Forum Discussion

Kookoo2's avatar
Kookoo2
New member | Level 2
11 months ago

My hard drive is full, will marking files as online-only free remove them from the hard drive?

My hard drive is full. So, I have marked several folders to be On-line only. Will they automatically be removed from my hard drive or, do I need to take some additional steps to free up hard drive space?

  • Jay's avatar
    Jay
    Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff

    Hi Kookoo2, thanks for posting today!

     

    The files would become online-only, meaning they would free up space on your hard drive, but you'll still see the placeholders there.

     

    If you have any further queries, feel free to message back.

    • 7ererer's avatar
      7ererer
      Explorer | Level 3

      I actually think I have a problem with this too, my macbook (MacBook Pro 15 inch, 2019)  says it has around 620 gb of system Data. When I went looking for what takes up that space it was the File "Cloud Storage", which in my case only contains the file Dropbox. So I took a look at my Dropbox and it has all in all about 1.38 TB of Data. But most of my Files on Dropbox are online only. I'm really confused as to why it takes up so much space?

      Also after reading another post about this problem I checked the box in the settings for it only to show the filesize of the files which are actually on my computer. But it still shows all the filesizes. Could that be the problem?

      • Walter's avatar
        Walter
        Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff

        Hey 7ererer - sorry to hear you're having issues with this. 

         

        If you made sure that the app is 'up to date' and not still syncing in your menu bar, could you check your cache folder and let us know what you find?

  • Drdtkk's avatar
    Drdtkk
    Explorer | Level 4
    Same issue for me, not sure the reply’s have fixed the issue, for some reason the offline data stays registered in the storage despite making it online only again.
    • 7ererer's avatar
      7ererer
      Explorer | Level 3

      Hey, over the weekend I uninstalled and deleted everything connected do dropbox from my Computer, then installed it again. That has worked, almost all system data has gone, only that somehow now the path to some files has changed (?) and i need to reconnect some of my Indesign files. Hoped that there would be an easier way but doesn't seem like it. I still think that it was some kind of bug.

      • Nancy's avatar
        Nancy
        Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff

        Hi everyone! Can you please go to this directory ~/Library/GroupContainers and let me know if you can access your cache/temp data there? 

         

        As for your hard drive usage, I’d like you to go to your main drive in Finder, highlight it by clicking on it and then, hit space to show a preview of the drive.

         

        This will show the total size of the drive, the amount of that which is available, and finally the amount of “purgeable” data. This purgeable data is part of the “available” data which is actually currently taking up disk space.

         

        Otherwise, you can also double check this by using the Disk Utility app on your Mac device.

         

        Finally, you can also try using our Manage hard drive space tool to make sure your files are online-only and not taking up hard drive space:

         

        Click the Dropbox icon in your menu bar.

        Click your avatar (profile picture or initials).

        Click Manage hard drive space to open the tool.

         

        Let me know if that helps.

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