One drive online files take space on Macbook

I Agree it seems there is no definitive solution to the problem. The best I managed was a workaround.

In my case I have a 256 GB disc in the Mac, and I purchased a 2TB external disc. 

I now have OneDrive on that external disk, and keep all files downloaded on that disk, so I am not relying on the OneDrive ‘space saving’ feature. 

I have a Mac Mini, so having a permanently attached external disk is ok for me, 

And having all files downloaded means that I have a copy of all the files locally as well as in the cloud. 

Fusers with MacBooks, I appreciate this is not viable even as a workaround.

But the first thing is to clear that space used by OneDrive so the Mac can function normally. 

From my original post....

Unlinking the account shows the 'hidden' space that OneDrive was using. Nearly 120GBs in my case.

Update:

I decided to try and clear down all of the hidden used 'update' space following unlinking the account.

I installed the MacPaw CleanMyMac X software to try and do this.

I went though all the clean up steps that that product offers, which helped me free up a lot of disk space, but it did not clear down the space left as 'other' after unlinking one drive.

So I rebooted. After reboot all this 'other' space disappeared.

It is not clear whether CleanMyMac, or the reboot, or the combination of both was needed to clear the ‘other’ space.

 CleanMyMacX, however, was very helpful analyzing disk space usage. 

Another nightly recommended utility is DaisyDisk, https://daisydiskapp.com/, which is quite a bit cheaper than CleanMyMacX

I can’t confirm if the current MacOS version helps solve the issue as I have not experimented further with OneDrive

Hi Nick

If you look at previous posts from both myself and others you will see some solutions. 

But in short. 

Unlink one drive and delete any left over files. 

I then put the one drive folder on to an external drive. 

Not ideal, but no other solution it seems until MS/Apple sort this out finally.

I have the same issue.

I have One-Drive as part of a family subscription and so have 1TB, I have been moving files from my MAC external storage to my One Drive and its filled up my Mac.

All the files seem to have gone to the OneDrive, but my mac's 1 TB is full and I am not able to do anything on the Mac as its all Full and CLEAR SPEACE has been selected multiple times, and the FileFinder is showing all the files and directory with a blue cloud icon (on the cloud) 

Can you please help - I am IT and can not see why.

On my windows machine, it works fine and shows all the files on the OneDrive( cloud) and Zero MB used on the local drive!

Thanks

NIck

Just wondering if there is any further updates on this? I have a few users that are experiencing the same issue. One of which recently upgraded to Big Sur and has made no difference.

First thanks a lot for taking the time to share your results.

You suggest that the problem could be solved by resetting the mac, I have already done that a few months ago with Catalina only for the problem to reappear even after big sur upgrade.

So please, could you try to delete some files locally and inspect if the change in size of the folder is registered and tell us the result ?

That would be very helpful because, resetting my mac a second time would be rather painful and this time I want to be sure it is helpful.

Also, if it ever caught the attention of Microsoft software engineers :

Big Sur does not fix the problem.

I have installed Big Sur, but the problem is still there, see attached image.

As you can see, I have made a local copy of one of my folder which is on the cloud, then I deleted some files locally.

After verification, the files were also deleted in the cloud, and the size of the folder on the cloud diminished, however the size of the folder remained the same locally.

I have waited 20 days, expecting that Mac Os could register the change in size but 20 days later the problem is still on.