How to Check Available Storage Space on Your PC in Windows 11

Using Settings to Check Total and Available Drive Space

The quickest way to check storage is the Settings ⚙️ app. It shows the total capacity and free space of your main drive. It also sorts your files into categories like apps, temporary data, and documents, so you can see what is filling your hard drive or solid-state drive (SSD).

1. Press Win+I to open Settings.
2. Select System in the left-hand menu, then click Storage on the right. A bar appears for your main drive (usually C:) showing how much is used.
3. Look at the drive overview at the top. It shows your total capacity, used space, and free space.
4. Click Show more categories to expand the list. You will now see exact figures for Installed apps, Temporary files, Documents, and other data types.
5. Click any category to drill down into the individual items using the space.

The category list is a snapshot, and Windows may take a few moments to finish calculating it. If a category looks too small or too large, wait a few seconds and look again.

On the same page, look for the Cleanup recommendations section. In current Windows 11 versions it gathers suggestions in one place: temporary files, large or unused files, files already synced to the cloud, and unused apps. Open each suggestion, review what it lists, and select only the items you want removed.

Settings also reports on drives other than C:. Go to Settings › System › Storage › Advanced storage settings › Storage used on other drives. Pick a secondary drive from the list, and Windows shows its usage by category, not just the main drive’s.

Checking Drive Health and Properties in File Explorer

File Explorer is the best way to check any individual drive or partition (a section of a physical drive that Windows treats as its own drive). It shows a capacity bar for external hard drives, secondary internal drives, and USB thumb drives, so you do not have to dig through Settings.

1. Press Windows Key + E to open File Explorer.
2. Click This PC in the left sidebar. All connected drives appear on the right.
3. Find the drive you want to check. The colored bar under the drive icon shows used versus free space at a glance. The bar turns red when a drive is nearly full.
4. Right-click the drive and select Properties from the context menu. A window opens for that drive.
5. On the General tab, read the pie chart and the figures for Used space and Free space.

If a USB drive or external disk is missing from This PC, check that it is plugged in and that Windows has assigned it a drive letter. Try a different USB port or cable if it still does not appear.

Using Storage Sense to Automatically Manage Free Space

Storage Sense is a built-in Windows 11 tool that deletes unneeded files, such as temporary items and old content in the Recycle Bin, without you doing it by hand. Once it is set up, it keeps clutter from piling up and your drive from filling. It is available in both Home and Pro editions.

1. Open Settings, go to System, then Storage.
2. Click Storage Sense to open its options. On some builds this sits under a Storage management heading.
3. Switch the Automatic User content cleanup toggle to On, so Windows can run the cleanup on its own.
4. Under Configure cleanup schedules, use the drop-down menus to choose how often Storage Sense runs. You can also choose how long files stay in the Recycle Bin and in your Downloads folder before they are deleted.
5. Scroll down and click Run Storage Sense now to run an immediate cleanup. When it finishes, a message says how much space was freed.

Check the Downloads folder setting before you enable it. If you keep important files there, leave it set to Never so nothing you wanted to keep is deleted.

To undo any of this, return to the same page and switch the toggle off. No restart is needed for these settings to take effect.

Cleaning Up Temporary Files and System Residuals

Operating system updates, installer caches, and previous Windows installations leave temporary files behind. These can take up several gigabytes. Going straight to them in Settings is one of the fastest ways to get space back.

1. Open Settings, go to System, and click Storage.
2. Click Temporary files near the top of the category list. Wait while Windows scans the drive. This can take a minute.
3. Tick the boxes for the data you want to remove, such as Windows Update Cleanup, Previous Windows installation(s), and Delivery Optimization Files. Selecting Previous Windows installation(s) means you can no longer roll back to the older version of Windows. That entry only appears after a major upgrade, and Windows removes it by itself after a while anyway.
4. Read the list carefully before you continue. Items such as Recycle Bin and Downloads may appear here, and deleting them cannot be undone.
5. Click the Remove files button.
6. Confirm the prompt to permanently delete the selected items. Windows then shows how much space it freed.

If a category you expected is missing, it probably holds nothing to remove right now. The list changes with your system's state, so it may look different after the next update.

Using Disk Cleanup for Advanced Drive Sweeps

The classic Disk Cleanup tool is still included in Windows 11. It reaches deeper into system directories than the Settings app and gives you more control over Windows update caches and old installation files.

1. Type Disk Cleanup into the taskbar search box and select the app from the results.
2. Choose your main drive from the drop-down menu and click OK. Disk Cleanup spends a moment calculating how much it can free.
3. Click Clean up system files. This step needs administrator rights, so you may see a prompt to approve it. Select your drive again if asked.
4. Tick the boxes next to the system caches, old log files, and error reports you want to clear. The size next to each item shows how much space it uses.
5. Click OK, then click Delete Files to run the cleanup.

Deleted files cannot be restored from this tool, so review each ticked box before you confirm. Leave an item unticked if you are unsure what it does.

Using Command Prompt to Check Storage and Volume Details

You can also check storage with text commands in Command Prompt. This is useful if you prefer the command line, or if you need to see your partitions and volume details from a Windows recovery environment where the normal Settings app is not available.

1. Type cmd in the taskbar search box, right-click Command Prompt, and select Run as administrator. Approve the User Account Control prompt if it appears.
2. Type diskpart and press Enter. The prompt changes to show that the tool is running.
3. Type list volume and press Enter. You will see a numbered list of all partitions, their formats, their total sizes, and their remaining free space.
4. Type exit and press Enter to close the tool.

Do not type other commands into the tool unless you know what they do, because some of them can erase partitions.

If you only need size and free space for every volume, PowerShell is a simpler option that skips the diskpart tool. Right-click the Start button, open Terminal (or Windows PowerShell), and run the Get-Volume cmdlet. It prints a table of your volumes with drive letter, file system, health status, remaining space, and total size.

Finding Large Files with Disk Space Analyzers

When the built-in tools do not explain where your space went, a third-party disk analyzer such as WinDirStat or WizTree can help. These programs scan your whole file system and show your files as visual blocks, which makes huge media files and forgotten game installs stand out.

1. Download and install a reputable disk analyzer. Get it from the developer's official website to avoid bundled adware.
2. Launch the program and select your main drive to start the scan. Large drives can take a few minutes.
3. Review the color-coded map. Larger blocks stand for bigger files and folders.
4. Click an oversized block to see its exact file path.
5. Right-click the file in the analyzer to delete it, or move it to external storage if you want to keep it.

Leave anything inside the Windows or Program Files folders alone, since removing those files can break the system or your apps.

Monitoring Storage Health and SMART Status

A drive that is failing can look like a full drive, with slow saves, freezes, and errors. Windows 11 can show health information for your drive in Settings, which helps you catch signs of hardware failure before you lose data.

1. Open Settings and go to System, then Storage.
2. Click Advanced storage settings and select Disks & volumes. Your physical drives are listed here.
3. Click Properties next to your main drive to view its hardware details.
4. Check the drive health readout and make sure it reports normal operation. If you see warnings about bad sectors or impending failure, back up your important files right away.

The health readout is not available for every drive. In current Windows 11 builds it appears mainly for NVMe SSDs, and older SATA drives or some external disks may not show it.

If nothing appears, that does not mean the drive is faulty. A manufacturer tool is the next thing to try.

What to do next

If your internal drive is still full after cleanup, move large personal media libraries, such as photos, videos, and music, to an external hard drive or a cloud storage provider. Copy the files first and confirm they open from the new location before you delete the originals.

Keeping some free space on your drive helps maintain performance and prevents future slowdowns. Check the Storage page every few weeks so a filling drive does not catch you off guard.