How to Free Up Space on iPhone

To free up space on iPhone, open Settings > General > iPhone Storage and find the largest category. If it is Photos, delete the photos and videos you no longer need, then empty Recently Deleted. After that, offload unused apps, or turn on Optimize iPhone Storage if your library fits in iCloud.

Apple released iOS 27 on 14 September 2026, according to its security releases page. It added one tap to the Optimize iPhone Storage setting. Every method uses Settings and Apple's own apps, and only Optimize iPhone Storage may need a paid iCloud+ plan.

Check What Is Using Your iPhone Storage

iPhone Storage in Settings shows how much space each kind of content takes, with a list of apps and what each one uses. Apple's storage support page describes it as recommendations plus a list of apps with their storage usage. The largest category decides where to start.

1. Open Settings, tap General, then tap iPhone Storage.
2. Wait while the screen works out how the space is used.
3. Scroll down to the app list to see how much each app uses.
4. If recommendations appear, tap Show All. Tap Enable to turn one on, or tap it to review what it would remove.

Apple defines each storage category on its support page.

Checking iPhone storage again after each step shows what that step returned. When Photos is the largest category, start by deleting photos.

Delete Photos and Videos You No Longer Need

The camera roll keeps every photo and video until you delete it, so this category only shrinks when you act on it.

1. Open Photos and tap Select.
2. Tap each photo or video you want to remove.
3. Tap the Trash button, then confirm.

Screenshots, burst frames and retakes build up without anyone deciding to keep them. That is how a library grows past the point of sorting by hand. Tapping photos one by one is slow on a large library. The faster ways of deleting photos on iPhone start from the same Select button.

Empty Recently Deleted to Get the Space Back

Why is my iPhone storage still full after deleting photos?

Your iPhone storage is still full after deleting photos because deleted photos move to the Recently Deleted album, not off the device. Apple keeps them there for 30 days so they can be recovered. The space comes back only when the album is emptied or the 30 days pass.

1. In Photos, tap Collections, swipe up, and tap Recently Deleted under Utilities.
2. Unlock the album with Face ID or Touch ID.
3. Tap Select. To delete everything, tap Cancel, then tap Select again.
4. Tap the More button, then tap Delete All.
5. Tap Delete from All Devices or Delete Photos I Added to confirm. A photo deleted from this album cannot be recovered.

The same 30-day hold protects anything deleted by mistake, which is the main job of the Recently Deleted album on iPhone. When iPhone Storage still looks full after the album is empty, the space sits in another category. iPhone storage that stays full after deleting photos has its own causes.

Merge Duplicate Photos

Photos finds duplicate photos and videos itself and gathers them in the Duplicates album. Open Photos, tap Collections, scroll down to Utilities, and tap Duplicates.

Tap Merge on a set to combine its copies. Apple says merging keeps one photo with the highest image quality and moves the other copies to Recently Deleted. The space returns once that album is emptied.

The album can be empty on a phone full of copies. Apple says detection runs only while the iPhone is locked and connected to power, and on a large library it can take a few days. Leaving the phone locked on charge overnight gives detection the conditions it needs.

Ten frames of the same view taken a second apart are near-identical rather than exact copies. Sorting them is part of dealing with duplicate photos on iPhone. Deleting and merging both make the library smaller. Keeping every photo needs a route that moves the originals off the phone instead.

Free Up Space Without Deleting Photos

How do I free up space on iPhone without deleting photos?

Space on iPhone is freed without deleting photos by turning on Optimize iPhone Storage in iCloud Photos. With it on, Apple keeps full-resolution originals in iCloud and smaller, space-saving copies on the iPhone when space is needed.

1. Open Settings, tap your name, tap iCloud, then tap Photos.
2. Turn on Sync this iPhone.
3. In iOS 27 or later, tap iPhone Storage.
4. Choose Optimize iPhone Storage.

Apple marks the iPhone Storage tap as iOS 27 or later, so on iOS 26 the option is chosen without it. Older instructions that stop at the Photos screen are missing that tap.

Optimize only works when the whole library fits in iCloud. New iCloud accounts come with 5 GB free. A library larger than the plan cannot sync in full, so a bigger library needs an iCloud+ plan first.

Paying for iCloud+ adds cloud space, not phone space. That is the difference between iPhone storage and iCloud storage, and it is why a phone can show full while iCloud has room to spare.

Offload or Delete Apps You Do Not Use

Apps and the data they keep are the next category to check. Apple gives two options for every app on the iPhone Storage screen, and they differ in what stays behind:

• Offload App frees the space the app itself uses but keeps its documents and data on the iPhone.
• Delete App removes the app and its related data.

1. Open Settings, tap General, then tap iPhone Storage.
2. Tap an app in the list.
3. Tap Offload App or Delete App, then confirm.

Apple also shows an Offload Unused Apps recommendation on the same screen, and tapping Enable turns it on. Offloading suits apps you expect to use again, such as a travel app between trips. Deleting suits apps you have replaced.

In chat apps, the photos and videos you receive count as the app's data. Offloading such an app keeps them, and deleting it removes them. That is why WhatsApp's use of iPhone storage is better cut from inside the app. Apple's own Messages app stores its media the same way.

Clear Large Message Attachments

Does deleting texts free up space on iPhone?

Deleting texts frees up space on iPhone mainly through the photos, videos and files attached to them. Apple counts "Messages and their attachments" in the Messages category, so long chats full of media are where the space sits.

1. Open Settings, tap General, then tap iPhone Storage, and tap Messages to see how much it uses.
2. In the Messages app, delete conversations you no longer need, starting with group chats full of photos and videos.

Emails follow the same pattern. Apple counts "Emails and their attachments" under Mail, so deleting old messages that carry large files returns more space than deleting plain text.

Clear Safari History and Website Data

Clearing Safari history and website data removes Safari's browsing history and the data websites have stored. Apple says cached data might not count as usage, so the figures in iPhone Storage may barely change. The iPhone also removes cached files itself when it needs more space.

1. Open Settings, tap Apps, then tap Safari.
2. Tap Clear History and Website Data.
3. Choose the timeframe, then tap Clear History.

Apple notes that AutoFill information is not changed. Apple says website data includes what sites use to save login information, so some sites may ask you to sign in again. Other apps keep their own caches, and clearing cache on iPhone for those apps follows different steps.

Caches are the part of storage you can clear by hand. iOS keeps a second set of files that no setting removes.

What You Cannot Clear: System Data and Other

System and Other are the parts of iPhone storage that no setting deletes. Apple describes System as space taken by the operating system. Other holds non-removable items: Siri voices, fonts, dictionaries, non-removable logs and caches, the Spotlight index, and system data such as the Keychain.

iOS manages this space itself. When storage is low, Apple says the iPhone frees space by removing items that can be downloaded again or are not needed. Why System Data on iPhone grows larger on some phones than others has its own causes.

The Order That Frees the Most iPhone Space

What is the best way to free up space on iPhone?

The best way to free up space on iPhone is to work from the largest category down. Check iPhone Storage, delete unwanted videos and photos, empty Recently Deleted, then offload apps you no longer open. Turn on Optimize iPhone Storage next if your iCloud plan holds the whole library.

Deleting photos is the slowest step, because every photo needs a decision. Photo cleaner apps take on that job by putting one photo on screen at a time.

Apps like Swipe Quick work this way: swipe right to keep, swipe left to delete, month by month, by album or by duplicate group. The app runs on the device and needs no account. Nothing is deleted until you confirm, and deleted photos go to Recently Deleted for 30 days.

Storage that fills up again within weeks of a clean-up points to an ongoing cause. Finding the cause of an iPhone storage full warning matters more than another round of deleting.

Open Settings, then General, then iPhone Storage, and start with the largest category.