Cleaning Up Google Drive for Free Storage
A financial writer shares their personal experience of avoiding Google One fees by cleaning up clutter in their Google Drive storage. They claim that most of the time, they can free up months' worth of space without spending a dime.
The writer starts by checking where their storage is going, using the Google One website to see how much space is being used by Gmail, Google Photos, and other applications. If Gmail or Photos are taking up too much space, they focus on cleaning those areas first.
If it's Drive that's the issue, they sort files in Google Drive by size, identifying large video files, ZIP archives, and duplicate exports as common culprits. They recommend downloading needed files to an external hard drive and deleting them from Drive.
The writer also advises emptying the Trash folder regularly, as deleted files remain there for 30 days before being permanently deleted. Additionally, they suggest searching for 'unorganized' files in Google Drive, which can reveal orphaned uploads or duplicate files.