Have you noticed that iCloud Drive is taking up so much storage on your Mac?
Your iCloud Drive is meant to store your files and make it easier to access them on multiple devices—but sometimes you’ll find that it’s also taking up space on your Mac.
If you’re anything like me, your Mac is always running low on storage space, so you’ll probably want to do one of two things:
- Free up extra space on your Mac
- Stop the iCloud Drive taking up space on your Mac
In this article, I’ll explain iCloud Drive, why it uses storage, how to stop it from taking up space on Mac, and how to get some more storage space.
Before we start:
Whether it’s because iCloud Drive is taking up space on your Mac or you have thousands of photos stored, sometimes you’ll need to find more storage space on your MacBook. But if you don’t want to delete your personal files, how can you get that extra space?
MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup has the answer. With just a few clicks, Safe Cleanup can find unnecessary junk files and delete them for you.
Here’s how to free up storage space on your Mac:
- Download MacKeeper and follow the on-screen instructions to install it.
- Open the app.
- Choose Safe Cleanup from the sidebar.
- Click Start Scan.
- When the scan is complete, choose the files you want to remove and tap Clean Junk Files.
In this article you will find the following:
What is iCloud Drive on Mac
iCloud Drive is Apple’s file storage service. It allows you to store files online and access them from multiple devices. If you have an Apple Account, you automatically have 5GB of free iCloud storage, but you can upgrade to iCloud+ if you need more storage space.
How to get to iCloud on Mac is simple—you can access it through your web browser or in Finder on your Mac.
Our expert’s tip: You can also access your iCloud Drive on a Windows computer, as well as an iPad or iPhone.
You can upload files to iCloud Drive in two ways, depending on your needs and preferences:
- Manually, either via the iCloud website or in Finder.
- Automatically, by turning on the Desktop & Documents Folders option, which will make your Mac sync with your iCloud Drive. When you use this option, files will automatically update in your iCloud Drive when you edit them on your Mac. If you regularly use multiple computers or devices, this automatic syncing is a really useful feature.
Why does iCloud Drive use storage on Mac
iCloud Drive uses storage on Mac for a few reasons:
- Uploading files to iCloud Drive doesn’t automatically delete them from your Mac. If you created these files on your MacBook, they’re still stored on your hard drive. You can turn on Optimize Mac Storage (I’ll explain more about this feature later) to automatically remove older iCloud files from your Mac when you’re running low on space—but every time you access the file, it will be downloaded to your hard drive again.
- Even if files were created on another computer or device, when you access them, they’re downloaded from Apple’s servers to your Mac. If you’re accessing lots of large files, you’ll find that they’re all being downloaded to your hard drive.
How to stop iCloud Drive from taking up space on your Mac
We all have limited storage space on our Macs. If you don’t know how much storage is available on your system, find out how to see how much storage on Mac.
It’s not always helpful just to know why iCloud Drive is taking up so much storage on your Mac. If you’re running low on storage, you’ll also want to know how you can stop it, so you can make the most of the space you have available.
However, there are a few things that you can do to stop iCloud Drive taking up space on your Mac:
- Free up disk space on your MacBook—note that this doesn’t stop iCloud, but it can give you more space
- Turn on the Optimized Storage feature
- Clear space on your iCloud Drive
1. Free up disk space on MacBook
If you’re running low on space, the quickest and easiest solution is often to delete files. But sometimes, you know that there’s no documents or media that you can safely remove. In that case, what should you do if iCloud Drive is taking up so much storage on your Mac?
That’s where MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup comes in. It can identify junk files stored on your Mac so that you can easily remove them. With just a few clicks, our tool will help you find unnecessary logs and caches, unneeded language files, mail attachments, and Trash that can be removed.
When I ran a scan, I found more than 5GB that could be safely removed!
To free up disk space on your MacBook:
- Open MacKeeper and choose Safe Cleanup from the sidebar.
- Click Start Scan.
- When the scan is complete, choose which files to delete and select Clean Junk Files. You can click on each category (Logs, Caches, Trash, Languages, and Mail Attachments) to expand it and find individual files.
A note from our team:
If you want to find out more ways to optimize space, check out our article on how to free up disk space on Mac.
2. Turn on the Optimized Storage feature
If you’re running low on storage space, you might want to use iCloud’s Optimized Storage feature.
When you enable this feature, files from your iCloud Drive will only be stored on your Mac’s hard drive if there’s enough space. If you’re low on space, your older documents will be stored in your iCloud Drive only.
Using Optimized Storage means that iCloud files shouldn’t take up extra space on your MacBook. However, every time you access a file, it will be downloaded to your Mac again—so if you regularly access large files, this may not free up as much space as you’d like.
To use Optimized Storage:
- Go to Apple menu > System Settings.
- Click Apple ID in the sidebar, and then choose iCloud.
- Toggle the slider to turn on Optimize Mac Storage.
3. Clear space on iCloud Drive
You can also manage iCloud storage on a Mac. If your iCloud Drive is getting full, you might want to free up some storage space there. You can do this simply by deleting files.
An extra hint from us: Before you clear space on your iCloud Drive, you could transfer data from iCloud onto an external storage device or another Mac. It’s always a good idea to have an external backup, even if you use a cloud-based storage solution like iCloud.
To clear space on your iCloud Drive:
- Open Finder—you can do this by pressing Command+Space to open Spotlight Search, typing Finder, and pressing Enter.
- Choose iCloud Drive from the sidebar. (If you can’t see the sidebar, press Command+Control+S to display it.)
- Right-click on items that you want to remove, and choose Move to Bin.
Important:
If you’d rather not clear space on your iCloud Drive, you can sign up for iCloud+, which includes more storage for all your important data—up to 2TB, depending on the package you choose.
Conclusion
If you’ve been wondering why iCloud Drive is taking up so much storage on your Mac, hopefully, our article has given you an explanation—and helped you find some solutions to free up some space.
Simply adding files to your iCloud Drive doesn’t remove them from your Mac’s hard drive. On top of that, even if you use the Optimized Storage feature, every time you access a file, it’s downloaded to your Mac—so it’s easy for your Mac’s storage space to fill up.
If you want to free up as much space as possible on your Mac, I’d suggest using MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup. It can help you find and remove junk files safely, potentially freeing up gigabytes of space.
