The 'Other' category in iPhone and iPad's storage doesn't have to take up so much space.
The "Other" category on your iPhone and iPad is basically where all of your caches, settings preferences, saved messages, voice memos, and… well, other data is stored. There is no simple way to identify and remove data in the Other storage category. With a bit of patience, you can reduce the amount of space it takes up on your iPhone or iPad. Follow the steps below to get started.
How to check your iPhone or iPad's storage space
You can quickly see what apps are taking up space on your iPhone or iPad by checking out the Usage folder in the Settings app.
- Open the Settings app.
Tap General.

- Tap Storage & iCloud Usage.
Tap Manage Storage.

You will see, listed by size, what apps you have on your iPhone or iPad. The larger apps may be the culprit for storing a lot of Other data.
How to check your iPhone or iPad's storage space using iTunes
When connected to iTunes, you can see a graph of your iPhone or iPad's storage categories in the device Summary section. This is where you will distinctly see how much space the Other category is using.
- Connect your iPhone to your computer.
- Open iTunes if it does not open automatically.
Click on the device icon in the upper left corner of the screen.

Click on Summary in the menu on the left side of the iTunes window.

Hover your mouse over the Other section at the bottom of the iTunes window to see how much space the category is using.

How to clear Safari caches and the offline Reading List
Some culprits that takes up Other space on your iPhone and iPad are history and website data in Safari. These are useful for accessing websites quickly, but are not a necessity.
- Open the Settings app.
- Scroll down and tap Safari.
Scroll down and tap Clear History and Website Data.

- When prompted, tap Clear History and Data.
- Tap < Settings in the upper left corner of the screen.
- Scroll up and tap General.
Tap Storage & iCloud Usage.

- Tap Manage Storage.
- Scroll down and tap Safari.
Tap Edit in the upper right corner of the screen.

- Tap the red Remove icon to the left of the Offline Reading List.
Tap Delete to the right of the Offline Reading List.

When you go back to your storage list, you will note that Safari no longer shows any data.
How to delete Mail caches
When you use the Mail app, a cache of all the documents, pictures, and videos you have viewed on your iPhone or iPad are stored on your device. This makes reloading them faster the second time around. But, you don't necessarily want to reopen that kitty GIF that your coworker sent you two years ago. So, you can remove the caches by deleting and reentering your email account information.
It should go without saying that you will need to know your email login and password information before following the steps below (I'm looking at you, Mom).
- Open the Settings app.
- Scroll down and tap Mail, Contacts, Calendars.
Select the account you want to clear the cache from. It might be a good idea to do this will all accounts you have on your iPhone or iPad.

- Tap Delete Account.
- Repeat the process with all email accounts you wish to remove the caches for.
Under Mail, Contacts, and Calendars, tap Add Account.

- Select the account type you wish to add.
Enter your login information.

How to delete iMessage caches
Similar to emails, all of the pictures and videos you receive through MMS are stored in the Other category in your storage. You can delete entire conversations, set messages to delete after a certain period of time, or delete individual images and attachments. We have a full guide for deleting iMessages and attachments.
How to restore your iPhone or iPad from a backup
If you are experiencing a serious issue with an excessive amount of Other storage, you may have some corrupted data on your iPhone or iPad that needs to be removed. The best way to do this is to restore your device from a backup.
You must first disable Find My iPhone before restoring your device from a backup.
- Open the Settings app.
Tap iCloud.

- Scroll down and tap Find My iPhone to toggle it off.
- Enter the password associated with your Apple ID.
Tap Turn Off.

- After disabling Find My iPhone, connect your iPhone to your computer.
- Open iTunes if it does not open automatically.
Click on the device icon in the upper left corner of the screen.

Click on Summary in the menu on the left side of the iTunes window.

Click on Back Up Now if your device does not backup automatically.

When the backup is finished, click on Restore Backup.

- Select the backup for your device.
Click Restore.

The backup should take about 10 minutes. When complete, any corrupted data should be removed from your device.
Questions about Other storage?
If you've got other questions about clearing your Other storage, or you have some best practices of your own, let us know in the comments!
Reader comments
How to find and remove 'Other' files from iPhone and iPad
Doesn't iOS properly manage cache and "junk" files on it own? I figured that's why there was really no easy way to clear cache and other files.
Sent from the iMore App
You're right. iOS does manage cache junk really well. But, that junk file can get bloated sometimes and some people don't like having it just sitting around taking up space.
Lory,
Any chance you could do a "how-to" on how to delete photos from an iPhone WITHOUT deleting them completely from one's iCloud backup?
Thanks
Skye
iCloud is not a storage option for photos. It's a back up option. It backs up what you currently have on your device. If you delete those photos from your device, then when you do the next back up, they are gone from iCloud. iCloud Photo Library is slightly different, but the end result is the same. If you want storage for photos so you can delete them from your camera roll, try Box or Dropbox.
It would be nice if the boys and girls at Piriform would create a version of CCleaner for iOS. It's worked wonders for me for years on the PC and now on Android.
I just assumed they didn't make it for iOS because iOS didn't need it. Seems like it would be really helpful, though.
~TheRealFixxxer
So there's no way to delete Mail caches without deleting the entire account from your phone and adding it again? That seems like an awful waste of time.
Not to mention that it looks like solution from 10 years ago.
But that is Apple shiny from outside only.
Sent from the iMore App
You could go through every single email you've ever opened on your iPhone and delete the ones that you looked at attachments on.
I agree, before you do that, however, you can check the current size of the mail cache by tapping on "Mail" in the list of apps (to get to the list see "Safari" from the tutorial above) and decide whether it's worth the trouble. Mine was just 7 MB.
The timing of this article coincides with WhatsApp for iOS having a major bug in the recent version (updated and fixed now) that caused it to take up a truckload of space. I've noticed a lot of posts of various forums complaining about "Other" storage. Note to WhatsApp users: before going through all these steps, try deleting and reinstalling the app, preferably with a reboot in between.
Thanks for adding this bit of helpful advice.
This didn't work for my iPhone, it even slightly increased the value of 'other' from 4.4 GB to 4.5 GB. What did work, however, was tapping on 'Settings/General/Reset/Erase all Content and Settings" and then restore from the backup. Although this method got rid of 1.5 GB of 'other' stuff, it also had the drawback of requiring me to initialize Touch ID again but I'm happy now.
I think that most of "Other" are apps documents and data, which you can found by Settings > General > Usage > Manage Storage (Storage) > App > ... Some apps collected so many junks, caches, downloaded files. And to completely deleted these document and data of apps, the best way is re-install your Apps. And there is no some third-part app can do this job now by 1-click. Even the #1 Cleaning tool for iPhone - PhoneClean, it is now only useful to clean "Other" in iOS 8.2 and older version.
the WORST offenders in my case filling up the up the other section is IOS updates ESPECIALLY IOS 9 which took up all the space of my 8GB 4S thankfully a restore fixed that
The article is useful but it's a bit time consuming way. Actually, there is a much easier solution to help you erase iPhone or iPad content, that is via third party apps. In this way, you could It only takes a few minutes to complete the whole erase process, here are two reference:
http://giveumore.com/iphone-cleaner.html
http://iosfilemanager.com/ioscleaner/
I tried these steps, more than once, but nothing changed. Any advice?