I've been noticing that the 'System & Reserved' storage on my Dell laptop running Windows 11 has ballooned from about 120 GB to 135 GB recently. I've deleted as much as I can, including my temp files, and I've even used Disk Cleanup multiple times. I don't think uninstalled apps are the issue either. I'm curious if anyone else with Windows 11 has the same experience and how much space their 'System & Reserved' is using.
5 Answers
Honestly, if you're managing all of this and still running short on space, it might be time to look into upgrading your SSD. A 256 GB drive can fill up quickly, especially with Windows updates!
One other thing to consider is shadow copies. They can be turned on automatically with Windows updates and take up more space than you'd realize. Make sure to check if that's enabled on your machine!
It sounds like you might have a lot of restore points saved, which can eat up space. Have you checked how many you have? You can find this in the 'System Protection' settings. If there are too many, consider deleting some to free up space!
Also, Windows 11 does tend to grow in size over time with updates. For example, the April update alone took up around 5 GB. Keep that in mind if you've recently updated your system. My own 'System & Reserved' is about 108 GB, which seems pretty normal, but 135 GB is quite high.
Consider turning off hibernation as well by using PowerShell. Just type 'powercfg.exe -h off' to disable it. That might help you recover some space!
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