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The New Math: How Sierra Calculates Free Space

Over at Six Colors, Jason Snell reveals that macOS 10.12 Sierra calculates free space on your drive differently than in the past. Along with drive space that doesn’t contain any data, Sierra now includes in the calculation “purgeable space,” which holds data that can be deleted from your drive because Sierra can redownload it if necessary. This purgeable data includes stuff like files stored in iCloud, certain large fonts, and unused dictionaries, along with purchased video content from the iTunes Store and photos and videos you have in iCloud Photo Library (those last two require you to have enabled the appropriate settings in iTunes and Photos). Keep this in mind, or you could get confused when trying to determine how much space you have left on your drive!

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