How to Find and Delete Old/Large Files on Mac

Some old or large files would be created and then take up the storage space on your Mac after you use it for some time. Some people may ask how to find those old files as they locate in different places on your Mac. And it is pretty difficult to find out those files easily.

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This article would introduce two methods to find and delete the unwanted old/large files on your Mac. The first method is totally manually and requires you to find them out one by one, while for method 2, all you need is a Mac cleaning tool - CleanMyMac 3. Anyway, please continue to read and find out the way which fits you most.

• Method 1: Manually Find and Delete Old/Large Files on Mac
• Method 2: Delete Old/Large Files in Two Clicks

Method 1: Manually Find and Delete Old/Large Files on Mac

There are some old files that are stored on your Mac, which are useless and would take up the storage space. Now, let’s see how to remove the old files one by one on you computer.

Step 1 Delete Junk files from Inbuilt Application
1. For junk files on the Trash, please just go to the Trash app in the Dock and then simply empty your Trash.

2. For useless files from iPhoto app, please choose "iPhoto > Empty iPhoto Trash".

3. For the unwanted files from iMovie app, select "File > Move to Trash" or "File > Move Rejected Clips to Trash".

4. For the Junk mails from Mail app, please navigate to "Mailbox > Erase Deleted Items > In All Accounts" and "Mailbox > Erase Junk Mail".

Step 2 Remove Unwanted Downloaded Items
You may download contents such as photos, music, documents from Safari or Google Chrome. However, most of them may become useless and you don’t need them anymore. Please follow the guide below to remove those items.

1. Go to the Finder in the Dock.

2. Choose "Go" from the Menu pane and then click on "Downloads".



3. Select the unwanted items from it and then drag them to Trash.

4. Empty your Trash.

Step 3 Delete Large Files or Move Them to Another Disk
For the large files, you can move them to another disk even the external storage which gets enough space. Or simply delete them if they are useless. Now, you need to firstly locate the files.

1. Go to Finder in the Dock from your Mac.

2. Then choose “Go > Home" and click on the Command + F on the keyboard.

3. Open the Kind pop-up menu and choose "Other".



4. Select the checkbox for File Size under the "Select a search attribute" option.



5. To find out the large files, may be you can set the minimum file size as 100 MB (it is up to you). And please note that you need to change the "equals" pop-up menu to "is greater than" and the "KB" pop-up menu to "MB".

6. Start to search the eligible files and then you can choose to move them or delete them.

Method 2: Delete Old/Large Files in Two Clicks

The other method I want to recommend would be to use a very effective program - CleanMyMac 3, to remove the old/large files from your Mac in several simple steps. Now, please check it out below:

Step 1 Install the CleanMyMac 3 on Mac
First of all, please download and install the CleanMyMac 3 program on your Mac by clicking the download button below.



Step 2 Start to Scan Old/Large Files
After you install the program, please launch it on your computer. On the interface, please go to "Large & Old Files" under the Cleaning menu. Then please click on the "Scan" button to start scanning the wanted files.



Step 3 Clean Up Unwanted Old/Large Files
The program would scan not the files smartly, which can be safely deleted from your Mac. After the scanning completes, you are able to preview the scanned out files before you take any action. If you think they are totally useless, you can now click on the "Clean" button to remove them.



As you can see above, method 2 can effectively clean up the old files and then release the storage space on your Mac. So why not have a try yourself?