What is the .Trash folder on Mac, and is it safe to empty?

Where it is

What it is

When you delete a file in Finder, it is not erased. It is moved to a hidden folder in your home folder called .Trash, which is what the Trash icon in the Dock shows you. The file keeps taking up the same space as before.

External drives have their own hidden trash folder, so files deleted from an external drive stay on that drive until you empty the Trash while it is connected.

The Trash grows simply because people forget to empty it. Large items such as old installers, videos and virtual machines can sit there for months.

How big it gets

Anything from empty to many GB, depending on what you deleted and when you last emptied it.

How to clear it by hand

1. Click the Trash icon in the Dock and look through what is there.
2. Drag out anything you want to keep, or right-click it and choose Put Back.
3. Choose Finder > Empty Trash, or right-click the Trash icon and choose Empty Trash.
4. To have this happen automatically, open Finder > Settings > Advanced and turn on Remove items from the Trash after 30 days.

What happens afterwards

Emptied files are permanently deleted and can only be recovered from a backup such as Time Machine. Free space may take a moment to update, and recent local snapshots can hold on to some of it for a while.

How Diskzy handles it

Everything Diskzy removes goes to the Trash, so nothing is gone until you empty it. That gives you a chance to put something back if you change your mind.

Related guides

• Caches~/Library/Caches
• Time Machine local snapshots(APFS snapshots, not a folder)
• Mail Downloads~/Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Mail Downloads