You may therefore periodically need to take a look at what you’ve got and refine what you store locally. The quickest free, safe and manual way to make more space on your Mac is to identify large files you no longer require, and then get rid of them.

This tutorial shows how to use built-in macOS tools for this, and third-party app GrandPerspective. Free from grandperspectiv. sourceforge.net (or $1.99 from the Mac App Store), this app complements Apple’s by offering an at-a-glance overview of any drive (rather than just a file list), and enables you to scan specific folders. Obviously, be mindful of deleting any file you don’t have a backup of – once it’s gone, it’s gone!