Delete caches and save disk space

I'm starting to run out of disk space on my Mac, so I decided to poke around and see what's been taking up space. It turns out that my ~/Library/Caches folder is 1.55 GB. So what's taking up all of the space?

~/Library/Caches/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate/ : 425.5 MB
~/Library/Caches/Desktop/ : 496.5 MB
~/Library/Caches/QuickTime/ : 512.6 MB

Since they're caches, and they'll be rebuilt if needed, I dragged those three folders to the Trash and restarted. I did not encounter any problems, so I emptied the Trash and now my ~/Library/Caches folder is only 154.3 MB.

[kirkmc adds: This Caches folder holds lots of stuff that you really don't need. It's good, if you need to save space, or if you are planning a backup and want it to go faster, to check from time to time, sorting by size, to see which folders take up the most. You may find folders for applications that you no longer user, or, as in this hint, folders that contain much data that you can delete.

I don't know why the SoftwareUpdate cache has so much in it; I've never seen that. The Desktop cache contains Desktop pictures, and if you change often, may grow. As for the QuickTime cache, you can set the maximum size, or turn of caching entirely, in the QuickTime preference pane on the Browser tab.]

From our Sponsor...

The macosxhints Poll

iPad_poll_#1

Delete caches and save disk space | 15 comments | Create New Account

Click here to return to the 'Delete caches and save disk space' hint

The following comments are owned by whomever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: zs on Mon, May 1 2006 at 8:56AM PDT

I've been a fan of the free JDiskReport for finding files and folders sitting there taking up space.

---
zs

[ Reply to This | # ]

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: Twist on Mon, May 1 2006 at 9:16AM PDT

I recently recovered 5 gigs of hard drive space using Tiger Cache Cleaner. My iBook also starts up and runs noticeably faster now.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: macgruder on Mon, May 1 2006 at 9:53AM PDT

$ du -k ~/Library/Caches/ | sort -n

Great for spotting where that space is going

(you may need to sudo it)

$ sudo -k ~/Library/Caches/ | sort -n > du_cache.txt

to get a text file

How to make display current info?
Authored by: the_webmaestro on Mon, May 1 2006 at 12:49PM PDT

I tried this:

    diskspace="du -k `pwd` | sort -n"

Doesn't work...

---
Father of Jeremy Logan

[ Reply to This | # ]

How to make display current info?
Authored by: the_webmaestro on Mon, May 1 2006 at 12:54PM PDT

I meant to add, that I want to add something like this to my ~/.bashrc:

alias diskspace="du -k `pwd` | sort -n"

How to make display current info?
Authored by: regulus on Tue, May 2 2006 at 10:42AM PDT

just use a . (ie. period) in place of pwd... and no quotes. FYI: in unix the . stands for the current directory and a .. stands for the parent directory.

How to make display current info?
Authored by: macgruder on Wed, May 3 2006 at 9:06PM PDT

It's easier than that!

du -k | sort -n

du defaults to the present directory

Use WhatSize to find garbage
Authored by: bruderfranz on Mon, May 1 2006 at 9:55AM PDT

A good start to analyse your file system is WhatSize, an all-mac program, universal binary, small, fast and free.

(Comparable to TreeSize on Win-Systems)

-- brf

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: Hodag on Mon, May 1 2006 at 10:03AM PDT

AppleJack, among other things, will clean both system and user caches, as well as feed the pets and repair your permissions. Welll, maybe not the pets thing, but it is a lovely program.

---
--
Adam C.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: Robbug on Mon, May 1 2006 at 12:25PM PDT

I'm not sure if this hint has been posted before but if you get info on each application file there are installed language options. I went through all of my apps and deleted all of them except english. Most times this will halve the size of the app. Apple is notorious for installing 12 different languages for each app. I believe there is an apple script that does this automatically too.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: TigerKR on Mon, May 1 2006 at 9:03PM PDT

Just be careful about deleting some application localizations. Some applications may have dependencies to those localizations. Some time ago, I remember a problem when someone tried to delete localizations, and they ended up having to reinstall that application.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: sjk on Tue, May 2 2006 at 11:39AM PDT

Yep, certain apps can mysteriously misbehave after you've deleted their language localization files. And Apple software updates can reinstall ones you've deleted so it's not necessarily a one-time removal routine.

I don't see any reason to risk removing those files unless reclaiming disk space is a necessity and there are no safer alternatives.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: ahagstro on Tue, Jul 25 2006 at 1:33PM PDT

I can recommend Monolingual (monolingual.sourceforge.net), a neat little software that does just that - removes language resources you don't want/need. I've been using it for a couple of years now without problems (making sure never to remove any of the English varieties (my system language).

Anders

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: TigerKR on Mon, May 1 2006 at 9:34PM PDT

Just for reference, I will reiterate what has already been said about the long-term importance (or lack there of) of files in the ~/Library/Caches directory.

Recently I discovered a bug in an application (the producer of said application was "some kind of fruit company" who shall remain nameless), and the top level tech that I was working with confirmed that its no big deal to delete the contents of the ~/Library/Caches directory.

I'm not advocating that you empty the directory and then lock the folder so that it can never be populated, nor am I advocating that you empty the directory at all. I'm simply stating that you can empty the directory and its not a big deal.

If your Caches folder is out of control, then you should think about some sort of cleaning.

For comparison purposes, here are the current sizes for my (Mac OS X created) Caches folders:

/Library/Caches
24.7 MB

/System/Library/Caches
11.6 MB

/private/var/root/Library/Caches
16 KB

~/Library/Caches
80.2 MB

The oldest directory within the ~/Library/Caches directory was modified Apr 4 2006.

Delete caches and save disk space
Authored by: sjk on Tue, May 2 2006 at 10:56AM PDT

I'd be cautious deleting ~/Library/Caches/Metadata because it contains Spotlight proxy files used by iCal, Safari, and other apps. Something will eventually trigger those files to be regenerated but before that happens Spotlight searching may be temporarily crippled. I discovered that awhile ago with Safari bookmarks and eventually deleted and restored the Bookmarks.plist file to force proxy files to be rebuilt after other methods had failed to do it.

Hint Options

Search

From our Sponsor...

User Functions

What's New:

Hints

Comments last 2 days

Links last 2 weeks

What's New in the Forums?

The Editor's Corner...

Hints by Topic

News from Macworld

The macosxhints Poll