How to free up storage space on your Mac (KIPP Edition)

Save space and speed up your computer by using built-in tools to find and remove large or unneeded files.

Find out how much storage is available on your Mac

Choose Apple menu  > About This Mac, then click Storage. Each segment of the bar is an estimate of the storage space used by a category of files. Move your pointer over each segment for more detail.

About this Mac: Storage

Click the Manage button to open the Storage Management window, pictured below.

Manage storage on your Mac

The Storage Management window offers recommendations for optimizing your storage. If some recommendations are already turned on, you will see fewer recommendations.

Do not use "Store in iCloud", you will not have enough space and will asked to pay Apple to upgrade your storage!

Storage Management window with recommendations

macOS Documents icon Reduce Clutter

Reduce Clutter helps you identify large files and files you might no longer need. Click the Review Files button, then choose any of the file categories in the sidebar, such as Applications, Documents, Music Creation, or Trash.

You can delete the files in some categories directly from this window. Other categories show the total storage space used by the files in each app. You can then open the app and decide whether to delete files from within it.

Storage Management window with Documents selected showing large files

Uninstall Unused Applications

You can remove apps that you downloaded and installed from the internet or from a disc.

On your Mac, click the Finder icon in the Dock, then click Applications in the Finder sidebar.
Do one of the following:
- If an app is in a folder: Open the app’s folder to check for an Uninstaller. If Uninstall [App] or [App] Uninstaller is shown, double-click it, then follow the onscreen instructions.

If an app isn’t in a folder or doesn’t have an Uninstaller: Drag the app from the Applications folder to the Trash (at the end of the Dock).

Learn more

The Storage pane of About This Mac is the best way to determine the amount of storage space available on your Mac. Disk Utility and other apps might show storage categories such as Not Mounted, VM, Recovery, Other Volumes, Free, or Purgeable. Don't rely on these categories to understand how to free up storage space or how much storage space is available for your data.

Source: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT206996