Don’t feel like cleaning your PC of unnecessary files yourself? Let Windows 10 automatically delete unnecessary documents, pictures and other files.
Smart save in Windows 10
Modern hard drives have a huge amount of storage space. But downloads, videos, photos and other files together take up a lot of space on the hard drive. With that ‘Smart save’ feature, Windows 10 automatically disposes of files that are no longer needed.
Turn on the ‘Smart save’ option like this:
- Click the Start button.
- click on Institutions (the gear icon).
- click on System.
- Click on the left Storage.
- Click on the slider under ‘Smart save’ so that it turns blue and the word ‘On’ appears. Is the slider already blue and it says ‘On’? Then this function is already active on the PC.
Unnecessary files are now automatically deleted.
Adjust settings
Also view the settings of the ‘Smart save’ function.
- Click under the blue slider on Configure smart save or run now.
- There are a number of options on this page. Set here whether unused files can be removed from the ‘Downloads’ folder after a certain number of days. And whether temporary files that Windows uses for nothing can be deleted.
- It is important to set how often Windows performs the check.
- Under “Run Storage Insight,” click the drop-down menu.
- Choose the option you want: every day, every week, every month or when disk space is insufficient. Every month is fine for most computers.
The other options are set correctly by default for most users. Adjust them to your liking, but read carefully what goes away. Recovering deleted files is not easy. Click at the bottom if necessary Clean up now to make a first cleanup. This may take a while. When it’s done, it will show you how much extra disk space is now available at the bottom. Click on the arrow at the top left to go back to the overview.
Parts List
In the ‘Storage’ section, there is a bar showing the capacity of the hard drive, how much space is in use and how much is left. Below that is a whole list of individual parts. Click on an item to read more about it. Sometimes an action is immediately available there, such as manually clearing temporary files. Click on the arrow at the top left to go back to the overview.