Best Free Disk Space Cleaner for Windows 10

• When to clean up disk space in Windows 10?
• Methods to perform disk clean in Windows 10
• Better strategy for Windows 10 disk clean
• Conclusion

When to clean up disk space in Windows 10?

As time goes by, no matter how large your hard drive is, you may face the awkward situation that the free space on your disk becomes less. If a particular partition is close to full, the prompt of “Low Disk Space” warning will occur now and then. Even worse, some system programs may not function well.

Unreasonable disk management could also lead you to disk clean in Windows 10. For instance, you store files or create files on your hard drive irregularly and do not delete them regularly. Day after day, year after year, you’ll find more and more useless files are taking up the hard drive space.

Moreover, if the hard drive comes with small disk capacity, even small amount of junk files obstacle your disk operations. Therefore, cleaning up the disk space ensures smooth running on your Windows 10. Anyway, there are possibly other factors like hibernation files and third-party application files force you to perform disk clean. But what you should do is to find out solutions accordingly.

Methods to perform disk clean in Windows 10

To clean disk space, you can first empty Recycle bin, delete useless files, disable hibernation, remove Temporary files, and uninstall applications you don’t use or preinstalled software from your PC manufacturer. If those measures are not effective, check out fixes below.

1. Run Disk Cleanup on Windows 10

“Disk Cleanup” is a useful tool to clean files including temporary Internet files, Recycle bin and even previous Windows installation, and works its magic on system partition C particularly.

1. Open Disk Cleanup by typing “disk cleanup” in Search box or asking Cortana, or right-clicking C drive and go “Properties”>“Disk Cleanup”.

2. At Disk Cleanup window, check files you want to delete and click on “OK”. Apparently, you have option to delete system files like previous Windows installation by clicking on “Clean up system files”.

2. Turn on Storage Sense for Windows 10

Windows 10 Creator Update version 1703 adds a new feature named Storage Sense which can automatically free up disk space by getting rid of files you don’t need. All you need to do is turning it on since it is disabled by default.

Go “Settings” > “System” > “Storage”. Then you should be able to see the “Storage sense”. You can toggle the button from “Off” to “On” directly or click the link “Change how we free up space” to configure more.

Tip:

If you don’t have Windows 10 Creator Update version 1703, you can also delete temporary files by accessing “Settings” > “System” > “Storage” >choose a drive (C drive for example) > scroll mouse down and find Temporary files > remove them.

3. Fresh start your Windows 10

Refresh Windows tool will help you remove all installed third-party software and games and keep only personal files by replacing the whole system with a clean copy of latest Windows 10 version. If that is what you want, go ahead. Go “Start” > “Settings” > “Update & security” > ”Recovery”. And then click on “Learn how to start fresh with a clean installation of Windows” beneath More recovery options.

4. Wise Disk Cleaner Windows 10

Wise Disk Cleaner, free disk defragmenter and disk cleaner for Windows 10, will clean junks of Browsers, remove junk and useless files of Windows and Defragment your disk. Junk files refer to temporary files, log files, index files and backup files. Now, let’s get to know how to use this tool.

Step 1. Download, install and run Wise Disk Cleaner on your Windows 10. Click “Start Scan” at main interface.

Step 2. You’ll get a list of useless files on your computer. Select the items you want to clean and click “Start Cleaning”. Wait for the process to be completed.

Tips:

You can set regular clean tasks by toggling “Schedule” button in the right side.

Above methods also apply to free disk clean in Windows 7and Windows 8.1/8.

Better strategy for Windows 10 disk clean

Except for cleaning hard disk in Windows 10 with covered methods, you can take other measures to clean your hard drive completely. To be specific, clean up the entire hard drive and create partition on that disk to reuse it. Surely, if you have important files stored on that disk, you have to backup disk or move them to a save place.

AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard is an all-around hard drive partition manager that works quite well on Windows 10/8/7 and Windows XP/Vista. This software allows you to wipe hard drive thoroughly and make hard drive free. Download this freeware to wipe the hard drive by the following steps.

1. Install and run AOMEI Partition Assistant. Right click the hard drive you want to clean and select “Wipe Hard Drive”.

2. Choose the "Fill sectors with Zero" wiping method and click on "OK". To use another 3 methods, you have to upgrade to Professional.

3. Click “Apply”  to execute the pending operations.

Tip:

If system installed, you can create a bootable device and run this software under WinPE mode.

Conclusion

To run Wise Disk Cleaner in Windows 10 is a good way to clean up free space. However, if you have more advanced and direct needs, why not try the free partition manager AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard. It can clean your Windows 10 in different ways and secure erase SSD if you need to. What’s more, the Professional editiont offers more advanced features, such as wipe data on SSD, split partition, transfer OS between MBR and GPT disks, Command Line partition and quick partition, etc.