Windows 10 Hard Drive Keeps Filling Up

This is a common problem, but in my case there is an uncommon cause. Everyone complains about this problem at some point in time, but it's usually because people have downloaded too much stuff, installed too many apps, or haven't cleared out temp files and cache etc.

In my case, I've literally deleted over 15 gig of data, and Windows still keeps telling me that I'm out of space. The other day, I moved all my movies, music etc. which was at least 15 gig of data on to an external drive, and give minutes later, I got the message telling me to clean up space.

This is driving me nuts. I've been using DOS and Windows for over 15 years and I've never had this problem. I've searched for gigantic files, and I deleted heaps of them. I have run C Cleaner (which got rid of about a gig), and still most of my hard drive is filled with garbage and I can't find it. I did a disk analyze in C Cleaner and it says about 90% of my disk space is "Other" types of files. Not movies, apps, or music.

How do I find out where it's all going?

15 gig belongs to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft but this is only a drop in the ocean. There is about 250 gig unaccounted for.

Kruddler2017 said:

How do I find out where it's all going?

If you don't want to use third-party tools, Settings > System > Storage.

View Storage Usage of Drives in Windows 10

Have you got sky news or simliar On mine sky new cached 12gig if you got programs and look at some of these types of apps it often tells you the cache and you can clear it

Another thing to check is the System Protection Settings / Max Usage Size... It might be set to high and eating up space.

See this tutorial .... Change System Protection Max Storage Size for Drive in Windows 10 Performance Maintenance Tutorials

Bree said:

If you don't want to use third-party tools, Settings > System > Storage.

Thanks. This does help a lot!

But, this is getting insane now. The above showed me where a lot of the space was. It showed me that there were 15 gig of Android emulators on my machine for development. So, I deleted them and emptied the recycle bin. 15 minutes later, Windows tells me my hard drive is full again.

I've got nothing to go on here! I've used C Cleaner, I've deleted everything I possibly can. Something is just eating space and I cannot figure out what it is! I'm really starting to get worried that it's malware.

Also, I don't have system restore turned on.

have you tried a virus scan (adware plus(. that shit can also fill your hard drive in no time.

I'm not using any backup utilities. I really can't figure out where it is going! I've been using DOS and Windows for decades so I know what the usual tricks are, but I'm really stumped now. It must be some hidden system files or something. Windows says that it's all being swallowed up by apps but that makes no sense.