How to delete Other storage on iPhone and iPad

One of the most precious assets on your iPhone or iPad is storage and it can be very stressful as it starts to fill up, particularly if you are already limited to 64GB or even less space to start with.

Checking what’s using all that space will show a mysterious category called Other that sometimes accounts for several gigabytes of data. So, what is ‘Other’ on your iPhone or iPad, and can you erase it?
What’s taking up iPhone Storage?
To start you’ll want to figure out how to see what’s taking up the storage on your iPhone or iPad.

  • Open Settings.Tap General.
  • Tap iPhone [or iPad] Storage.
  • Wait for the estimation of group sizes.
    You’ll be greeted by a graph anything like this. Look at the giant Other categories!

How to uninstall other storage on iPhone and iPad: iPhone Storage

What is Other?
Look at the line graph showing the breakdown of your store categories and you’ll see the different color-coded sections like one marked Other. iOS and iPadOS break down storage into various categories which include Media, Images, Applications, Devices, and a few more. Whatever doesn’t fit easily into these is then labeled as Other. Typically there would be stuff like cache data, changes, logs, additional Siri voices you may have downloaded, plus equally vague files.

You will also find that if you send a lot of text messages with photos or stream video content, your iPhone can build-cache files so it can handle all of these seamlessly. They should automatically be removed after use, but often they stay and end up in the Other segment, unnecessarily taking up a large amount of room.

Can I delete Other storage?
Due to its indistinct condition, you can’t press a button and clear the Other folder, however, it is possible to thin out the items that are taking up the Other room. As with every destructive act when it comes to data, we heartily suggest that you first make a full backup of your iPhone or iPad just in case something goes wrong. For a step-by-step guide to the operation, read how to back up an iPhone or iPad.

How do I delete Other storage?
There are different things you can look at when it comes to reducing the space that Other files take up on your computer.

Clear App Caches
The most obvious is to search for apps that may be hoarding caches. To try this out, do the following:

  • Open Settings.
  • Tap General.
  • Tap iPhone [or iPad] Storage.
  • Now scroll down through the different apps listed below the storage graph and you’ll see a list of apps and the amount of storage they are currently using.
  • How to uninstall other storage on iPhone and iPad: App Data
  • Pick one of them and you’ll be given a more thorough rundown. It’s hardly a forensic diagnosis, as you just have App Size and Documents & Records, but if the latter seems inordinately large then you might try going into the app itself and removing objects.
    If this doesn’t change anything then another alternative is to uninstall the app itself and reinstall it, as this also wipes out all cached data. Naturally, you’ll need to make certain that you have backups of any essential data before attempting this path. Follow our How to uninstall apps on iPhone & iPad for more information.

Clear Safari caches
Another good idea is to clear out the caches stored in Safari, as these can take up quite a bit of space. To do this, take the following steps:

  • Open Settings.
  • Tap Safari.
  • Tap Simple History and Website Info.                                                                                                                                                                                                How to uninstall other storage on iPhone and iPad: Safari Cache

There is a downside to this, like pages you’ve previously visited with briefly take longer to load and enable you to log back in again, but this should only be for the first time you visit them after removing the cache.

We have this guide to clearing the cache on your iPhone or iPad.

Limit the time that Messages are processed
The message is a frequent culprit in the Otherworld, so you may want to consider restricting how many conversations and messages it holds on your computer. Apple offers time-related choices for you to choose from, so if you don’t need chats from a year or two ago then it might be worth getting rid of them.

  • Open Settings.
  • Tap Messages.
  • Under Message History tap Keep Messages.                                                                                                                                                                                        How to delete other storage on iPhone and iPad: Restrict Message storage You’ll now be provided with three choices on how long your computer can store past conversations. There are 30 Days, 1 Year or Forever. As a default, Forever will be picked, so change this to a shorter period if you’re glad to see those messages vanish. Not to worry though, as you can save them to iCloud if you have it installed correctly. So, before you begin this process, read how to backup Messages in iCloud.
    If you still find yourself running out of storage, there are other ways to clear the clutter. We’ve outlined these in how to free up space on an iPhone or you could consider using a cloud storage service to host your larger files.

Leave a Comment