How to clear system data on iPhone

laceefromseattle Said:

"System data taking all my iPhone storage!: No matter how many times I follow the recommendations and offload and delete apps- my iPhone 12 storage always fills up- I can’t figure out why. I have about 25gb in apps, 11 GB of photos, 9 iOS, 16 in system data! Anyway to reduce that system data? Capacity is 64GB- seems crazy that a third of that is stuff I can’t control."

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Clearing System Data (Formerly Called "Other"):

Use my User Tip: How to Clear "Other" in your iPhone's Storage - Use Backup - User Tip. Caches would be being used for remembrance of application use. You'd backup your iPhone, and then restore your iPhone from the backup you've just created. All System Data will delete.

I discovered that ios 17.1.1 aparently has a bug in the memory manager not returning cache. I ended up having to deep sleep/suspending all of my apps. This is where it removes the app, deletes cache, but keeps stored data. That gave me enough room to immediately update to 17.1.2.

I tried just clearing all cache and the suspending some apps. In both cases, I could start the update, but cache would grow to take up available memory and the update would fail.

I don't know for sure if cache was growing or not after suspending all apps, but I had enough time to complete the update. After that, I restored apps as I needed them, which was a lot at first. I think there are some infrequently used apps that I have not yet restored, but I'm pretty close to where I was and I able to do everything I need to.

I still see over 127 Gb of usage, but everything works fine. If possible, skip 17.1.1. I was able to update my iPad from 16.x to 17.1.2. Also, I don't know if this bug effected ipados or not.

There may be other issues that cause this problem too. The other solutions here either didn't work or didn't apply. Maybe this will help some others with this problem.

Best of luck!

menzer1911 Said:

"It’ not a solution though, my Iphone is 512 GB and system data is fluctuating around 300-320 GB which is insane!!! "

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Emptying "System Data":

Use My User Tip: How to Clear "Other" in your iPhone's Storage - Use Backup - Apple Community

“iPhone 6s 32 gb system data 22 gb who I delete”

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How to Clear System Data:

“System Data” was formerly called ”Other” in older iOS versions. So, use my User Tip: How to Clear "Other" in your iPhone's Storage - Use Backup - Apple Community

Try removing application data from Google Maps. I just did that and my free storage went from 10 GB to 90 GB.

Check out this resource if it can help you: System Data taking all my iPhone storage: 6 steps to Clean it up. Step 6 helped me reduce 20gb of system data and force restart reduced 5gb.

The date change thing worked. Set my date 3 months ahead and went from 12 GB of system data to 4.5 GB

delete google and safari history and cache thank me later make sure it’s all time history setting

• Restart the device. That's it.

If the above does not resolve the issue then...

I would ignore that because this system data will make room when you need more space on your iPhone. These are some cache and temporary files that will be erased by the system whenever you try to save more files.

You may --> Clear Other storage on your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support (IN)

Tap on System Data it will take you to "Other System Data"

Now the question is what is the "Other System Data" storage. Read on...

• Other System Data: Non-removable mobile assets, like Siri voices, fonts, dictionaries, non-removable logs and caches, Spotlight index, and system data, such as Keychain and CloudKit Database. Cached files can't be deleted by the system.
• System: Space taken by the operating system. This can vary based on your device and model.

About cached files in "Other System Data"

Finder and iTunes categorize cached music, videos, and photos as Other instead of actual songs, videos, or photos. Cached files are created when you stream or view content like music, videos, and photos. When you stream music or video, that content is stored as cached files on your device so you can quickly access it again.

Your device automatically removes cached files and temporary files when your device needs more space.

If storage on your device differs from what you see in Finder or iTunes

Since Finder and iTunes categorize cached files as Other, reported usage for Music or Videos might differ. To view usage on your device, go to Settings > General > [Device] Storage.

If you want to delete the cached files from your device

Your device automatically deletes cached files and temporary files when it needs more space. You don't need to delete them yourself.

When following a bunch of these steps that some people ave suggested should work to remove it, my system data actually got bigger by about 5 GB and completely maxed out the space on my IPhone. The only step that did anything to reduce it was the one where you set the time and date to 1 year ahead with airplane mode on. Other than that, everything else I tried only made the problem worse. It seems like this is forced obsolescence at work to me. Phones should be designed to last at least 5 years, but actually using the device seems to be killing it.

Check music streaming platforms everyone! My friend was having this problem and we learned it counted all his Amazon music albums were being counted towards that because they are cached.

This Reddit post has a procedure you can go through which helped my drop the amount of system storage on multiple occasions

https://reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/zzoqdj/psa_the_proper_way_to_delete_or_shrink_iphone/j2en9xo/

Needless to say, 64GB isn't enough these days, but the first thing you can do is clear your browser cache, move your old backups to a mac, or another cloud service, and delete them from your iPhone.

You can also use powerful third-party apps like CleanMyPhone, CleanUp, etc. to clean up your iPhone's memory on regular basis

go to google and safari delete history cookies and all delete all time history i cleared all my system space settings up

thank me later