How to Free Up Storage on Your iPhone

No matter what iPhone you’ve got, whether it’s the old 11 or the new 16 Pro Max with a whole terabyte of space, sooner or later, you’re going to run into the same problem: it fills up. And if that’s what brought you here, you’re in the right place.

Below, we’re going through everything you need to know (and actually do) to free up storage on iPhone, without deleting stuff you care about or spending hours poking around in menus. 

Why Your iPhone Keeps Running Out of Space

Alright, let’s talk about why your iPhone keeps having a strop over storage. It’s not only because you take too many photos (though, fair play, that is a big part of it). The thing is, iPhones are sneaky. No matter how big your storage is – 256 GB, 512 GB, even a full terabyte – the demand for space keeps growing. The photos you take today are higher quality than they were a few years ago. Apps are bulkier, packed with features (and background data you didn’t ask for). Even new versions of iOS can take up more room than the last.

So while the storage on our devices is bigger than ever, it doesn’t always feel that way. If you’ve ever scrolled through the Apple Community forums, you’ll know there’s always a huge debate going on about why your iPhone keeps shouting storage full and what on earth to do about it.

So to keep things simple, we’re breaking it down into 5 easy steps that’ll work for pretty much anyone, no matter what iPhone you’ve got. Let’s kick off with step one.

1. Check What’s Using the Most Space First

First thing to do: check what’s actually taking up all that space, just like the iPhone User Guide suggests. It sounds basic, but loads of people skip this step and jump straight into deleting random apps or photos; no need to do that just yet.

Head to Settings > General > iPhone Storage and give it a sec to load. What you’ll see is a full breakdown: apps, photos, messages, system files, the lot. And more often than not, it’s something you didn’t expect sitting near the top.

This screen is your roadmap. There’s more than one way to go about clearing iPhone storage, and this view helps you figure out which direction to take first. 

2. Clear Space on iPhone by Cleaning Up Photos and Videos

For most people, the biggest category in iPhone Storage is Photos (or at least one of the biggest). So, your camera roll is probably the first place to look.

Start with the obvious: head into the Recently Deleted album. It sounds silly, but loads of people forget to clear it. When you delete photos, they’re not actually gone, they’re shoved into this limbo for 30 days (or until you manually wipe them out). Open the album, select all, and delete them properly.

Next, check out the Duplicates album. iOS does a decent job spotting exact copies and letting you merge them with a tap. But here’s the catch: it only works on identical files, and as many people find out, it takes a while to scan your library, so don’t be surprised if nothing shows up right away. That’s why, when it comes to cleaning up your Photos, we’d actually recommend going with a third-party option. Nowadays, some of these cleaner apps use proper AI to go well beyond what your iPhone can do on its own. They spot similar photos, group them together, pick the best one out of the bunch, and on top of that, they can help you manage large files, screenshots, and even compress your media to make more room.

One of the best we’ve tried is Clever Cleaner: Free iPhone Storage Cleaner. It’s completely free (no paywalls or trial limits), but it doesn’t cut corners. The app runs everything directly on your device (no cloud nonsense), and it genuinely holds up against paid alternatives. 

Here’s how to use it to free up iPhone space automatically:

1. Open it up, tap on Similars, and let the app do its thing – it’ll scan your entire camera roll and group together all those lookalike photos.
2. Tap Smart Cleanup, and the AI will pick the Best Shot to keep from each group. It’s surprisingly good at it too – sharpest photo, faces in focus, better lighting – it knows what it’s doing.
3. If you’re happy with the picks, Slide to Delete the rest. Prefer a bit more control? You can tap into any group, change what stays, or skip it altogether. You’re in charge.
4. Once you’re ready, hit Move to Trash, then Empty Trash to actually clear them out. Before and after each cleanup, it’ll show you exactly how much space you’ve saved.

It’s the quickest way to clear space on an iPhone automatically, but if you’ve already opened the app, you might’ve noticed it’s packing more than just the Similars tool:

• Heavies. Ever tried sorting your photos by size in the native Photos app? Yeah, still not possible. This tab does exactly that. It lines up all your videos and chunky photos from biggest to smallest, so you can instantly spot the storage hogs and bin the ones you don’t need.
• Swipe. This one’s weirdly satisfying. It organises all your photos by month and lets you speed through them like Tinder: swipe right to keep, swipe left to delete.

• Screenshots. This tab finds every screenshot you’ve ever taken and gives you a one-tap option to clear them all out in one go.
• Lives. Live Photos are lovely, but they eat up space fast since they’re basically tiny videos wrapped around stills. If you don’t care about the little motion clip, this feature lets you convert them to regular photos.

Note: Don’t forget to check the Recently Deleted folder after clearing things out. Even if you clear it using apps, it still ends up in there.

3. Delete or Offload Apps You Don’t Use

The next step’s a classic: delete (or offload) apps you don’t use. Sounds obvious, but hear us out, most of us have at least a handful of apps we haven’t touched in months. Maybe you downloaded a language app and never made it past “bonjour,” or tried a fitness tracker that’s been judging you silently ever since.

Now, deleting an app fully wipes it from your phone – data and all. But if you think you might come back to it later, try to offload it instead. This keeps all your documents and settings, but removes the app itself until you tap to reinstall. It’s a middle ground that works great for big apps you use occasionally. To do either: 

1. Head back into Settings > General > iPhone Storage. 
2. Scroll through the list, and see what’s been gathering dust. iOS even helpfully shows when you last used each app, so no guessing needed. 
3. If something hasn’t been opened in months, chances are you won’t miss it. Simply tap on Delete App or Offload App (whichever makes more sense for you).

You can also turn on automatic offloading in Settings > App Store > Offload Unused Apps. Sounds handy, and in some cases, it is. But it doesn’t let you choose which apps not to offload. That’s why plenty of people are openly against it. Scroll through Reddit and you’ll find loads of posts from users who lost access to a key app at the worst possible time.

Also worth noting: some apps, like Instagram, Snapchat, or Spotify, build up a ton of cached data over time. Even if they didn’t seem that big when you first downloaded them, they quietly expand the more you use them. And if you’re on those apps daily (let’s be honest, most of us are), the storage they take up can get ridiculous. One quick trick is to delete and reinstall them. That’ll wipe all the hidden clutter they’ve piled up and give you an instant space boost. It won’t touch your login or playlists (those live in the cloud), but it will free up gigabytes in some cases.

Note: Before you go full delete, though, check the app’s own settings. Some apps have a built-in option to clear cache without uninstalling. It’s usually tucked under things like Data, Storage Management, or App Settings. Not all apps offer it, but it’s worth a quick look.

4. Manage Message Attachments and Large Conversations

While text messages themselves take up a minuscule amount of space, the stuff that comes with them doesn’t. We’re talking videos, voice notes, shared photos, memes, stickers, the lot. 

To clean it up, you’ll need to do this:

1. To get a grip on it, head over to Settings > General > iPhone Storage.
2. Scroll down to Messages, and tap in. 
3. Here, Apple breaks everything down for you – Photos, Videos, GIFs, Documents – so you can see exactly what’s taking up space. You can delete the biggest offenders straight away without even opening the Messages app.

Prefer to do it in the app? Open up your longest-running chats, tap the contact name at the top, and scroll down. You’ll see every file that’s been shared in that conversation. From there, you can bulk delete anything you don’t actually need anymore.

And here’s a tip for keeping things tidy moving forward: go to Settings > Messages > Keep Messages, and change it from Forever to 1 Year or even 30 Days. That way, your iPhone will automatically clear out older conversations, no effort on your part.

5. Empty the Files App and Downloads Folder

This one’s often the last place people check, but if you frequently download things from Safari, open email attachments, or use AirDrop, the Files app (and specifically the Downloads folder) could be hoarding gigabytes. Most of us forget that anything we save “just for now” tends to stick around forever. PDFs from uni, old invoices, video files someone sent over months ago – it’s all still sitting there. 

To clean it up, here’s what to do:

1. Open the Files app, tap Browse.
2. Then go into On My iPhone. You’ll likely see a few folders for different apps, plus Downloads. Start there. 
3. Sort by size or date (tap the three dots in the top corner), and take a good look at what’s actually useful. 
4. Tap and hold to Delete anything you don’t need (or select multiple files at once and clear them out in bulk). If you’re using cloud storage apps like Google Drive or Dropbox, those can have their own offline caches as well, so it’s worth checking those folders too.

This bit doesn’t take long, but it’s seriously underrated. A few big files gone from here, and suddenly you’ve got space again; it’s a solid way to clear up storage on iPhone without touching your photos, apps, or messages.

Final Tips

These aren’t the only steps you can take to clear storage on your iPhone. But in our experience, they’re the most effective for most people. Quick and practical. Once you’ve handled your photos, offloaded the dead weight, and cleared out old files and message clutter, you’ll probably feel like you’ve got a brand new phone.

That said, if you’re still running low on space, there are a couple of extra moves worth looking at.

• One is clearing your Safari cache. We already touched on cached data – and Safari, like any other app, is no exception. Over time, it stores loads of website data, autofill info, and random bits of history that you probably don’t need anymore. You can wipe all that straight from your phone settings. Just head to Settings > Safari > Clear History and Website Data, give it a tap, confirm, and that’s it. Takes five seconds, might free up more space than you’d expect, especially if you browse a lot. Plus, it can make Safari run a bit smoother too.

• Another is optimising iCloud usage. Go to Settings > Photos and turn on Optimise iPhone Storage—this stores full-resolution versions of your photos and videos in iCloud, while keeping smaller versions on your phone. It’s a clever way to have your cake and eat it too: everything stays accessible, but without eating up all your local space. But, you’ll need to rely on a decent Wi-Fi or mobile connection if you want to download the originals on the fly. And since iCloud only gives you 5GB on the free tier, you’ll probably need to upgrade to an iCloud+ plan if you want this to actually work long-term. Not a dealbreaker, but definitely something to think about.

The point is, freeing up space doesn’t need to be a headache. A bit of regular maintenance goes a long way – and now that you’ve got the tools (and some clever tricks), you’re more than ready to keep your storage in check.