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How to permanently delete files or empty your trash bin without waiting for 30 days

How to permanently delete files or empty your trash bin without waiting for 30 days

Jesse D.1
New member | Level 1
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How to permanently delete files or empty your trash bin without waiting for 30 days

This actually works and I added a few things to clarify.

Per Mark Mc (SUPER USER):

Completely ignore that Trash folder.

  • Go to the link I gave (www.dropbox.com/home)
  • There navigate to the folders where your were files are that you want permanently deleting 
  • Click on 'Show Deleted Items' - at the top, its a little trash can
  • That shows, in grey, your deleted items. 

At this point you will see all deleted items in all folders of your Dropbox mixed in with your active items.

  • Click on one so it highlights, not the name of the item but the blank space after it.
  • Press 'Permanently Delete' listed at the top.
  • If you want to delete a batch, use the SHIFT or CTRL plus the mouse to choose or un-choose what you want to delete. For example, I clicked the top item and then scrolled down to the bottom and pressed SHIFT while clicking the last item. I could have permanently deleted everything but I need to remove the choosing of several items. For that I pressed CTRL and clicked each item. Then I clicked 'Permanently Delete' listed at the top. I had to do this within each folder to delete everything I wished to remove permanently. It is a pain but it is better than nothing.
22 Replies 22

becalash
New member | Level 2
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I did delete permanently, but it still appearrs in the deleted folder

Trevor Dsa

ilming
New member | Level 2
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Thanks for this procedure advice. I had 'deleted' several file last week but still got messages that the dropbox was full. My suspicion that the files were still there were confirmed when the option to restore them appeared. When I followed the advice to permanently delete it said 'Are you sure?'  and then "Permanently deleting these items won't free up space".

Hoe then can I clear out unwanted items to give me more space in my Dropbox?

Rich
Super User II
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@ilming wrote:

Hoe then can I clear out unwanted items to give me more space in my Dropbox?


Just delete them. Once deleted they no longer take up space in your account. Deleting files frees up space. Permanently delting files doesn't free up space because the space was already freed up when you originally deleted the file.

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Top contributors to this post

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    Rich Super User II
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    ilming New member | Level 2
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    becalash New member | Level 2
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    Mark Super User II
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