How to Find Duplicate, Large and Hidden files on a Mac

There are different kinds of files on your Mac that are eating up space, making your Mac slow and short on disk space, and it is recommended to remove all types of unwanted files such as hidden files, duplicate files, and large unused files. These files take a lot of space on your disk without your notice. These files can be removed with the help of different app; you can also remove them manually. In this article, we’ll show you how to clean up your disk by removing these unwanted files from your Mac.

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How to find Large files on Mac

Find large files on OS X El Capitan manually

Launch a Finder window
Go to the Tools Menu and click Show items in a list
Now hold the Cmd key and press F to open the Finder’s search options
Select the size of files to search
Remove unwanted files to free up space on your disk

Find large files on macOS Sierra and later

Using the macOS Sierra will help you remove large files quickly.

Navigate to the Apple Menu
Select About this Mac and then Storage
Now click the Manage button
Now click the Reduce Clutter option and then select Review files in the Storage Optimizing tab
Review your files and remove any unwanted and large files to free up space

Find large files on Mac automatically

As we discussed earlier, several apps will help you remove large and unwanted files easily; these apps help you find the files on your disk. We recommend the Disk Expert app that allows you to view large files on your Mac; this app shows an excellent visual diagram of files and folders. It also shows its size and other statistics. You can easily remove large and unwanted files using the Disk Expert; you can delete several files only using a single Trash button.

How to find duplicate files on Mac

Most of the Mac users are not even aware of the useless duplicate files on their computer; multiple users on the same system mean numerous copies of the same files. These unnecessary duplicate files take up a lot of space on your computer; therefore, it is recommended to remove these files to free up more space. Let’s see how to find duplicate files on your Mac;

Find Duplicate Files on Mac manually

There is no simple way of finding duplicate files on Mac manually; you need the help of an exclusive app. there is only one way of finding these files on your Mac, and that Is searching in the iTunes library. The iTunes library has a built-in option of finding duplicate files for you.

Launch the iTunes library
Select the View option in the Menu
Now click the Show Duplicate Items from the list

More bad news for macOS Catalina users, as there is no iTunes on the macOS Catalina version, so you cannot follow the above steps; therefore, we have another way of finding duplicate files for you.

Launch the Music app
Click Songs
Now click the File option from the Menu
Click on Library from the list and then select the Show Duplicate Items option

You’ll see a list of duplicate files if you’re in the iTunes app or Music app, review the list and remove all the useless duplicate files to free up space. To remove different kinds of duplicate files, you’ll need to navigate to every folder separately to remove them. This method is almost insane to follow because it would take hours to find and remove duplicates in each app individually. Therefore, we recommend you to seek help from a particular app that would help you find duplicates within minutes

Finding Duplicate Files with Duplicate File Finder

The Duplicate File Finder is the best application to use in this kind of situation; this app will help you find every type of duplicate file on your Mac. There’s no need to go to separate folders anymore, with the help of a click or two, you’ll be presented with all the duplicate files within seconds. Follow these steps to remove duplicates using the Duplicate File Finder app.

Open the Duplicate File Finder app
Scan your Mac Home folder for duplicate files
Select the Duplicate files tab to see the duplicates on your Mac
Review the list and remove all the useless duplicates.
Now select the Similar Photos tab and remove all the useless duplicates from there

You can easily find every type of duplicate file on your Mac using the Duplicate File Finder app.

How to Find Hidden Files on Mac

All of the MacOS and their applications create files and service folders that vital for the proper functioning of your system, but these files or folders are usually hidden. But, there are some hidden files and folders that eat up your disk without any purpose, these files are useless are should be removed from the system to free up space. Every file that has dot as the first character in their name is a hidden file. You can even hide a file by adding a dot at the beginning of their name.

Now well show you how to find and remove these useless hidden files.

Show hidden files on Mac via Terminal

Launch the terminal
Now type defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles true and click Enter
Now reboot your Finder by typing killall Finder

Now all of your hidden files are visible, to make them hidden again, you need to follow the same steps and type the same command. The only change you need to make is replacing the true with false. Reboot your Finder by typing the killall Finder command, and now all of your files will be hidden again.

Find Hidden files on Mac with Funter

Funter is a great application to use when finding hidden files on your Mac; this app is free to use and finds your hidden files within seconds. This app also allows you to hide files, find hidden files, and operate hidden files within seconds. You need to click a button or two to find your hidden files. Let’s see how to find hidden files on your Mac using the Funter application.

Open the Funter app
Click the Funter icon that is situated in the toolbar
Now enable the toggle button that says Show Hidden Files
Now that your hidden files are visible, if you want to find a specific hidden file, type the name of a file in the search box and press Enter
You’ll see a list of files that are matching your search

You can free up a lot of room by removing these useless files; these files may be duplicate, cache, or hidden files. You can quickly delete these files with the help of an app, or you can also remove them manually via terminal.