---
title: "Microsoft 365 - Tips To Free Up Space on Your Account"
canonical: "https://tech.calpoly.edu/space/CPKB/3392929793/Microsoft%20365%20-%20Tips%20To%20Free%20Up%20Space%20on%20Your%20Account"
format: markdown
---
Cleaning out emails, files and folders in your Office 365 account on a regular basis will help you find what you are looking for more quickly and stay more secure. Below are some tips on how to find and remove old and large files to free up space in your account.
> ℹ️ **REMINDER:**
> ℹ️
> ℹ️ - **Empty your Recycle Bin and Junk Email folders**, as they count against your quota.
> ℹ️ - **Faculty/staff/student** accounts have quotas of:
> ℹ️ - 100 GB for email and
> ℹ️ - 500 GB for OneDrive.
> ℹ️ - **Guest/department/emeritus **accounts have quotas of:
> ℹ️ - 50 GB for email and
> ℹ️ - 100 GB for OneDrive.
##
**EMAIL TIP #1 | Find Large Messages to Delete**
Large emails frequently have large attachments. Above your list of emails, you should see a drop-down menu for sorting your emails.
1. From the dropdown menu, choose **Size**, then choose **Largest on top**.
*Now your emails with large files are listed in a way that is easier for you to access/review.*
2. **Download attachments** you wish to keep, then **delete the emails**.
##
**EMAIL** **TIP #2 | Use the Built-in Storage Cleanup Tool to Remove Old Messages**
1. In the **web version** of **Outlook**, click on the **Gear Icon** in the upper right to open your **Settings**.
2. In **Settings**, go to **Account > Storage**.
*This will show how much space your email is using, and give you a breakdown by folder. *
> ⚠️ **CAUTION:**
> ⚠️ The steps below will **permanently delete** the messages that you select, so be careful to make sure you are confident you won’t need any of these emails.
1. Under the **Manage** column for each folder, you can choose to Empty: **All**, **3 months and older**, **6 months and older,** or **12 months and older**.
2. Repeat this process for each folder from which you want to delete older emails.
*Depending on the number of emails in the folder, it may take a few minutes to empty all the emails. You will see a spinning wheel by this folder in your account until it finishes deleting the old messages. *
##
**EMAIL** **TIP #3 | Use Sweep Rules to Find Emails From Specific Senders**
Use Sweep to quickly delete unwanted email in your Inbox or a subfolder. Sweep gives you options to automatically delete all incoming email from a particular sender, to keep only the latest email, or to delete email older than 10 days.
1. Select an **email message from the sender** whose messages you want to delete.
2. On the menu bar, select **Sweep.**
> ℹ️ **Note: **The **Sweep** option isn't available from the following folders: **Junk Email**, **Drafts**, **Sent Items**, and **Deleted Items**.
3. Choose **how you want to handle email messages** from the sender you chose, then click the **OK** button.
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##
**ONEDRIVE** **TIP | Find Large Files in OneDrive**
1. Log in to your **OneDrive account **in a web browser,
*At the bottom of the left side Navigation pane, there is a section that shows the amount of Storage you are using.* *The blue number is the amount of space you are using, *
2. Click the **blue number**.
*A screen listing your files in order of size. The largest files are at the top.*
3. From this screen, you can **select and delete files** you no longer need.
4. After deleting the files you no longer need, there is a convenient link to your OneDrive Recycle Bin in the title bar on the **Largest files in your OneDrive** page.
> ℹ️ **NOTE:**
> ℹ️ Files in your Recycle Bin will be automatically removed after 93 days, but they still count against your quota while they are in your Recycle Bin. You can manually empty the Recycle Bin to gain the space back immediately.
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## **SHAREPOINT** **TIP #1 | Find Large Files in OneDrive**
1. After opening a SharePoint site where you are a Site Admin or Owner, click on the **Gear Icon** menu in the upper right and select **Site contents**.
2. On the **Site Contents **page, you can:
1. Click on the **Site settings** button to look for large files to delete.
2. Click the **Recycle bin button **in the upper right to open the Recycle Bin.
*Files in the Recycle Bin are automatically removed after 93 days, but they count against the site quota until they are removed.*
> ℹ️ You can manually empty the Recycle Bin to gain the quota space back immediately.
3. After clicking on the **Site settings **button, look for the **Site Collection Administration **section and click the **Storage Metrics** option.
*You can drill down into different folders to find specific folders or files that are particularly large. Unfortunately, you cannot delete the files or folders directly from the Storage Metrics tool. *
4. You need to return to the **Site Contents** page to find the folders and files you want to delete, then delete them from there.
> ✅ *Don’t forget to empty the Recycle Bin after doing your cleanup. *
## **SHAREPOINT** **TIP #2 | Delete a SharePoint Site That is No Longer Needed**
If you are an Owner of a SharePoint site and no longer need the site or any of its contents, you can delete the site to help keep our SharePoint environment tidy.
1. After opening up the **SharePoint site **you want to delete, click on the **Gear Icon **menu and select **Site information**.
2. On the **Site information** menu, click on the **Delete site** link at the very bottom.