There are tons of free Mac cleaning apps available in the market. Amongst them, CCleaner is one of the most popular. But it seems you are not happy using it, right? That's why you are here.
So, what are you waiting for? Read the blog further and check out the best CCleaner alternatives for your macOS.
Duplicate Cleaner by DigitalVolcano Software is the leading program for finding and removing duplicate files on your Windows PC. Documents, pictures, music and more - this app will find it all. This free version has a subset of features found in it's big brother, Duplicate Cleaner Pro. Download CCleaner for free. Clean your PC of temporary files, tracking cookies and browser junk! Get the latest version here. Free PC Cleaner version lets you scan only 10% of storage. Windows 10, 8, 7, XP: Yes $29.84: Auslogic BoostSpeed 11 Pro: Works in real-time & clears temp files instantly. Lets you restore system stability in a click. Free pc cleaner version allows junk cleaning only. Windows 10, 8, 7, XP (Both 32 bit & 64 bit) Yes $20.41: Avast Cleanup Premium.
All electronics, including gadgets, automobiles, need consistent maintenance. Likewise, your PC, Mac machine also need spring cleaning for extended life and performance. Cleaning up Mac not only means free up space, but it also includes data organizations, cleaning of junk files, and other unwanted data. Hence, the tools we use to perform all these tasks should be the best and dedicated Mac cleaner apps.
Review title of anthony $17 to clean. OneCleaner app truly free to scan & clean. Could be a great app if didn't advertise as 'free'. 'free' gets you scan for duplicates and large files but no 'cleaning':-/ I prefer to pay those who don't falsely advertise. Found 'cleaner one'. The makers of the world's most popular PC and Mac cleaning software bring you CCleaner for Android. Remove junk, reclaim space, clean RAM, monitor your system and browse safely. Become the master of your own device with the ultimate cleaning app for your Android! Optimize and Clean Speed up your phone and clean junk safely Clean application cache, download folders, browser history, clipboard.
What is the Need for CCleaner Alternatives?
Certainly, CCleaner does its job well. It is designed to find unnecessary files, free up disk space, and is available for Mac, Windows, and Android. Yet, Mac users look for its alternatives because CCleaner is not fast. Also, junk removal is necessary, and it rarely cleans partial downloads, lists old and large files. Hence, the need for best CCleaner alternatives arise.
Best CCleaner Alternatives For Mac OS X – Paid & Free Mac Clean Tools
Being a Mac user, I know seeing that rainbow wheel is frustrating. Therefore, I always like to keep my Mac optimized and clean. For this, I use different tools and would recommend you use them. Once you use these tools, you will see a performance boost.However, if you hate paying for those expensive Mac cleaners, we have an ultimate solution called Disk Clean Pro. It comes for $4.99 and is available at Mac App Store. So, go for it.
Note: If you are looking for more than cleaning apps for Mac. We've got it covered. Disk Clean Pro, as the name suggests, does complete disk maintenance and check. Using this tool, you can clean junk files, logs, crash reports, partial downloads. Moreover, it can get rid of duplicates – the biggest space hogger. Detect large files, old & unused files, clean cache, cookies, and other privacy exposing traces. It's the one-stop solution for your Mac problems.
Get Disk Clean Pro from here.
#1. Disk Clean Pro – Best Mac Maintenance Utility
Disk Clean Pro, offered by Systweak, has been the #1 Mac cleanup and optimization utility on Mac App, and hence we recommend it. This all in one tool is designed to boost system performance and clean junk files. It offers a duplicate file cleaner and remover, partial file download remover, and more such features. It is amongst the first best CCleaner alternatives for Mac that offers comprehensive Mac cleaning and maintenance.
Disk Clean Pro features –
- Helps clean junk files, unused language files, cache, cookies, etc.
- Deletes local copy of email attachments and downloads
- Performs thorough scanning to clean errors
- Offers Internet Privacy
- Looks every nook and cranny of Mac for cluttered data
Pros
- 100% safe to use
- One-click optimization tool
- Offers cleaning and privacy features
- Available at Mac App Store
Cons
User Review
Works as it claims. Disk Clean Pro is a fantastic Mac cleaning tool. Anyone, even a novice and use it efficiently.
Try Disk Clean Pro
2. CleanMyMac X
Offered by MacPaw, CleanMyMac X is an excellent cleaning tool. It provides specific great tools and has earned its name for the way it works. It is among the best CCleaner alternatives as it detects junk files, finds, and removes malware, optimizes Mac to boost performance, and helps uninstall applications without leaving traces. Moreover, it offers Shredder to delete files and more permanently. You must be wondering then why it is second, right?
Unlike Disk Clean Pro, it is not listed on the Mac App Store, and it costs $34.95. Not only this, Disk Clean Pro performs better as a cleaning program for Mac.
CleanMyMac X features –
- Multilingual
- Removed malware
- Instantly removed browsing history and online, offline activity traces
- One button does all
- It is a great performance monitor.
Pros
- Best protection tool
- Quick scanning
- Free version available
- Guides through regular disk check-ups
Cons
3. AppCleaner
The most popular free Mac cleaner and uninstaller software for macOS. This is thorough at its job. When it comes to uninstalling and deleting unwanted programs from Mac, AppCleaner leaves no stone unturned. It detects all corresponding files from every corner and removes them. Once you use AppCleaner to uninstall an app, you will never get to know it existed.
To use it, simply drag and drop the software into it. This best CCleaner alternative will look for files, be it hidden, and notify them before deleting them. AppCleaner is an ultimate tool, and most importantly, you don't have to spend a penny to use it.
AppCleaner features –
- Free Mac cleaner tool
- Decide what action to perform.
- Uninstall apps without leaving leftovers
- Reset app preferences
Pros
- Easy installation
- Drag & drop to uninstall apps
- Multilingual
- Great space saver and performance booster
Cons
- Works only as an uninstaller. Not a multipurpose app.
Try Disk Clean Pro
2. CleanMyMac X
Offered by MacPaw, CleanMyMac X is an excellent cleaning tool. It provides specific great tools and has earned its name for the way it works. It is among the best CCleaner alternatives as it detects junk files, finds, and removes malware, optimizes Mac to boost performance, and helps uninstall applications without leaving traces. Moreover, it offers Shredder to delete files and more permanently. You must be wondering then why it is second, right?
Unlike Disk Clean Pro, it is not listed on the Mac App Store, and it costs $34.95. Not only this, Disk Clean Pro performs better as a cleaning program for Mac.
CleanMyMac X features –
- Multilingual
- Removed malware
- Instantly removed browsing history and online, offline activity traces
- One button does all
- It is a great performance monitor.
Pros
- Best protection tool
- Quick scanning
- Free version available
- Guides through regular disk check-ups
Cons
3. AppCleaner
The most popular free Mac cleaner and uninstaller software for macOS. This is thorough at its job. When it comes to uninstalling and deleting unwanted programs from Mac, AppCleaner leaves no stone unturned. It detects all corresponding files from every corner and removes them. Once you use AppCleaner to uninstall an app, you will never get to know it existed.
To use it, simply drag and drop the software into it. This best CCleaner alternative will look for files, be it hidden, and notify them before deleting them. AppCleaner is an ultimate tool, and most importantly, you don't have to spend a penny to use it.
AppCleaner features –
- Free Mac cleaner tool
- Decide what action to perform.
- Uninstall apps without leaving leftovers
- Reset app preferences
Pros
- Easy installation
- Drag & drop to uninstall apps
- Multilingual
- Great space saver and performance booster
Cons
- Works only as an uninstaller. Not a multipurpose app.
So, this is what the list of 3 best CCleaner alternatives look like. You can pick any and try using them on your Mac. In addition to this, we have also got certain frequently asked questions covered.
Frequently Asked Questions – Top CCleaner Alternatives
Q1. What is wrong with CCleaner? Why look for an alternative?
Even after being in bad publicity, CCleaner is a powerful Mac cleaning tool. But as Mac is getting advanced, we need a more advanced tool that is fast and thorough. Hence, the need to look for the best alternative for CCleaner rises.
Q2. Are the CCleaner alternatives safe to use?
Used by millions worldwide, the CCleaner alternatives listed above are trustworthy and safe to use. On our recommendation, you can try using Disk Clean Pro, the single Best CCleaner Alternative for macOS.
Q3. Which is the best CCleaner alternative, paid, or free Paid?
The paid ones are always better. They are thoroughly tested and can be relied upon. That said, you should never trust a free product for your Mac optimization and cleanup.
Tada, with this, the list of best CCleaner alternatives comes to an end. You can use any. If you are looking for a multipurpose tool, use Disk Clean Pro. However, if you want an optimization app and a malware cleaner, CleanMyMac X is there. Besides, if you just want an uninstaller, then you know App Cleaner is the choice. If you like reading the post, do share with others, and give us an upvote.
So you've had your Mac for a while, and things don't feel as fresh and clean as they used to? Although Macs don't require a lot of maintenance for cleaning, those temporary files, app leftovers, and system cache do accumulate. These files may slow down your machine and take up a lot of valuable space. In this article, we share quick and easy ways to clean up your MacBook. Let's get started!
How to clean your Mac automatically
Here's a simple diagram to explain the most common types of computer junk, sorted by size. Some of these, like Trash bin files, are easily reachable, while others are stored away in hidden system folders. Sadly, there's no easy way to clear them up without special skills.
If you don't feel like spending the next several hours cleaning your Mac manually, you can use a powerful cleaning tool CleanMyMac X to find and remove all the clutter your Mac contains. It knows which files are useless, how to find them and remove completely. CleanMyMac has everything to finish the 3-hour task of a Mac cleanup in under 5 minutes. It will even clean up the junk you didn't know about and give your computer a speed boost.
How to clean up system storage on Mac with CleanMyMac X:
- Download CleanMyMac X for free here.
- Run the app and go to System Junk.
- Click Scan.
- Press Clean to get rid of all junk.
Done! Now your Mac looks much better!
How to Clean Mac Hard Drive Manually
If you never performed an automatic or manual system cleaning — it means that your Mac has been collecting unnecessary files and clutter for years. You can quickly clean up your Mac with these easy steps.
1. Clean up cache
You've probably heard 'Remove your cache' as a web browser troubleshooting tip. In fact, your Mac stores a lot of information in files called caches, allowing fast access to that data and reducing the need to get it from the original source again. Unfortunately, those files take a lot of space on your Mac, and instead of speeding the things up, they slow your computer down. Therefore, if you want to give your system a boost, clean your Mac from the cache files.
There are two ways to do that: you can delete them manually or use a MacBook cleaner like CleanMyMac X to do the job for you. Of course, the second way is an easy and fast one. However, if you decide to clean up the cache manually, check out a comprehensive guide on 'How to Clear Cache on a Mac.'
2. Uninstall apps you don't use
The applications you've installed on your Mac take up space, of course. And over time when your Mac becomes full of different apps, it may start running slowly. How to clean MacBook? In the first place, you need to remove the apps you no longer use or need. To do this, right-click on the app you want to remove and choose Move to Bin.
You may be surprised to find out that sending an app to the Trash will not uninstall it completely because the app leftovers still remain on your Mac taking up a lot of storage. So, if you want to be a responsible Mac user, you need to uninstall applications the right way. Here's a step-by-step guide on 'How to Uninstall Apps on a Mac.'
Extra step: Trim down your login items
Login items are applications that run automatically upon startup. Nowadays, every second app tries to become as prominent as possible and get into your Login Items. First of all, you may not even know what they are (not all of them appear in the Dock). Secondly, such apps consume memory. That's enough reasons to get rid of extra login items you don't need.
- Open System Preferences.
- Go to Users & Groups.
- Choose your nickname on the left.
- Choose the Login Items tab.
- Check startup programs you want to remove.
- Press the '–' sign below.
You're done.
3. Clean out useless duplicates
Identical photos, music tracks you've added one time too many, saved and re-saved PDF files… all of that sits on your Mac and gobbles up storage. The storage that could be used for better purposes.
So how do you quickly weed them out? The fastest way is to use Gemini 2: The Duplicate Cleaner.
- Download and launch the app
- Click 'Scan for Duplicates', and watch as it quickly fetches them from different corners of your Mac.
- Once the scan is done, hit Review Results and check which copies you want to remove.
- Click Smart Cleanup to delete everything you've selected.
That's it. Now your Mac should be completely duplicate-free.
4. Empty the trash
Even though you've deleted the files, they reside in your Trash bin taking up a lot of storage on your Mac. They are just waiting to be removed completely. If you want your precious hard drive space back, you need to empty the Trash.
Here's how to clean your MacBook from the trash:
- Click and hold on the Trash can icon in the Dock.
- Click Empty and then Empty Bin.
The process is quite simple, right? There is even a more effortless way to clear Trash. CleanMyMac X scans your Mac for junk and lets you remove all trashed files. To do that, launch CleanMyMac X and press Scan. When the scan is completed, click Review Details to see what exactly CleanMyMac X has found.
I've already cleaned Bin a couple of weeks before, but over some time, almost a gigabyte of trashed files has accumulated. Now, I can simply click Back to Summary and then Run to clean Trash and system junk.
5. Reduce clutter
Apple has already thought about the clutter that can be generated on the Macs and provided a possible solution. Here's how to reduce clutter on your Mac:
- Go to the Apple menu.
- Choose About This Mac and then Storage. Here you can see how much free space is left on your computer.
- Then click Manage.
Here're some recommendations for saving space on your Mac. You can choose Review Files to examine apps, documents, and other files that are stored on your Mac.
You can choose any file in every category (Applications, Bin, Documents, etc.) and click Delete to remove it and optimize space. Look through other recommendations and make the necessary changes to use your Mac's space more efficiently.
6. Delete large and old files
It has always been a rule of thumb among computer geeks, that you should keep a minimum of 15-20% of free space on your main hard drive. This is just a rough estimation, but the more free space you have, the faster your Mac works. A computer magazine once performed a test on this, which concluded that the difference in speed can reach as much as 35%. If you work with heavy graphics or video rendering, even more free space is recommended.
How to have more free space? Delete large and old files.
The first way is totally manual and requires you to find them one by one, while for the second way, you just need to make two clicks and CleanMyMac X will do the job for you.
How to clean up Mac with CleanMyMac X:
- Download CleanMyMac X (a link to a free edition of the app)
- Launch the program.
- Go to the Large and Old Files section on the menu.
- Click Scan.
- Review the details, select what to clean and then click Clean.
That's it!
7. Remove old iOS backups
Having your files backed up is a wonderful thing. But over time your Mac becomes overloaded with old backups that take gigabytes of storage on your hard drive. That's why you should consider removing the old iOS backups you no longer need.
Each backup remains stored on your computer and is accessible via iTunes. To delete the old backups, you need to do the following:
- Choose the Apple menu and then select About This Mac.
- Go to the Storage tab and click Manage.
- Here, choose iOS Files.
- Select the backup you want to remove and click Delete.
- Confirm and you're done!
That's it! The backup files are gone from your Mac forever.
8. Wipe out Language files
Unused language localizations take up about 1 GB of storage space. Mac applications come with language files for every language they support. It allows starting using the app in that language immediately. Cool, right? Not always. Just consider: when was the last time you used the app in Bengali or Korean? Since you don't speak those languages, such files just waste space on your Mac. You need to remove the unnecessary language files and clean MacBook from that clutter.
How to delete the language files? Go to Finder > Applications, then right-click the app which language files you want to remove and choose Show Package Contents. Open the Resources folder and then find folders ending with '.lproj.' Every folder contains language files for one particular language. Note that for every app you should manually find and select the files to remove. But there is an automatic way to delete the language files that will save you tons of time — CleanMyMac X. Just download the application (for free) and it will do the job for you.
9. Delete old DMGs
Disk images (DMGs) often take up valuable space on your Mac. Here's how to perform a Mac cleanup and get rid of those files:
- Open Finder and type 'disk image' in the search bar.
- Then delete all files that have .dmg extensions. Don't forget to remove them from Trash as well.
CleanMyMac X allows you to locate and delete DMGs quicker. With its System Junk module you can remove unused disk image in the single click of a button:
Download old version mac os. Just press Clean and it's done!
10. Remove duplicates
Useless copies of your documents, files, and photos eat up your Mac's precious space. Therefore, if you wonder how to clean up a Mac and boost its performance, try to delete the duplicates. Note that the process of finding and removing the duplicates requires either a lot of patience and time (if you decide to delete them manually) or a duplicate finder app. Whatever method you choose, make sure to check out this article on 'How to Find Duplicates on Mac.'
11. Tidy up your desktop
Many people use Desktop as their primary destination for files. But this could be tricky because your OS treats every file on a desktop as an active window. When items on your desktop are too many, Finder gets substantially slower. This leads us to the most compelling advice in this article — cleaning up desktop does miracles!
Rather than just leaving every file on your desktop, organize them into folders. The latest macOS does that automatically thanks to the Stacks feature. You can also use Google Drive, Dropbox or any external storage device to save your files and keep your desktop tidy.
12. Clean your Mac's keyboard
Our last but not least advice is to wipe your Mac's keyboard. As you use your keyboard daily, it quickly gets dirty. Moreover, all those crumbs may live under the keys forever!
If you were wondering how to clean Mac's keyboard, there are no special rules here. You can try blowing the dust and other particles out of your keyboard once in a while. Disinfecting wipes and alcohol-based sprays may also prove useful. Just choose the piece of fabric and wipe the keys gently to make them clean and shiny!
All in all, be careful with your system files. Don't delete things you're not sure about. If you are not completely confident that you can manage the task by yourself, better use a dedicated utility like CleanMyMac X to get a fresh and clean Mac in just two clicks. Here's the video describing quick tips to clean up your Mac:
Happy cleaning!