what to know
- Highlight the item you want to delete and select the trash can icon. Open the Trash folder to delete it permanently.
- Select storage in Google Drive to see all of the largest files in your account. This makes it easy to free up space quickly.
- Remember, Gmail and Photos count toward your Drive space. Delete or move these items to free up more space.
This article explains how to delete files from your Google Drive account from the desktop website and mobile app. Deleting files, especially large files or items in the Trash folder, is an easy way to free up space in your account.
You can delete files and folders from the Google Drive website and mobile app. It doesn't matter if it's documents, videos, spreadsheets, images, slideshows, etc.; they're all accessible through Drive.
Visit the Google Drive website and log in to your account if necessary.
Select the folder or file you want to delete. To select multiple items at the same time, hold down the Ctrl or Command key while making your selections.
You may not be able to select everything you want at once. For example, if the files you want to delete exist in multiple folders, you'll need to split the task; delete the first group first, then go to another folder and repeat the process.
Select the trash can icon at the top. Deleted files will be moved to the Trash folder.
If you work on a tablet or phone, you can use the app to delete files from Google Drive.
Find the file or folder you want to delete. You can search for it or browse manually via the Files tab.
Click the three dots at the top of the screen and select Delete .
To delete multiple items at once, tap and hold the first item, then continue tapping additional items. If you choose this route, click the trash can icon at the top.
Select Move to Trash to confirm.
Yes, but not immediately.
If you delete files to free up space in your Google Drive account (for example, to make room for more emails or photos), you may notice that your storage usage doesn't change after completing the steps above.
This is because Google Drive doesn't permanently delete deleted items. Instead, it collects them in the Trash folder so you can restore them when needed.
If you want to free up space immediately, you must empty this folder manually, otherwise they will be automatically and permanently deleted after 30 days.
To skip the 30-day wait for deleted items to be deleted, permanently delete the files by emptying the Trash folder. It will free up the space occupied by the junk folder. In other words, if there are 500MB files inside, clearing it will instantly restore half a GB of space.
Select Trash from the Drive menu to open the Trash folder, then select Empty Trash > Permanently Delete to permanently delete these items. To delete only individual items or selected files and folders, right-click on them to find the Delete option.
The app works basically the same way. If you want to choose which items are permanently deleted, tap and hold on them, then use the three-dot menu at the top of the app to find the same deletion options as for websites.
Google Drive simplifies the file cleaning process to free up drive space. Here are some of the best ways to clean up your account, but before you get started, it's smart to take a quick look at where in your account you're using the most storage space. It will help determine where you should focus.
Open Google One Storage and browse the list of storage details. As you can see, most of the data in this example is in Google Drive, but Gmail and Google Photos also count toward Drive storage.
We'll start by directly addressing Google Drive. Here's how to list all of the largest files stored in Drive, allowing you to reap some potentially huge space gains in just a few clicks:
Select "Storage" from the left menu to access your Google Drive storage page.
All files using your Drive storage are listed here, sorted by size. This is a great place to regain the most storage space in the fastest way.
Select and delete anything you no longer want (and remember to do the same in the Trash folder).
Another method is to search for files or file types that you suspect are taking up too much storage space. For example, you can select "Type" below the search bar and then select a file type such as "Archives" or "Videos" (the usual storage footprint) to see all your data.
Files take up storage space in Google Drive because they are stored there! If you take something out and then delete it from Drive, you'll free up that space for other content.
For example, let's say you've been saving home movies online. Instead of keeping them in Google Drive, especially if you're approaching your storage limit, move them to another online file storage service. There are many to choose from, many of which have enough space for video backup.
Downloading Gmail messages is not a simple process, but it is still possible and can free up a lot of space if you have a lot of attachments. However, downloading from Google Drive is very simple: right-click on the selected file/folder and select Download .
While it's safe to delete files from Google Drive once you've downloaded them to your computer, we recommend waiting to confirm that they've been fully backed up elsewhere, such as one of the online file storage services, before permanently deleting them.
Something else to consider is Google Photos. Since photos count toward Drive storage, this is another easy way to clean up Google Drive. However, instead of following the above steps, use Google Takeout. It provides an easy way to transfer data from Google Photos from your Google Account to other services like Flickr; no manual downloading or uploading is required.
Additional handy details about Google Drive usage are available from the Storage Manager. This page provides cleaning suggestions, making it very easy to delete content you may have forgotten. For example, you can erase all Gmail spam and deleted messages from here.
