How to Make Google Drive Storage More Usable

If you have a Google account, you can get 15GB of free Google Drive storage. This is useful for storing photos and documents in the cloud. However, other Google services, such as Gmail and Google Photos, use the same 15GB quota, so your Drive storage might rapidly fill up.

Google Drive may suggest that your storage is full, even if you don't have any files on it. If that's the case, or you're about to fill up your Google Drive cloud storage, here are five ways to free up space on Google Drive so you can store more files and create room for incoming emails.

WHY FREE UP STORAGE ON GOOGLE DRIVE

By default, Google Drive provides 15GB of storage capacity to all Gmail users. As and when you save files, this 15GB allowance fills up over time. You won't be able to store any more files to Drive once your quota is full. Other features, such as Google Photos backup, which uses your Drive's storage capacity, will be affected as well.

Furthermore, because all of your Gmail data is included in your Google Drive storage quota, you may not be able to receive emails. This is why it's important to keep some free space on Google Drive and free up storage on a regular basis.

To free up Google Drive storage, simply follow these simple steps.

1. DELETE LARGE FILES

It's possible that you're unaware that you've saved enormous files on Google Drive for a long time. To examine all of the huge files on your Google Drive, sort the list of files in descending order of storage size. It's preferable to delete those files if you don't require them.

Step 1: Open Google Drive in your web browser.

Step 2: Click on the Storage option in the left pane.

Step 3: This is where you will see all your files on Google Drive listed in descending order. The largest file will be listed at the top.

Step 4: Take a look at the files listed here. If you do not want them anymore, right-click the file and select Remove.

Step 5: Repeat it all the files you don’t need. If the large files are important, you can also download them onto your computer’s local storage and delete them from Google Drive.

2. CLEAR BIN REGULARLY

Google Drive offers a Trash Bin, similar to the one seen on Windows. As a result, make careful to empty the Bin anytime you delete files from Drive.

Step 1: Open Google Drive in your web browser.

Step 2: Click on the Bin option in the left pane.

Step 3: Select the Empty bin option on the right of your screen.

Step 4: Confirm by clicking on Delete forever. That’ll clear Google Drive’s Bin.

3. CHANGE GOOGLE PHOTOS BACKUP SETTINGS

If you have Google Photos auto-backup activated on your phone, it's likely that it's taking up a lot of space on Google Drive. This is due to the fact that the backup contains photographs and movies. Backing up in the Storage Saver resolution didn't take up any space on Drive until last year. That, however, has changed.

If you backup your photos and videos in original resolution, you'll need a lot more storage. As a result, it's preferable to set the backup quality to Storage Saver and convert all existing photos from Original to Storage Saver as well. Here's how to go about it.

Step 1: Open the Google Photos Settings page on your computer.

Step 2: If your upload quality is set to Original quality, change it to Storage saver. This will change the quality of all future uploads.

Step 3: To change the quality of existing photos, click on Recover Storage.

Step 4: Click on Compress to confirm the action. Note that compressing the images will reduce its quality a bit.

Step 5: You will see another warning saying your photos will be compressed and the action cannot be undone. Click on Compress once again.

Wait the Drive to compress your photos and videos. After that, Google Photos will occupy less storage space.

4. DELETE SPAM EMAILS AND ATTACHMENTS

You wouldn't believe it, but if you have a lot of old emails in your inbox, Gmail can take up a lot of space on your computer. Go to the Storage Settings page to see how much storage Gmail is taking up.

The only method to free up this space in Gmail is to delete all of your old and spam emails. If you don't need your previous emails, go to the top of your inbox and start removing them all at once. You can also clear your Spam folder of all emails.

After you've deleted your old emails, you may use Gmail's auto-delete feature to have spam emails erased automatically in the future. This will keep your Gmail in good working order.

5. DELETE ANDROID BACKUPS

If you have many smartphones or have previously used a few, Google creates a cloud backup of your data and saves it on Drive on a regular basis. Depending on the amount of data backed up, this takes up some extra space on Drive. If these backups aren't vital to you or are from outdated devices, you can remove them.

Step 1: Open Google Drive in your web browser.

Step 2: Click on the Storage option in the left pane.

Step 3: Select the Backups option listed on the top-right corner.

Step 4: You will now see a list of all the backups.

Step 5: Select the backup you don’t need. Right-click on it and select Delete backup.

Step 6: When the prompt displays, click Delete once more. Rep for all of the backups you wish to get rid of.

USE GOOGLE DRIVE TO STORE MORE FILES

Following these procedures should have freed up a significant amount of Google Drive storage, allowing you to store more files in the cloud. To avoid files filling up your storage, make sure you clear up your Google Drive on a regular basis.