The Trash and the space it holds

Files you move to the Trash still take up space until the Trash is emptied. Storage Studio shows you how much your Trash is holding, but emptying it is the one thing in the app that can't be undone. So it's never behind a one-tap button: Storage Studio leaves that decision to you, in Finder, where macOS asks you to confirm.

Where you'll see the Trash

• What's Using Space (Storage Inspector) lists the Trash with its size, without a Move button, and says why: Emptying the Trash is the one thing Storage Studio can't undo, so it isn't offered here. Use Free Up Space when you've decided.
• Emergency Space shows Your Trash is holding … in a separate note with an Open Trash button. The Trash is never part of the plan it builds for you. See Emergency Space.
• Where Did My Space Go lists the Trash as a line of its own when it grew, with Open Trash and the hint Emptying it can't be undone, so it's yours to do. See Where did my space go?.
• Smart Care lists Empty old Trash items in its checklist but never runs that step. See Smart Care.

The one automatic exception: old Trash items

Among the default rules that Free Up Space runs, one clears items that have been in your Trash for more than 30 days. It runs when Free Up Space runs, including the first step of a Smart Care run and the daily automatic run. Items removed this way are gone for good; they don't go anywhere else first.

%% caption: When old items in the Trash are cleared, and how to stop it
flowchart TD
  A[Free Up Space runs your rules] --> B{Is Never delete personal files on?}
  B -->|Yes| C[The Trash is left alone]
  B -->|No| D{Has an item been in the Trash more than 30 days?}
  D -->|No| C
  D -->|Yes| E[That item is removed for good]

To stop this, open Settings → Rules and turn on Never delete personal files — only move them. Every Delete rule is skipped while it's on; app-cache cleaning still runs. When the switch is on, a Smart Care summary may mention how much more you could free by allowing old Trash to be cleared, so you can decide.

Other things that go to the Trash, and stay recoverable

Several features use the Trash as a safety net rather than deleting outright:

• Delete rules (old crash reports, old Mail attachments and similar) move items to the Trash, not straight off the disk.
• Duplicates: extras are moved to the Trash, so you can put them back. See Finding and removing duplicates.
• Uninstalling an app moves it and its files to the Trash. See Uninstalling an app completely.

Things that are still in the Trash keep using space, so the space comes back only when you empty it.

The Recycle Vault is different

The Recycle Vault is Storage Studio's own safety net. Files that Emergency Space and some other features remove are copied there first, normally on your external drive, and kept for six months so you can put them back. It isn't the macOS Trash, and emptying the Trash doesn't touch it.

See also: Storage Studio and emptying the Trash automatically · How Storage Studio deletes things · Why deleting files doesn't always give the space back